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Year in Industry placements are neither a common target for QE leavers nor are they easy to obtain – just 750 are offered nationwide annually – yet sixth-former Deshraam Ganeshamoorthy has successfully gained one, thanks to a glittering CV and some deft interview preparation.

Deshraam, of Year 13, capitalised on his national successes with a QE robotics team over the last four years to impress bosses at the Cambridge engineering consultancy interviewing him for his placement.

Now he is looking forward to spending next year at Springboard Pro, which develops advanced medical devices, before going on to university to read Mechanical Engineering.

Head of Year 13 Helen Davies said: “Whilst a large majority of our A-level students head on to leading universities straight after school or after a conventional gap year, there are some other interesting and potentially valuable vocational routes, with the Year in Industry programme among these. Deshraam is to be congratulated on the work he did to investigate and achieve this, and we wish him every success.”

Deshraam first came across the UK’s Year in Industry scheme when he was looking through the Engineering Design Trust website to learn more about the trust’s summer courses. The scheme places around 750 young people annually in engineering, science, IT, and business, where most work full-time before going on to join degree courses.

His interest piqued, he realised that a placement would enable him to pursue the things he loves most about engineering: “The ability to take a client’s challenge, create a design brief and through iteration go from simple sketches to a final product.”

“I felt that the skills I would learn from working as an engineer would help me greatly when studying for my degree and into the future.”

After consulting QE’s Head of Technology, Michael Noonan, he decided to apply.

“The application process involved creating a CV highlighting my engineering strengths. Here I had the opportunity to briefly describe my IT skills – from using Office to [3D programs] Solidworks and Cura and programming in Python – as well as past projects such as: my GCSE automatic pill dispenser project, the robots built over four years competing in the VEX robotics competitions, and most recently my independent EPQ project exploring the use of soft robotics.” (Soft robotics is a subfield of robotics dealing with the construction of robots from compliant materials similar to those found in living organisms.)

“Over the following months, new vacancies opened up and I had the opportunity to apply to the ones that most interested me.” He was especially keen that his placement should cover Mechanical Engineering, his intended degree subject.

A few months after submitting his first application, he received an invitation to interview with the Cambridge company. “I was sent some documents regarding what the interview might entail, and prepared accordingly.”

The first half of the one-hour interview on Microsoft Teams was spent talking about a project of Deshraam’s choice. “Here I spoke about the most recent robot built by my team, HYBRID, for the VEX Robotics Competition to compete in the game Tower Takeover. During this mini-presentation, I spoke about how we initially analysed the problem, our early more adventurous explorations of design possibilities, and how I used CAD to aid us in designing, manufacturing, and improving this robot. I spoke about where our weaknesses were and how we fixed these, allowing us to succeed at the end of the season and become VEX Robotics UK National Champions, winning both the Tournament Champions and Excellence trophies.

“The second half of the interview centred around a physics problem that started by looking at the forces and energy involved in the motion of a bungee jumper, but progressed to look at the properties of different materials that could be used for the cord.

“Overall, the interview was an enjoyable experience, and whilst it was challenging at times, I felt that I had done my best to explain how I was thinking through problems before reaching an answer.”

“Having spoken to three employees at the company, researching their work further, and after also speaking to Mr Noonan and Mr Feven [Michael Feven, Assistant Head (Pupil Development)], I felt this opportunity would allow me to learn lots of new things and become a better overall engineer.”

When the offer to work for the company duly arrived a few days later, Deshraam was happy to accept. He will start work there after finishing his Mathematics, Further Mathematics, Physics and Economics A-levels this summer.

He is grateful to the staff who have helped him – “primarily Mr Noonan, for always being willing to answer my questions and give me advice both during this process and over the course of the last seven years.

“I would also like to thank my closest friends at QE for always supporting me and believing in me; I couldn’t have done this without all the great people around me.”

A seven-strong team from Harrisons’ House won a Year 9 careers competition with their carefully thought-through design for a ‘smart’ water bottle that would use UV light to kill bacteria, viruses and fungi.

Team 4’s Water UVC bottle could thus benefit many millions across the developing world without access to safe drinking water, the boys explained in their richly illustrated, 31-page PowerPoint presentation. They even included an option for the UV lamp to be solar-powered to make the bottle viable for people who could not afford mains electricity.

