With just two weeks left to go until the deadline, schools need to act fast to submit entries for school-science competition the Bright Spark Awards.

The awards encourage teams of pupils to use cross-curricular skills in science, technical, engineering and maths (Stem) subjects in practical projects.

They are open to primary and secondary schools across Kent and the south-east, and have three categories: innovation, investigation and invention.

And with the May 31 deadline fast approaching, details are immerging of some of the entries that have already been submitted.

These include the Solar Tiles Project involving a team from Simon Langton Grammar School for Boys.

Working with renewable-energy company Pavegen, the pupils have developed a solar-energy prototype that modifies one of the firm’s existing products.

Pupil Kieran Zheng explained: “Pavegen develop smart flooring solutions which harness the power of kinetic energy from people’s footsteps.

“We decided to incorporate solar panels with their technology so that they would be able to constantly harness power even in areas where there aren’t people treading on the tiles at all times.”

Collaborator Emilia McCarthy added: “Pavegen are currently looking into developing other products that include other sources of renewable energy.

“We decided to incorporate solar energy as this would help the efficiency of their products, and it’s a very renewable source.”

Any other schools that would like to enter the Bright Spark Awards need to register details of their projects online before noon on May 31.

Shortlisted teams will present their work at a Dragons’ Den-style awards ceremony at the Sandwich premises of Bright Spark judge Discovery Park.

The other judges are BAE Systems, Atkins Global, Megger, the ITL Group, EduKit, Highways England, Pfizer, Kent Renewable Energy and Golding Vision.

Find out more and register projects at kmcharityteam.co.uk/brightspark.

And watch a video about the Solar Tiles Project here: