‘Alex Sutton Prize’ Awarded for Year 10 Chemistry Challenge

Almost 30 students in Year 10 took on the newly created Year 10 Chemistry Challenge at the end of January this year.

The contest saw 12 teams of enthusiastic students taken on a real-world laboratory situation, identifying five clear, colourless solutions which had lost their labels, with only minimal equipment. All of the teams successfully managed to identify the solutions in times ranging from 27 minutes and 13 seconds to as little as 5 minutes and 43 seconds.

Gordon Prescott, Head of Chemistry, said: “The challenge had a high degree of difficulty. In addition to knowledge of acid-base chemistry, the students had to work together to produce an organised procedure which avoided duplicating tasks. They also had to be prepared to adjust their plan in real-time to adapt to the information their results revealed and to any difficulties they encountered.”

After completing the task, the teams of two were judged on time, their reporting, health and safety, teamwork and organisation, plus a set of 23 unusual questions designed to test their creative thinking.

Third place went to Isabella H and Adam M, second place to Thomas B and Zyana C, and in first place we had Raphael S and Wenhao Y.

The winning team are the first holders of the Alex Sutton Prize, created in memory of a long-serving and distinguished previous Head of Hymers Chemistry. Joining in 1962, Alex Sutton taught at Hymers for a total of 40 years, with 34 of those years as Head of Department.

Victoria Bastiman, our Alumni Engagement Officer and Old Hymerian (1989-96), has fond memories of being taught by Mr Sutton herself. “Mr Sutton was an amazing chemistry teacher, who helped me to understand and enjoy the subject. It was through his enthusiasm and support that I decided to continue studying Chemistry for A Levels and after leaving Hymers, I continued to keep in touch with him, swapping Christmas cards up until he passed away in 2021.”

Not content with just excelling in Chemistry, Alex Sutton also contributed to many other areas of school life such as Sport teams and Drama productions. You can find out more about Alex Sutton here.

Thanks go to Ms Johnson, our Chemistry Technician, for all of her work in preparing materials for the practical exercise, and also to Dr Martin, who assisted with the supervision of students and judging.