Bede's welcomed nearly 120 students from eleven schools, including new entrants from Croydon High School and Lancing Prep (Worthing), to compete in the Galactic Challenge 2024.

The students participating this year ranged from 10 years old up to 14, so creating balanced teams was an interesting challenge in itself. It was great that almost half of the students who took part this year were girls, since there is a perception that STEM subjects are the domain of boys.

The schools arrived shortly before 9am for a bite to eat and after presentations on the competition and a little detail on the task that they would receive, the students were split into five teams, each led by Bede's Senior School students and trooped off to their work-rooms to begin work on their designs for AXcelerate, a low-earth orbit settlement for 700 inhabitants, based in the year 2054.

The break for lunch, whilst very welcome, was viewed by many students as an interruption to their work and the queues to get back into their rooms after lunch was testament to how keen they were to continue with their designs.

Teams were required to produce a presentation with no more than 20 slides, but most produced presentations with 10-15 slides, since the 10 minute time limit on presentations was the real limiting factor.

"It always amazes me to watch students this young present their ideas to an audience of around 300 people", said Mr Richards, the organiser of the Galactic Challenge. "I love the passionate way they approach what is essentially an impossible problem, but it is when you have an 11 year-old argue their point with one of the judges in the Q&A that always makes me smile!"

Five excellent proposals were presented, but in the end the plaudits and winners medals were awarded to the team of Infinity Aerospace that had students from Bede's Prep, Croydon High School, Lancing prep (Hove), Skippers Hill and The Schools at Somerhill.