Senior Physics Challenge
The Senior Physics Challenge for Year 12 students is an exciting opportunity for students to stretch their problem solving skills and apply fundamental physical principles to novel situations. Over 6000 students take part in the competition each year.
The SPC Challenge is a single, one-hour paper that provides an excellent tool to assess and challenge students’ ability to work at a high level in Key Stage 5 and beyond. It consists of several short questions followed by one or two longer questions that test only core subject knowledge and application.
Little knowledge of new Year 12 topics is required, whilst the style of questions is more advanced than students will generally be acquainted with.
The study of four past papers is recommended in order to ensure that students are prepared for the challenge.
Senior Physics Challenge (Online)
- The SPC Online Competition takes place in the last week of January
- It consists of two 30-minute sets of multiple choice questions which are largely about physics ideas, but also encouraging some wider reading and interest in the subject. It is an opportunity for students to take part in a national physics competition and to develop their confidence in the subject. It is definitely a quiz which is accessible to sound students but is not an ”Olympiad Challenge”.
- Length – 2 x 30 minutes (can be sat on different days if required) with each section containing 20 questions.
- Sat within your school supervised by the teacher. It may not be sat by students at home or run remotely.
Senior Physics Challenge Competition (Paper)
- This is our traditional problem based set of questions. This is not only for students who have done some preparation, but for all those who like to engage in problem solving questions and developing those skills. The best preparation is through working through some past papers which available here on this website.
- Length – 1 hour
- Sat within your school. It is teacher invigilated. It may NOT be sat remotely online.
- Marked within schools – a detailed and easy to use Mark Scheme is provided