Apex Action Judge Cheshire School
Enterprise Project

Apex’s Commercial Manager Debbie Snelson was one of six judges who visited Springfield School, Crewe on 9th May to critique merchandise that students had made from recycled materials.

Delivered by Safe Opportunities of Crewe, the Enterprise Event challenged students to make saleable items out of unwanted materials including plastic milk cartons, cardboard, bottle tops, wire, a broken computer keyboard, and even cooker parts!

The students presented their design drawings to the judges and displayed the final product creations which included bird feeders, watering cans, ladybird magnets, photo frames, kitchen accessories and even an egg incubator!

Two of the most innovative designs were “Gardenbot”, a one-off ultimate gardening storage companion, containing gloves, seeds and other gardening utensils, and “Dollar Till”, a game where participants are asked a math question and then used a handmade cash till to reveal the correct answer.

All participants received a Certificate of Achievement and in addition certificates were presented to the following winning teams:

Best Creative Idea – Dollar Till Team
Best Useable Product –  Plastic Bottle Creations Team
Best Environmental Idea – Bird Buddies Team
Best Team Work – The Lion Team
Best Group Presentation – Gardenbots
Team Best Individual Speaker – Kieran, Egg On The Bed Team

As well as utilising their creative skills, the project enabled students to learn about teamwork, problem solving and the importance of recycling and caring the for environment.

Helen Pullan, Director of Safe Opportunities commented;

“It was lovely to see how the students interacted with the judges and how well they explained their projects.

This type of event really helps our students with confidence building and using their communication skills, as well as being enjoyable for them to take part in.

We really appreciate employers like Apex, Junk Art Creations, AO & Ryman for freely volunteering their time to support these initiatives”.

“Apex Action” is Apex’s volunteering & funding initiative for school & community projects.  They are always up for a challenge and doing something a bit different!  If you think they can support your project contact Debbie on debbie.snelson@apexconnected.com or call 01948 302066 to discuss further.