The aim of the activity was to encourage boys both to develop their entrepreneurial skills and to make use of Science, Mathematics and Technology as they prepare to make their subject option choices.

The teams were given a choice of four briefs to work on, with Team 4 choosing the fourth  – “design and make a ‘smart’ water bottle that has at least one other function”.

Making the announcement that Team 4 had won, Assistant Head (Pupil Progress) Sarah Westcott said: “During last term’s lockdown, our usual face-to-face careers activities for Year 9 in this important period of their School careers had to be reimagined. We amended our plans so that boys could work from home, while still developing important work-related skills such as creativity, teamwork, independence and the ability to communicate their ideas.”

Dr Westcott judged the entries together with Head of Year 9 Sean Kelly, who is a Technology teacher.

“Both Mr Kelly and I loved the creativity and simplicity behind the winning design: all members of the team worked equally to realise the design brief and develop the marketing materials – which included a website!”

The boys’ PowerPoint presentation featured hand-drawn illustrations, as well as photography and computer graphics.

After an introduction, the presentation set out the whole process of turning the stainless steel bottle into a mass-produced product, with major sections entitled Design and Creativity, Manufacturing, Marketing and Pecuniary Matters (finance).

• Team 4 comprised: Shivam Vyas; Rohan Varia; Jenarth Thavapalan; Manthan Thakkar; Shrey Tater; Abyan Shah and Shreyaas Sandeep.

After a busy spring of online competitions, the Summer Term opens with all four QE teams now qualified for this year’s VEX EDR Robotics World Championship.

Hyperdrive and Override first reached the virtual international finals next month and then Tempest and Hybrid safely made it through, too, reports QE’s Head of Technology Michael Noonan.

Their achievement capped a term that saw the School host two successful international remote robotics events.

Head of Technology Michael Noonan said: “Both events saw the QE teams demonstrating great problem-solving, teamwork and communication skills as they made lots of last-minute adjustments online in order to optimise their robots or deal with technical faults.

“Boys are very happy that they can physically work on their robots now we are back in School. Everyone is looking forward to the world championship, and, with restrictions now beginning to ease, we are all hoping for more events before the end of the year, too.”

Teams from Canada, Taiwan, the US and UK, including one from QE, took part in the first QE-hosted event, which was held during lockdown.

The second QE event was a bigger remote skills tournament close to the end of the Spring Term. Twelve places were available, three-quarters of which were reserved for UK teams. Hyperdrive, competing in their first event, represented QE, together with Override and Tempest. Hybrid were unavailable. The QE teams took on five UK and three US teams close to the end of the Spring Term.

Each robot first had to pass an inspection before taking the field. Conducted over Zoom, the competition involved each team having 30 minutes to try to complete three ‘driver’ runs (where the robot is controlled by a driver using a remote control) and three ‘programming’ runs (where the robot moves around the field based on pre-programming – so once it starts there is nothing more you can do).

When competing on their own in such events (as opposed to directly against another team on the field of play, as would happen in an ‘in-person’ competition), the aim is to amass the highest score by picking up red balls and tipping them into the goals, while also ‘de-scoring’ as many blue balls as possible, dislodging these from the bottom of the goal stacks.

The winners were one of the two teams competing from Galion High School from the small city of Galion in the state of Ohio; they scored 110 points in the driving section and 45 points in the autonomous control section. The remaining US team were an independent team from Newnan, Georgia, who were placed second in the competition, with a score of 114 for driving and 28 for autonomous control (and were competing from a garage at 6.30am local time!).

The highest-placed UK team went to an independent team, which included one QE pupil, Year 11’s Yash Shah.

QE’s Tempest team came fourth with their highest score to date – a “highly respectable 122 points in total; 95 in driver and 27 in programming”, said Mr Noonan.

The event was administered by Mr Noonan, with Technology teachers Stephanie Tomlinson and Shane Maheady, and Technology assistant Jemima Snelson, handling the refereeing and scorekeeping.

