School pupils test their engineering skills in college competition

Pupils from Bryngwyn Comprehensive and Ysgol Glan y Môr formed six teams of three to assemble a small vehicle kit within a set amount of time, following specific instructions which used many of the key skills involved in working in engineering. 

The competition - called Engineering Demo Skills Champions for Carmarthenshire - also involved a driving challenge using the assembled vehicles and a modification task to improve on what had already been built to improve performance.

This event was arranged by the ISEiW (Inspiring Skills Excellence in Wales) project, which is based at Coleg Sir Gâr, funded by the Welsh Government and supports all Welsh competitors taking part in regional, national and international skills competitions through Skills Competitions Wales and WorldSkills UK. 

Adam Twells, head of engineering and computing at Coleg Sir Gâr said: “We were thrilled to work with our local partner schools and host the competition facilitated by our engineering staff. 

“We hope that more young people will think about engineering and STEM subjects as a career path and by hosting events such as this, we can offer an insight into the type of problem-solving skills needed to study and work in engineering and STEM.”