Record Breaking Detectives at Shiplake College

09 Jul 2018

A Shiplake College team have recorded the highest ever score of an all-male team in the history of the ‘Thinkers in Education’ CSI challenge on Wednesday 20 June.

The challenge, where students have to work in Crime Scene Investigation teams and solve a fictional crime, has been taken up by over 20,000 pupils in schools nationwide since 2008. The team made up of Year 10 pupils: Ralph Burrows, Tom Craven, Conrad Cameron-Tueton, Harry Clark, Alexander Coles and Toby Coles knocked previous record holders King’s School Ely off the top spot who had held the record since 2016.

Students had to represent CSI teams investigating a mysterious death and use DNA Electrophoresis, Fingerprinting and Blood Typing to process evidence and reach a conclusion. As forensic scientists, pupils had to process the evidence accurately and earned points for doing so. Students then had to scrutinise suspects and crime scene photos in the search for clues and then needed to evaluate their evidence, determine its relevance and reach a conclusion before facing the pressure of the courtroom. If pupils made a mistake they may have seen the ‘murderer’ walk free!

Matthew Hackett, Director at ‘Thinkers in Education’ said, “The winning team from Shiplake College were outstanding in the CSI Workshop ‘Dead on Time’ – with effective teamwork, accurate application of forensic science skills and very high levels of critical thinking. Conrad led his team – Toby, Alex, Tom, Ralph and Harry – to victory with the highest ever score for an all male team – scoring an incredible 190333 points.”