Braidhurst High School under 18 football team have won the Scottish Senior Shield. In a hard fought match at Hampden Park, Glasgow the boys came from a goal down to win the game 2-1 against Eastwood High School.

Braidhurst made their way to the final coming through seven rounds of matches, including an away tie at Thurso. Winning their semi-final on penalties gave them the chance in the final on May 4 at the national stadium.

The boys started well but could not take any of the chances that they created. As had happened so often before Braidhurst lost the first goal due to some scrappy defending. However, their heads did not go down but instead Braidhurst continued to play the brand of football that had gotten them to the final in the first place. Darren Wilson sent a long pass through to Kyle Connell who latched onto it and squeezed it past the Eastwood keeper to send the teams in level at half-time.

The second half saw Braidhurst make the changes as three subs came on which saw Braidhurst move up a gear. Jamie Semple went off on a waltzing run past three players before his shot was deflected into the path of the on rushing Lewis Guy who stuck the ball into the empty net. This set off some wild celebrations amongst the players as they knew that with only a few minutes remaining the Shield was all but theirs.

The boys deserve all the plaudits they receive as they have been wonderful both on and off the pitch this season. Mr Lawson and Mr Brandon are both incredibly proud of the lads and are so happy for their much deserved success.

Braidhurst Under 14s won the Lanarkshire Cup for the second year in a row thanks to a five-star performance against Lanark Grammar at Beltane Park, home of Wishaw Juniors. The holders controlled the match throughout, with each player putting in a superb and determined performance. The Under 14s made a promising start to the match, passing at a high tempo and looking dangerous going forward. Their reward soon followed as Kai Kirkpatrick broke the deadlock – a powerful long-range effort was fumbled by the goalkeeper and into the net. Lanark could have equalised shortly after but were denied thanks to a good save from Matthew Connelly. That missed chance was punished by Dylan Kerr who doubled his side’s lead, heading home from a Cameron Williamson long throw. On the stroke of half-time, Dylan turned provider as his corner-kick was met by Kai who headed into the roof of the net for his second of the match. Just as they did in the first half, Braidhurst made a great start to the second half and within seconds they should have found themselves further in front. A fantastic through ball from Dylan found Kyle Laikowski who unfortunately fired wide. A fourth goal did arrive courtesy of Dylan as he found space in the box to fire past the goalkeeper at his near post. The goal of the match was saved until the end, as Darrell Love skipped past three players before firing in a low shot that left the goalkeeper helpless and gave his side a resounding 5-0 victory. Mr O’Toole and Mr Clarke were absolutely delighted with the performance and result, but in particular the fantastic attitude shown by the players. The soon to be Under 15s can now look forward to next season, hoping to retain their title for a third consecutive season whilst making further progress in the Scottish Cup.

Line Up:

Matthew Connelly; Cameron Williamson (Captain), Steven Rodger, Ross Brownlie (Sub: David Cleland), Kai Kirkpatrick; Kyle Laikowski, Dylan Kerr, Robbie Brown, Grant Mudd (Sub: Jamie Hamilton); Dylan Campbell (Sub: Matthew Barclay), Darrell Love (Sub: Craig Cardno).

MOTM:

Dylan Kerr

A hotly contested ‘Staff –v- Pupils’ netball match took place on Tuesday 9^th May at lunchtime in the Sports Barn.   The match is the latest fundraiser for the school’s ‘Malawi Project’ with spectators charged £1 to watch the game and all proceeds going to charity.   Despite giving it their all the pupils were eventually beaten 4-9 to ensure a staff victory.   Pictured are the pupil players and members of the PE Department who made up the staff team.   Well done to all the participants and spectators for helping to raise money for such a worthy cause.

Pictured are the Braidhurst High Robotics Club with new and existing members. The club has recently picked yet another award to add to the trophy room. The club has been awarded an Excellence and Equity award at the North Lanarkshire learning Festival launch on  held at the Motherwell Civic Centre. The award was given in the category “successful interventions – going the extra mile” . Robotics is offered as an elective and ensures the schools broad general education (BGE), curriculum offers personalisation, choice, relevance and enjoyment. Both the elective and the club are organised by Mr Hussain of the science department. Mr. Hussain commented that, “we at Braidhurst are committed to meeting the needs of the individual by being creative and provide them the opportunity to develop skills they will need in the world of work, this year the link between the elective and the extracurricular robotics club will be fused and it is hoped that the success of one will foster the success of the other”.

Last week Braidhurst received a visit from I Bike NL, the North Lanarkshire arm of Sustrans Scotland, a leading UK charity which encourages people, young and old, to make more of their everyday journeys by foot, bike or public transport.   The PE department arranged for S2 pupils to watch a stunt display performed by 3Sixty cyclists which everyone thoroughly enjoyed.

Over 100 S3 pupils took part in the annual Maths Challenge this week.   The challenge consisted of various team rounds, including tower building and an energetic relay round.   The extremely competitive year group fought it out and in the end Team 6, which included Aimee Harper, Sarah Leighton, Reece McAleer and Marc Ross were the delighted winners.

Having qualified from the Vex Robotics Regional competition team “Braidy Angeles” from Braidhurst High School Robotics Club and team MEH… from Airdrie Academy then took part in the UK finals in Birmingham held at the vast NEC exhibition complex. The robotics club is committed to delivering Scotland’s STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics) future. The club meets on a Wednesday  lunchtime and is supervised by Mr Hussain of the Science department ,the topics covered by the club so far include Logic circuits, robotics and computer software / hardware architecture.

The Vex challenge formed part of the “Big Bang Fair” is the World’s Largest and Fastest-Growing Robotics Competition for High Schools and Collages. More than 10,000 teams from 32 countries playing in over 750 tournaments compete to become the best globally. This was the first time that teams from Scotland took part in the National competition.

In the VEX Competitions, presented by the Robotics Education & Competition Foundation, teams of students are tasked with designing and building a robot to play against other teams from around the world in a game-based engineering challenge. Classroom STEM concepts are put to the test on the playing field as students learn lifelong skills in teamwork, leadership, communications, and more. Tournaments are held year-round at the regional, state, and national levels; local champions go on to compete against the best in the world at VEX Worlds each April.

This year Braidhurst High has further invested in teaching robotics by imbedding it in the curriculum by investing in four full classroom kits. This commitment will hopefully be rewarded in the future by the Club making to the World championships in the USA in the near future.