Chemistry Challenge 2021 results announced

The results of the RSC Belgium Chemistry Challenge 2021 were announced at our webinar event with John O'Donoghue on 'Chemistry in the Movies' on the evening of 23 September 2021. As for last year, due to COVID19 rules, this year's Chemistry Challenge was also a virtual event that was undertaken remotely by students at their schools.

For the 2021 Challenge, we received entries from the majority of our group of international and European schools in the Brussels area and beyond and, as ever, the Challenge was designed to test the student's chemical knowledge and initiative.

The RSC Belgium Chemical Challenge has three sections:

• A chemistry multiple choice paper (Section A)
• A structured questions on chemistry (Section B), and
• A 'Thinking Matters' paper that is not chemistry based (Section C)

The top results were as follows:

Section A - Multiple choice

First prize for this section was shared by Marcus Waterson from the European School in Mol (ESMol) and Ito Yurie from the British School of Brussels in Tervuren (BSB) who each receive a €50 award. 

There were three winners of €25 second prizes: Matilde Malagodi of St John’s International School in Waterloo (St John's), and Julie Petermans and Hannah Haris of BSB.

Third prizes of €10 went to Vladislav Morozov and Mels Leurs of BSB and Maria Shopova from European School Brussels IV in Laeken (EEB4).

Section B - Structured questions

In this section the first prize of €50 was awarded to Vladislav Morozov of BSB with Marcus Waterson of ESMol and Ito Yurie of BSB picking up second prizes worth €25. A third prize of €10 was awarded to Sungbin Yun from BSB.

Section C - Thinking Matters

For this section the top prize of €50 went to Lilia Kautz of EEB4, with BSB's Rosanne Roberts picking up a second prize of €25, and three third places worth €10 awarded to Antoni Tokaj of St. George’s International School in Luxembourg (St George's), Maria Shopova from EEB4 and Ito Yurie of BSB.

The Keith Price Prize

With excellent performances in both chemistry sections, this year's Keith Price Prize was jointly claimed by Marcus Waterson of ESMol (pictured below) and Ito Yurie of BSB (pictured above), who both received an additional €100. 

Well done to everyone who took part in this year's Chemistry Challenge! Every student that entered the competition receives a certificate of participation. And, of course, we will be running the Challenge again in 2022 and look forward to further widening participation!

St George's retain RSC Belgium TOTB trophy

Despite the challenges and restrictions due to COVID, RSC Belgium successfully organised and ran its annual 'international eliminator' for the Royal Society of Chemistry's Top of the Bench (TOTB) competition in 2020 - and the results are now in. This year, the competition was run remotely during late November and early December with the results evaluated over the Christmas holiday period. The winning team, who will now represent Belgium in the TOTB grand final in March, is Team Phosphorus from St. Georges International School in Luxembourg. The school therefore retains the Keith Price Cup as their Team Sulfur was Belgium's TOTB winners in 2019.

Our 2020 TOTB eliminator retained the usual elements of the competition: a written test component for individual team members and a practical group exercise. Also as usual the questions were set by RSC committee member Rita Woodward.

TOTB teams need to be composed of four students with two students from Year 9 (UK equivalent to 3rd year or Grade 8), one student from Year 10 UK (4th year or Grade 9) and one student from Year 11 (5th year or Grade 10). With COVID restrictions/ bubbles this added an extra complication to the event.

The competition itself was managed remotely by the participating schools and consisted of a Multiple-Choice ‘Written’ Section, with questions and marking schemes tailored to the three age groups that was delivered in an appropriate 'timed' manner at the schools and a practical element with input from all four team members. The practical task for 2020 was to construct a calibration graph and use it to determine the percentage of baking soda (bicarbonate of soda) present in a commercially produced baking powder. Practical kits were sent to participating schools.

Challenging event

In the end four teams from two schools were able to complete and return a full set of results for evaluation. The participating teams were teams Barium and Nitrogen from the International School of Flanders (ISF) in Waterloo and teams Magnesium and Phosphorus from St. George's International School in Luxembourg.

