TEAMS of potential engineers have taken part in a challenge to design and build model bridges from straw.

Pupils aged 11 and 12 years from schools in Stanley, gathered at Tanfield Comprehensive School, to take part in the event organised by the County Durham Education Business Partnership and John Chidgey, County Durham Local Education Authority inspector.

Designed to test their problem-solving skills, teamwork and planning, the competition gave students an opportunity to work in teams of four, alongside engineers from the Derwentside Engineering Forum, designing and building model cantilever structures from modelling straws.

Pupils from Tanfield Lea Junior School, Shield Row Primary School, East Stanley Primary School, Burnopfield Primary School and Tanfield Comprehensive, were given a design brief and time limit of 75 minutes in which to build freestanding structures projecting as great a distance as possible from the edge of their worktop.

Organiser Gail Tolfree, from the County Durham Education Business Partnership, said: "The challenge is a fun activity which allows the students to demonstrate practical skills and imagination.

"Hopefully, the challenge will encourage some of them to begin thinking about what they might like to do when they leave school."

Winning teams from Tanfield Comprehensive and Burnopfield Primary School and won a BBC Technogames robot-building kit for designing bridge structures covering more than half a metre.