Career milestones and biological artworks celebrated at RSB Awards Ceremony 2026

The annual Biology Week Awards Ceremony, hosted by the Royal Society of Biology, took place at the House of Commons, London on Wednesday 14 October 2026. With over 70 guests in attendance, the event was the culmination of the RSB's creative and careers awards where awardees and members of the bioscience community gathered to celebrate.

Welcome speeches

The Viscount Stansgate, Stephen Benn, opened the ceremony welcoming everyone, before passing over to RSB President Professor Dame Melanie Welham DBE FRSB. Melanie emphasised the importance Biology Week – now in its 15th year – as a flagship event for engaging with our members, communities, and wider audiences through celebrating the diversity of biology. She then proceeded to present this year's creative awards.

RSB President Professor Dame Melanie Welham DBE FRSB

Creative awards

The RSB hosts an annual Photography Competition and a drawing and painting competition, BioArtAttack, to celebrate the beauty of the natural world.

Photography Competition

This year's Photography Competition theme was 'colours of nature'. The winner of the Photographer of the Year Award (the over 18s category) was Hannah Campaigne with her picture of a hummingbird amongst fuchsias. The winner of the Young Photographer of the Year (the under 19s category) was Anton Poon with his photograph of a red-whiskered bulbul.


BioArtAttack

Following this, the BioArtAttack awardees were presented with their prizes. There were winners across three age categories, and three winners for the Nancy Rothwell Prize for labelled specimen drawings. The BioArtAttack winners received a prize bundle provided by Defra (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs), while the Nancy Rothwell Prize winners received a cash prize. We were also joined by MPs Sally Jameson for Doncaster Central and Daniel Zeichner for Cambridge to congratulate their local constituency winners in person.

Spelling Bee competition

The winner of last year's Spelling Bee, Sophia from Dromore High School in Northern Ireland, received her award.

Sophia won the Spelling Bee competition 2025 which took place during last year's Biology Week by receiving the highest score in the finals: 54 correctly spelled words in two minutes.

Many thanks to Jon Hale, Head of Biology at Bromsgrove School, Worcestershire for organising the competition last year which engaged 288 schools, and again this year with 260 schools taking part.

L-R: second from left Anton Poon (winner of the Young Photographer of the Year), Sophia (winner of the 2025 Spelling Bee competition), Elizabeth (winner of the Nancy Rothwell Prize age 7-11 category), and Eva (winner of the BioArtAttack Award for the 12-14 category).

Career awards

The RSB is committed to championing people's careers in the biosciences, from school age through to late-stage careers, and has a range of awards and competitions to support this pipeline. The RSB's Chief Executive Dr Doug Brown FRSB presented this year's career awards.

School Biology Teacher of the Year

The highly anticipated School Biology Teacher of the Year (SBTOY) Award 2026, which recognises the very best and most inspiring secondary school and college teachers in the UK, was awarded to Robert Loveridge, Science Teacher from The Sir Robert Woodard Academy in West Sussex.

Many congratulations to Dr Kimberly Williams (née Swann) from Moseley Park Academy in Wolverhampton and Michael Noone from Radley College, Abingdon for being finalists.

On winning the award, Robert (top image) said: "It has been an amazing and humbling experience and process. Firstly, thank you to the Royal Society of Biology, and secondly thank you to James who nominated me. The whole process was a real validation and confirmation that I am still doing the right job teaching biology after 35 years, and that time to reflect about all of the awesome things that I still try and build into my teaching to keep students curious about the natural world. I feel deeply honoured."

Chair of the SBTOY judging panel, Professor Mark Winterbottom FRSB, said: "Robert’s long-standing commitment to his school and community has given him invaluable wisdom and experience, yet, remarkably, this has done nothing to diminish his enthusiasm, excitement, joy, and passion for biology teaching. He is committed to fostering deeper thinking, independent practice, and extended inquiry, and his care and commitment to the environment is matched only by his care for his students and colleagues. Robert is a dedicated and exceptional teacher while being an inspiring presence."

Robert receives a £500 prize and a further £500 of school resources, the latter of which is provided by Oxford University Press.

Higher Education Bioscience Teacher of the Year

The Higher Education Bioscience Teacher of the Year Award was presented to Dr Ahmed Elbediwy, Senior Lecturer and Biochemistry Course Leader at Kingston University London.

Apprentice of the Year

As part of the RSB's work to champion apprenticeships and other technical career pathways, the RSB runs the Apprentice of the Year Award to celebrate apprentices' contributions to their teams and the wider bioscience community.

Apprenticeships are a combination of employment-based training and formal education, and are a valuable route into a career in science. For apprentices, they provide an opportunity to grow both personally and professionally, and support employers to elevate skills in the biosciences by training their own workforce.

This year's Apprentice of the Year is Sarah Hardman, Laboratory Scientist (Level 6) at AstraZeneca. She received her training at Northeastern University, London.

Winner Sarah said: "Winning this award was an unexpected but amazing surprise! My apprenticeship journey has been challenging at times, but it has also been incredibly rewarding, providing me [with] so many opportunities to learn, grow, and develop as a scientist and as a person. Receiving this award has given me confidence in what I’ve achieved so far and encouraged me to keep growing. I want to give special thanks to my supervisor, manager, mentors, and colleagues in Functional Genomics for making this experience so enjoyable."

Sarah receives £250 as the winner, and complimentary RSB membership and professional registration (to either the RSci or RSciTech register) for one year.

Congratulations also to Gabrielle Baumber, Bioinformatic Scientist (Level 7) at AstraZeneca, and Max Marshall, Healthcare Science Practitioner (Level 6) at East Suffolk and North East Essex Trust, for being Highly Commended. The Highly Commended recipients also receive complimentary RSB membership and professional registration (to either the RSci or RSciTech register) for one year.

Many thanks to the judging panel for their expertise:

• Dr Hilary Jeffreys CSci CChem FRSC: Consultant, former Chair of the Science Council Registration Authority.
• Matthew Garland RSciTech MRSB: Laboratory Director at Donnington Grove Laboratories.
• Rebecca Baldwin CSci MRSB: Laboratory Coordinator for chemistry, pharmacy and pharmacology (CPP) at UEA.

Apprentice of the Year winner, Sarah Hardman (right), with her supervisor (left).

Closing remarks from Emma Cook

The closing speech was delivered by Emma Cook, Head of Engagement at BBSRC. Emma stated that the future of biology depends upon teachers, organisations, and young people – all of those being celebrated in the room. She said she personally values Biology Week as it's centred around curiosity, and that it facilitates building stronger connections, nurtures talent, and supports discovery.

The evening concluded with networking over canapés and drinks.

The Biology Week calendar outlines what is coming up in the remainder of the week.

Emma Cook, Head of Engagement at BBSRC.