The competition was close but the overall winner - ranked first in the practical test and second in the written test - was the Phosphorus team from Luxembourg.

Our congratulations to Team Phosphorus and our thanks to everyone who took part in the TOTB eliminator this year. RSC goodies are on the way to participants at ISF and St. George's. Thanks to St. George's for providing photos from their eliminator.

Chemistry Challenge 2020 results announced

The results of the RSC Belgium Chemistry Challenge 2020 were announced at our first webinar event on the evening of 24 September 2020. Due to the COVID19 restriction, this year's Chemistry Challenge was also a virtual event that was undertaken remotely by students.

For the 2020 Challenge, we received some 50 entries from six international and European schools in the Brussels area and beyond for this testing challenge of young people's chemical knowledge and initiative. This year the more chemistry orientated questions in Section A and B were a little more accessible, which resulted in more prize winners than for previous years. A selection of our participants are pictured below!

And the 2020 winner of the Keith Price Prize for best overall performance in terms of chemical knowledge came from a school that has not won previously.

The RSC Belgium Chemical Challenge has three sections:

• A chemistry multiple choice paper (Section A)
• A structured questions on chemistry (Section B), and
• A 'Thinking Matters' paper that is not chemistry based (Section C)

The top results were as follows:

Section A - Multiple choice

First prize for this section was shared by Maria Stanescu and Mia Williams from European School Brussels IV in Laeken (EEB4) and Riana Sadretdinova of St John’s International School in Waterloo (St John's) who each received a €50 award. There were seven winners of €25 second prizes: Ashling Neill from EEB4, Yosra Al Hayani of the ISF International School in Waterloo (ISF), Louis Baranger and Matteo Pourbaix, who both study at St John’s, Nefeli Giannaloo from the European School at Mol (ES Mol), and Sofia Mori and Martin Prucha both from the British School of Brussels in Tervuren (BSB). Third prizes of €10 went to Alia Meek of St. George’s International School in Luxembourg (St George's), Nicholas Smits and Issie Bentley from BSB, and Tyler McGee and William Dobney both at ES Mol.

Section B - Structured questions

In this section the first prize of €50 was awarded to Yosra Al Hayani from ISF with Martin Prucha of BSB picking up the second prize worth €25. Three third prizes of €10 were awarded to Nicholas Smits of BSB, Alia Meek from St George’s and Louis Baranger of St.John’s.

Section C - Thinking Matters

For this section the top prize of €50 went to Matteo Pourbaix of St John’s, with ESMol's Tyler McGee picking up a second prize of €25, and two third places worth €10 awarded to Alia Meek of St George’s and Nefeli Giannaloo ES Mol.

The Keith Price Award

With an excellent performance in both chemistry sections, Yosra Al Hayani from ISF, pictured below, also received the prestigious Keith Price Prize for the best best overall score worth an additional €100. This is the first time that a student from ISF has won our Chemistry Challenge.

Well done to everyone who took part in this year's Chemistry Challenge! Every student that entered the competition receives a certificate of participation. We will be running the Challenge again in 2021 and look forward to widening participation!

RSC Belgium Top of the Bench 2019

Our annual 'international eliminator' for the Royal Society of Chemistry's Top of the Bench (TOTB) competition was held at the British School of Brussels (BSB) on Saturday 23 November 2019 with teams from Belgium and Luxembourg taking part. In total 12 teams from 6 schools participated. An exciting afternoon of chemical problem solving ended with the announcement of the 2019 winner of the Keith Price Cup: Team Sulfur from St George's School in Luxembourg. They will now represent RSC Belgium at the TOTB grand final in the UK in 2020.

The teams completed individual written question papers and then enjoyed a challenging team Practical Problem Solving Exercise. As usual both the 'hands-on' practical and the paper-based component were developed by our resident competition guru, Rita Woodward. The competition was designed to really test the teams’ chemistry knowledge and problem-solving abilities and encourage young talented chemical scientists to consider further education and careers in Chemistry.

