School News
Success for Year 8 Boys at the Salters' Festival of Chemistry.
News posted: 24-06-2009
On Monday 15th June 2009 two teams of Year 8 students went to the Chemistry Department at Manchester University to take part in the annual Salters’ Festival of Chemistry. Amy Thompson (8W), Eleanor Kirk (8W), Niamah Bashir (8E) and Ria Saraf(8F) represented the girls’ school and Jack Glynn (8M), Liam Curl (8R), Joe Gledhill (8R) and Robert Thackeray (8G) made up the boys’ school team.
Their first challenge involved solving a “Who Dunnit?” murder mystery. Given materials found at the scene of the crime, the teams had to work out by chemical analysis which compounds were present and hence by deduction which of the suspects was the likely murderer! The teams were awarded marks for their practical techniques, their safety awareness and their final conclusions.
19 teams form the North West were competing and for the first time ever, the school reached one of the prize positions with the boys’ team being awarded second place. (Clitheroe Grammar School came first!) The boys were all given avocado-shaped radios, whilst the school received two very useful boxes of molecular model kits. Very well done lads!
The second exercise involved altering the concentrations of two reacting solutions by the correct amount to produce a solid which would obscure a picture in exactly one minute. The girls managed to achieve this in 59 seconds but unfortunately this was not close enough to gain a prize.
There followed a demonstration of chemical reactions which made plenty of bangs and flashes – enough to scare Jack several times over!
It was a very enjoyable and productive day out and gave the students a taste of working in very impressive university laboratories. Once again, congratulations to the boys’ team on their success!