Competition continued even on the very last day of term, when all the QE teams competed in a UK live remote skills event hosted by the Vex Robotics Training Academy in Warrington. Tempest and Override came third and fourth, with total scores of 132 and 113 respectively.

With this weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix due to launch the new Formula 1 season, members of QE’s pupil-run Year 12 Engineering Society have been making front-page news with their own exploration of the hi-tech sport.

The Sixth Form engineers looked into how CFD (computational fluid dynamics) can be used to create a virtual wind tunnel for an F1 car design. And an article about their work penned by the society’s leaders, Nirmay Jadhav and Ansh Jaiswal, features prominently in the current edition of Futureminds, the magazine produced by CLEAPPS*, a national science and technology education advisory service. In the article, Nirmay and Ansh explain why they established the society, the activities they have already held and what they aim to do in the future.

Headmaster Neil Enright said: “I congratulate Nirmay and Ansh. This is a good example of the student-led clubs and societies that are such a feature of life at QE. We find them an excellent way for boys to display initiative and develop skills such as teamwork, while providing enrichment for themselves and for their peers.”

The pair’s achievement was also praised by Head of Technology Michael Noonan: “It has been encouraging to see how they have applied their knowledge to solving real-world problems using new and emerging technologies.”

In the article, Ansh and Nirmay state that they launched the society with a threefold aim:

• To educate members about the different engineering disciplines
• To help those interested in applying for engineering courses at university
• To pursue their own engineering interests and help others to do so, too.

One key meeting of the society looked at mechanical engineering, with members discussing why it is among the most popular fields in engineering. “To build upon this overview, we hope to incorporate some practical mechanical engineering with small challenges that can be worked upon weekly as a taster for the career of a mechanical engineer,” said Ansh.

In other sessions, members worked together to solve questions from Cambridge University’s Engineering Admissions Assessments (ENGAA). “This helped us get to grips with the principles and gave us all some preparation in advance,” Nirmay said.

But the undoubted highlights so far have been Computer-Aided Design (CAD) sessions, he said. “We went through the basics of how to design and develop models in 3D workspaces with Solidworks (our software of choice).” In the second week of these sessions, the society members focused on the simulations that can be carried out using Solidworks, including both the CFD simulation used to create the virtual wind tunnel and also FEA (Finite Element Analysis), which can be used to collect data about the performance of a 3D model. To explore FEA, the boys tested a load on a prism.

Ansh and Nirmay have plans to run further extra-curricular activities or competitions involving “the practical, hands-on aspects of engineering that we all enjoy”, while also boosting their skills and their appeal to employers and universities.

Besides Ansh and Nirmay, the society’s members are: Amudhu Anandarajah, Varun Vijay Kumar, Aiden Smith, Medushan Thevadaran and Alex Woodcock.

* CLEAPSS (Consortium of Local Education Authorities for the Provision of Science Services) is an advisory service providing support in science and technology to local councils and schools.

Year 8 pupil Keon Robert has won an international 3D design challenge with his idea for a solar-powered bulldozer with special caterpillar tracks based on those used on Moon rovers.

Judges in the Polar Cloud CAT Inc. Design Challenge congratulated him for combining creativity with practicality in his design, and he also won appreciation from other users of American manufacturer Polar 3D’s Polar Cloud online 3D design platform.

To maximise his chances in the competition, which was sponsored by heavy plant manufacturer Caterpillar, Keon even produced an alternative design for the other type of caterpillar – the larval-stage insect – in its natural setting, as well as later producing a design based on snowflakes.

Keon’s victory in the heavy machinery category of the competition won a Polar Cloud-enabled Polar 3D printer and $100 for Queen Elizabeth’s School.

QE Head of Technology Michael Noonan said: “Keon’s achievement is a truly remarkable one. He promoted and shared his idea widely, and his was an outstanding example of design and creativity. He received plaudits from Polar 3D’s CEO, Gregory Lalonde, and many others within the Polar Cloud platform, one which has over half a million members.”

Keon explained his thinking and the process by which he arrived at the bulldozer design.

“I decided to reimagine and reengineer your typical bulldozer by adding features which allow for greater accessibility to remote areas, as well as providing a greener alternative to the standard vehicles.