The individual scores from the written paper were added together for each team with the placings from the practical session to give an overall score.

Members of the winning Sulfur team (pictured above) received our TOTB Keith Price Cup as well as some RSC goodies. All the student participants will receive a certificate.

Conkering foams

The practical component of the challenge was based around making and measuring 'foam'. Saponins are natural detergents found in many plants including the seeds of the horse chestnut tree - traditionally called ‘conkers’. Saponins contain both water soluble and fat soluble components and as a consequence form stable foams. 

The teams were asked to prepare a detergent extract from saponin present in conkers and then, in the shortest time produce a declared volume of chemical foam from a mixture of the liquid detergent, sodium hydrogen carbonate and lemon juice.

The judges were particularly impressed by the approach to and quality of the practical work this year and once again the outcome for the practical was very close with hardly anything between the teams. However, when taken with the performance on the written papers the Team Sulfur from St George’s International School was the clear winner.

Commenting on the practical competition, Rita Woodward said: "Overall I was impressed. It was very pleasing to see how well the teams worked together to make good use of the equipment and the time allowed."

Thank you

Our huge thanks to everyone involved in the 2019 TOTB challenge including our judges, staff at BSB and to all the teachers and other volunteers involved in preparing and organising the event.

The full list of participating teams for our 2019 competition was:

Magnesium - European School Brussels 4 (Laeken)

Silicon - European School Brussels 4 (Laeken)

Fluorine - European School Brussels 2 (Woluwe)

Chromium - European School Brussels 2 (Woluwe)

Lithium - International School of Flanders (Rhode St Genese)

Oxygen -  International School of Flanders (Rhode St Genese)

Nitrogen - British School of Brussels (Tervuren)

Calcium - British School of Brussels (Tervuren)

Bromine - European School Brussels 3 (Ixelles)

Copper - European School Brussels 3 (Ixelles)

Sulfur - St Georges International School (Luxembourg)

Vanadium - St Georges International School (Luxembourg)

The TOTB Finals will take place at the University of East London campus on Saturday 21 March 2020 and RSC Belgium will sponsor the travel arrangements for our winning team. The RSC Belgium team is usually the only competing school team not based in the British Isles.

Our next TOTB Eliminator Round will take place in Autumn 2020. Get your school involved!

St. George's retain the Keith Price Cup

The results of the RSC Belgium Top of the Bench (ToTB) eliminator for 2016 have been confirmed and the winners announced. And the winner of the Keith Price Cup (pictured right) for 2016 - and the Belgian representative in the TOTB grand final in the UK in 2017 - will be team Vanadium from St. George's International School in Luxembourg! St. George’s made a winning debut in the competition last year and now retain the cup for 2017. 

We were unable to hold our usual practical Saturday event in 2015, due to the Brussels security lock down, so it was a great relief to get back to normal on 3 December and welcome 11 eager teams from six schools to the chemistry labs at the British School of Brussels (BSB) for our ToTB ‘international’ eliminator.

The teams completed individual written question papers and then enjoyed a challenging team Practical Problem Solving Exercise. As usual both the 'hands-on' practical and the paper-based component were developed by our resident competition guru, Rita Woodward. The competition was designed to really test the teams’ chemistry knowledge and problem-solving abilities and (hopefully) encourage young talented chemical scientists to consider further education and careers in Chemistry.

Winners
The individual scores from the written paper were added together for each team with the placings from the practical to give an overall score. And for the second year in a row a team from St. George’s won out- the Vanadium team. Members of the winning team (pictured below) each received a RSC heat sensitive mug and the school will hold the TOTB Keith Price Cup during 2017.

Two teams were joint runners up: the Scandium team from BSB and a second team (Gallium) from St. George’s with members receiving a RSC phone battery charger. Every student that took part in the competition received a certificate.

 The two teams from St George's are pictured above with the Keith Price Cup, their prizes and certificates. 

