KEVICC Courier Spring

Page 25 Science Year 13 Biology students took part in a DNA PCR and gel electrophoresis workshop kindly led by two of Exeter University's leading expert lecturers. Students got a chance to use the university facilities to analyse some of their own DNA pinpointing the presence of a particular mutation. They also had the opportunity to tour the University cutting edge research laboratories and find out a little about university life and study. Every year the Royal Society of Chemistry puts on a competition for GCSE students to compete against each other. Four students from years 9-11 took part. The competition was in the main undergraduate teaching lab that has space for over 100 students to work at once. The challengewas to cook various vegetables and thenmeasure the vitamin C in each. After a bit on chopping, blending and boiling the extract was measured relative to a vitamin C tablet and the humble Brussels sprout was champion! During lunch the students had a tour of the University and visited the Students’ Guild including a peek inside a lecture theatre that can fit over 300. During the tour they got an idea of what university life is like and how hardworking every student was. They all seemed to be reading or working on their laptops! After lunch there was a chemistry quiz which included questions from the triple science GCSE course. Some of the questions were very difficult but the students performed well, finishing a very creditable fourth. Top of the Bench Year 7 Cell Models One of the first topics in Year 7 science is all about cells. Those tiny units that we are all made from…. about 30,000,000,000,000 of them in an adult human! Mr. Hartigan’s class put their creativity to the test to make a model of a cell as a homework and the results were incredible! University of Exeter