“Firstly, at the back, there is a retractable claw which is able to lift five tonnes. This was created as a feature to utilise when carrying more rubble or dirt. The treads for the vehicle are intended to be made out of wire mesh and rubber to ensure balance and protection, which is a necessity for users who require some means of transportation in more secluded regions.”

This combination of materials was, in fact, used by the vehicles taken on the Moon landing missions, and is, therefore, ideally suited to rocky environments, Keon explained in his design notes.

“Furthermore, photovoltaic cells were added in order to absorb the sun’s solar energy. This would then be converted to electrical energy to power the vehicle via a generator in the engine compartment. The engine compartment also includes lithium-ion batteries, as another energy source in the event of a breakdown.

“Finally, like any other bulldozer, there is another digger at the front, which can carry lift around 35 tonnes.”

Judges stipulated that entries should not only fulfil criteria such as printability, design execution and creativity, but also prioritised those, such as Keon’s, which garnered higher numbers of ‘likes’ on the online platform.

Keon entered the competition as a way of improving his CAD (Computer-Aided Design) skills and of engaging in the Polar Cloud platform – “essentially a workplace for engineers and designers to post and share their work…a STEM-oriented ‘Facebook’.

“I was frankly stunned when I found out I won the competition: the effort I had given it was extraordinary, so I felt it was definitely worth my time,” said Keon.

He added that he had surprised himself with the level of dedication he had brought to the competition, but feels that this will benefit him in the future, not least in terms of his schoolwork.

Experts have been helping QE A-level students see the exciting topical applications of their subjects in the real world in a series of lectures streamed into the School.

Sixth-formers have already enjoyed stimulating day-long sessions on Medicine in Action, Chemistry in Action, Product Design in Action and Geography in Action, with a similar event for Biology due to take place in December.

The training days are run by The Training Partnership, the leading provider of external educational study days in the UK, and would normally be held in London, but are this year being conducted remotely because of Covid-19.

QE’s Head of Technology, Michael Noonan, said that the Product Design A-level students, and even a couple of “enthusiastic non-subject specialists”, enjoyed a “superb day” of lectures. “Favourite amongst the talks attended by students was Pioneering aeronautical innovation by Sam Rogers – an aeronautical engineer working in product development for Gravity Industries, a company who are currently developing a jetpack suit.”

One of the pupils attending, Paul Ofordu, of Year 12, said: “It was amazing to see the application of prototyping, testing and iterative design in such a high-end product development project.”

The Resourcefulness and design lecture, delivered by Kingston University Senior Lecturer Pascal Anson, stimulated a practical activity, pictured. “Here we see some examples of structures which were resourcefully developed by the students using VEX IQ and EDR Robotics game elements – great thinking on their feet!” added Mr Noonan.

Chemistry students gathered in the Main School Hall to hear engaging contributions from speakers who ranged from Andrea Sella, a synthetic chemist and broadcaster, talking about mercury – “the most beautiful element in the periodic table and the most reviled” – to marine engineer Hayley Loren exploring whether nuclear fusion could provide the solution to the world’s energy issues.

Julia Lister, QE’s Head of Chemistry, said: “The engaging Chemistry in Action lectures covered an array of topics. Streaming these lectures took students from key concepts to cutting-edge science and future directions across many applications of the subject.”

The Geography lectures were similarly wide-ranging. One talk, entitled Lessons in sustainability: An explorer’s tale, was by Jason Lewis, the first person to circumnavigate the earth without using motors or sails. Another featured academic Martin Evans, from the University of Manchester, speaking on Landscape Systems in the Anthropocene. And Emily Parry, Head of Geography, highlighted lectures on water insecurity and on how COVID-19 has impacted the Pacific Islands.

“The boys enjoyed the talks, which both built up content covered in their A-level course and extended their knowledge on a range of issues facing the planet,” she said.

“Each lecture was followed with a Q&A session in which the boys could send in questions to the lecturer. Often questions focused around what young people themselves could do to help address some of the issues explored such as climate change, river pollution and how we choose a sustainable future.”

Head of Biology Gillian Ridge said that after the forthcoming Biology in Action day, boys who attend will be invited to give a series of lunchtime presentations to the rest of their year based on the talks.