Full results

As ever, the RSC Belgium ToTB eliminator was a close-fought competition with a total of 11 teams from six schools taking part.

The full line up of participating teams for the 2015 competition is listed below:

• Actinium – European School Brussels 4 (Laeken)
• Copper – International School of Flanders (Rhode St Genese)
• Francium – British School of Brussels (Tervuren)
• Gallium – St. George’s International School (Luxembourg)
• Radium – European School Brussels 2 (Woluwe)
• Scandium – British School of Brussels (Tervuren)
• Titanium – European School Brussels 3 (Ixelles)
• Uranium – International School of Flanders (Rhode St Genese)
• Vanadium - St. George’s International School (Luxembourg)
• Xenon - European School Brussels 4 (Laeken)
• Zinc – European School Brussels 2 (Woluwe)

The TOTB Finals will take place in Loughborough in the UK during Spring 2017 and RSC sponsors the travel arrangements for our winning team. The RSC Belgium team is usually the only competing school team not based in the British Isles. 

St. George's Hydrogen team had a great time at the 2016 finals so we wish good luck to the Vanadium team from St. George’s in 2017! Our next TOTB Eliminator Round will take place in Q4 2017.

St George's and the TOTB Dragon 2016

In November, St George’s School in Luxembourg City entered two teams into the RSC Belgium annual ‘Top of the Bench’ (TOTB) competition. This prestigious event is open to all schools in Belgium and Luxembourg region. 

The RSC Belgium ‘eliminator’ took place in unusual circumstances as the planned event in Brussels had to be cancelled at the very last minute (St. Georges were already on the bus from Luxembourg) due to a terrorist threat and the subsequent ‘security lock down’ of Brussels.

So instead of the 'face-to-face' event, each team was sent tests to complete and return to the section for marking. Team Hydrogen from St George's did really well and won the RSC Belgium regional heat! And as a result of this victory they received the Keith Price Cup and entry into the final of the TOTB competition representing RSC Belgium. The following is a short description of their experience at the RSC's main competition in the UK.

TOTB
The TOTB final was held at Loughborough University, in the UK on Saturday 16 April. It was jointly hosted by the Royal Society of Chemistry and Loughborough University’s Chemistry department. In total 32 teams participated in the event, all of which had made it through their regional eliminator rounds to earn the right to compete against the best schools in the UK (and St George’s).

It was a great event, starting with an individual round – which was essentially a chemistry exam, followed by the main event which was a team round involving a series of very complicated chemistry investigations regarding batteries and energy (see above). To round off the day, students were invited to view interactive presentations from some of Loughborough University’s post-graduate chemistry students on the various research projects that they were working on. All the competing teams were used as a voting panel and asked to decide where they would like to see further funding utilised.

Despite the St. George's team not making it into the top six ranked places, this competition was an excellent opportunity for the students to challenge themselves and see the various avenues of research that university students are taking after studying chemistry.

This event certainly stretched their ability and provided a great insight into teamwork and working under pressure. Overall it was an enjoyable experience for all members involved, including the staff!

The St. George's team (pictured above) consisted of the following students: Ethan – Year 11 (Team Captain); Yi hua – Year 10; Alistair – Year 9; and Alexios – Year 9. The team were accompanied to Loughborough by their teachers Mr Stenton and Mrs Winter. Well done St. George's!

The Road to Loughborough – The Belgian Top of the Bench Experience 2015

Every year RSC Belgium runs an eliminator competition for schools in Belgium to choose a team to participate in the RSC’s Top of the Bench competition in the UK. The eliminator is usually held in November in Belgium to select a team to compete in the TOTB final held in the UK in the following spring.

In 2014 the winning Belgium team was Team Boron (pictured below) from the European School Brussels IV at Laeken in Brussels. This was the first time that the recently opened school had competed in the RSC Belgium competition. This following essay was written by team member Carlo Stella and recounts his experiences of the competition in Belgium and at the final in the UK in April 2015.

