A TEAM of children from a Fermanagh school were among the teams drawn to Belfast from across Northern Ireland recently to compete in the inaugural FIRST LEGO League Challenge UK and Ireland regional tournament.

Local school, Erne Integrated College (EIC), was amongst the many participating schools at the event held at W5, the award-winning Science and Discovery Centre in Belfast.

Those attending from EIC were among the many children aged 9-16 competing in the regional FIRST LEGO League Challenge, part of a global science and technology challenge, with up to 24 student teams from Northern Ireland taking part annually.

Under the theme of ‘Cargo Connect’, designed to inspire curiosity around architecture and STEM subjects, the event at W5 saw students presenting the fruits of their labours and studies, with the teams of ten researching the topic area, completing a project, and preparing a short presentation.

The teams also designed and programmed a LEGO Mindstorms robot to complete a series of related specific tasks; with points given for each task the robot completed in just 2.5 minutes.

Ultimately, Wallace High School emerged as the overall champions, and will go on to compete at the International Open Tournament in Brazil, held in August, but EIC’s project and work was widely praised.

While EIC didn’t win on the day, the school still came home with an award – team mentor and Classroom Assistant Eileen Boyle, who supported the EIC team, scooped the ‘Best Coach/Mentor Award’ at the event.