BEN Robinson from Year 13 at Marling School is to represent the UK at the International Biology Olympiad in Szeged, Hungary in July.

Ben was one of only 16 out of 9,465 students nationally to be shortlisted for the UK team after taking a gold award at the British stage.

His success in the final selection event means that he will now travel to Hungary for the prestigious international competition along with three other UK students.

The Biology Olympiad sets theory and practical challenges for some of the top pre-university biology students in the world, with over sixty countries taking part.

Marling biologists put in a strong performance at this year’s British event, taking home four gold, five silver and six bronze awards.

Ben Robinson, Oscar Cocks-McCracken, Hope Clutterbuck and Ben Barber achieved gold awards, with Marcus Holba, Noah Lambert, Marcus Oodian, Ciaran Sandhu and Louis Davenport taking silvers.

Ben, who has an offer to study engineering at Oxford next year, said: “I am so pleased to have the opportunity to represent the UK this summer. It is really exciting to work with students from across the country, let alone from across the world. I have found it so inspiring and am so glad Dr Warren encouraged me to go for it.”

Marling’s head of biology Stephanie Warren said: “We are really excited that Ben will represent the UK in Hungary. Overall we are so proud of what our sixth form biologists have achieved this year – the competition was tough.”