The RSC Belgium team selected to participate in the 2016 final is St Georges School from Luxembourg.

RSC Belgium TOTB
The RSC Belgium section was established in the mid 1980’s and has over 100 members. The section organises lectures and visits every year with the majority of activities, including extremely popular annual demonstration lectures, held in or around the Brussels area. However, group expeditions, both professional and social, are also organised throughout Belgium and beyond!

The section is growing its links with schools, both in the Anglophone educational community and the wider Belgian and European language communities, through poster and essay competitions and other outreach activities. And the section runs a national elimination round to select a team from Belgium to attend the annual RSC Top of the Bench (TOTB) in the UK.

Schools were invited to select up to two teams of four students per school to compete to represent RSC Belgium in the Top of the Bench National Final to be held at Loughborough University in the UK on 25 April 2015.

The Eliminator Competition included individual tests of factual chemical knowledge and data interpretation with a team-based practical problem solving activity.

In the UK Final, prizes are given for the best overall school performance and runner up teams. The Jacqui Clee Award is given for an outstanding individual contribution to the day. Travel and accommodation expenses are covered by RSC UK for the selected team and one accompanying teacher.

Team selection
Before forming a group there was an internal elimination round to make up the two groups which will participate in the RSC Belgium eliminator that was held at the British School of Brussels. We started planning in November when our Chemistry teacher announced the possibility to join a team for a Chemistry competition.

TOTB teams are composed as follows: one year S5, one S4 and two S3 students. Only two teams from the European School Brussels IV at Laeken (EEB4) could enter.

There were about 10 candidates in S4 EN. We had to pass a preliminary test as only two S4 students could participate. I was very surprised when they told me I’d made it through. Two teams were formed: Team Boron (Samuil Iskarov S3, Kristian Iliev S3, Carlo Stella S4, Deyan Pehlivanov S5) and Team Argon (Leo Tyrpac S3, Daniel Spasic S3, Victor Elgersma S4, Timothy Rhein S5).

Belgian competition
To qualify to participate in the TOTB final in the UK, we had to compete against other schools from Belgium and Luxembourg. The competition took place in the British School of Brussels. There were a total of 15 teams from all over Belgium and Luxembourg. We had to complete a written test and then perform a practical experiment.

At the end of the day it was announced that team Boron was the first place winner! At first I couldn’t remember who team Boron was. Then they called our names and we received a cup. The other EEB4 team (Argon) was in third place. It was the first time EEB4 had entered the competition and both of our teams had done really well! We were all very happy.

Loughborough final
It was announced that the winning team had to go to Loughborough University to compete in the final. There would be 32 teams participating!

We departed on Friday 24 April on the Eurostar with our team and our exceptional Chemistry teacher Mrs. Mary Jaeger. Then we took an East Midlands Train Service to Loughborough town. The journey was quite long but we finally made it there.

The University campus was gigantic covering almost half of the town. On Saturday morning we got a briefing about the events. The topic of the tests was ‘Chemistry in Food- Organic Chemistry’. We passed a 30 minute individual test in a big university lecture hall. The test was extremely hard and contained topics which were studied in first or second year university courses. I saw many people leaving blank questions.

The second part of the test consisted of a group laboratory experiment. They made us visit the University labs, which were fabulously equipped. The material was set already for each team. The countdown started. Now, this experiment was really impossible. We had with us a 20 page booklet featuring the ‘Procedures’ and some apparatus on the table. However, in the pages they gave us, they told us what to do but not how to do it so we had to figure out how to perform the tasks.

Team work
There was a lot of team work required as it was a very difficult task and on top of that there were judges (senior chemistry teachers) walking around observing every action we made. We distributed out the roles. We were confronted with tasks and problems and we had no idea how to handle them. After a few tries we got the first part right, but then we still had to do the second part of the booklet. We got mostly through the second part but suddenly we were out of time. I am not supposed to tell you what questions they asked us, but I can tell you it was far too hard!  The experiment involved specialised university machines with light spectrum frequencies analysers… I guess the whole point of the competition was testing our ability to react towards unknown content.

I know we have done our best and I am confident that we will be in the first half of the teams. Unfortunately, we know we are not in the top six but we don’t know yet what rating we obtained. Due to the difficulty of the task I would be very content rating in the middle.

After missing the East Midlands train due to a slow taxi driver we finally managed to return back to Brussels a few hours later. We had a very brief stop in the Science Museum in London. I went straight up to the last floor to see the aviation part of the museum (the best part). Then we took the Eurostar back.

I encourage everyone to take part in the RSC competitions because you will never forget nor regret it! It has definitely been the BEST trip I’ve ever had! Special thanks to Mrs. Jaeger for promoting Chemistry throughout the Secondary students and of course for engaging us in competitions!

Luxembourg to represent Belgium in Top of the Bench!

The results of the RSC Belgium Top of the Bench (ToTB) eliminator for 2015 have been announced. And the holder of the Keith Price Cup (pictured right) for 2016 - and the Belgian representative in the TOTB grand final in the UK - will be team Hydrogen from St. George's International School in Luxembourg!

This year we were unable to hold our usual practical Saturday event - scheduled for 21 November - due to the Brussels security lock down that came into force on the morning of our event. Fortunately we were able to inform all our competing teams before any of them started to travel to the British School.

Unfortunately it was not possible to find a Saturday afternoon slot to re-schedule the TOTB Eliminator Round before the RSC HQ deadline date for submission of team details of 31 January 2016. So a modified form of the Eliminator was held at each competing school.

This consisted of a written question paper and a challenging Practical Problem Solving Exercise. Although the competition this year did not involve any 'hands-on' practical work the format developed by our resident competition guru, Rita Woodward, gave the students more than just a standard paper and pencil test of their chemical know-how. Students from the Oxygen team at the SHAPE International School are pictured above taking part in the competition at their school.

Winners
Members of Hydrogen, the winning team from St George’s Luxembourg, each received a RSC heat sensitive mug and the school will hold the TOTB Keith Price Cup during 2016.

St. George's School Principal, Dr Christian Barkei, was really pleased with the team's success and the win has been reported in some Luxembourg newspapers: 'Young chemists set eyes on prize in UK contest'  (Wort.lu) and 'St George’s Hydrogen Team Wins Royal Society of Chemistry Regional Event in Belgium' (Chronicle.lu).

The Runner–Up team was team Calcium from the European School Brussels 4 in Laeken (EEB4) and Calcium team members each received a RSC phone battery charger as did those students who scored the top mark in the written paper for each of the three year groups that form the TOTB teams. Every student that took part in the competition received a certificate.

The winning Team Hydrogen from St George's are pictured above with the Keith Price Cup and their certificates. Pictured from left to right are team members Alexios Valsamidis, Alistair Reid, Yi-hua Lim and Ethan Utting.  Mark Stenton, Head of Science at St. George's said all the team were very pleased with the trophy, their certificates and their additional gifts!

Full results

Despite our troubles and tribulations the eliminator was, as ever, a close-fought competition with a total of nine from six schools taking part.

The full line up of participating teams for the 2015 competition is listed below:

• Calcium – European School Brussels 4 (Laeken)
• Krypton – European School Brussels 4 (Laeken)
• Cobalt - European School Brussels 2 (Woluwe)
• Copper - European School Brussels 2 (Woluwe)
• Barium – International School of Flanders
• Chlorine – International School of Flanders (Team members pictured above with ISF's resident skeleton called Eric!)
• Beryllium – British School of Brussels
• Oxygen – SHAPE International School
• Hydrogen – St. George's International School, Luxembourg

The TOTB Finals take place in Loughborough in the UK on 16 April 2016 and RSC sponsors the travel arrangements for our winning team. The RSC Belgium team is the only competing school team not based in the British Isles.

  

Our next TOTB Eliminator Round will, hopefully, take place in November 2016.