Engineering steps ahead in Big Step Challenge 2025

Members of Chemical Engineering's Big Step Challenge teams

The Faculty of Engineering made a significant impact in the 2025 Imperial Big Step Challenge.

Of the 379,000 kilometres covered by the Imperial community, 117,000 were contributed by the Faculty of Engineering. 28% of active challenge participants belonged to Engineering (312 members of staff and 170 students) and their efforts resulted in 48 trees being planted. Big Team Challenge work in partnership with Ecologi - read more about the partnership.

The Department of Chemical Engineering featured highly in the leaderboards with plenty of top teams coming from the department. Director of Operations Anusha Sri-Pathmanathan said:

'Taking part in the Big Step Challenge was a fantastic experience! Our team was thrilled to come first in the Steps-Only challenge, and it was great to see three teams from the Department of Chemical Engineering placed in the top four of the Steps and converted activities league table.

Even more exciting was seeing three engineering teams in the top five of the Steps-Only league table (Chemical Engineering, Bioengineering, and Aeronautics), and four Engineering teams in the top four of the Steps and converted activities league table (Chemical Engineering and Aeronautics). 

Congratulations to all the teams for their fantastic achievements – a terrific effort all round! It’s clear that both staff and students in our departments love a good challenge – and there was a little bit of competition among the teams, but also a lot of fun.'

Abby Sanderson, Move Imperial Wellbeing Manager, said 'It’s been amazing to see so many members of our Imperial community come together on Imperial’s Big Step Challenge and embrace a more active lifestyle. The challenge has had such a positive impact on overall employee wellbeing. We saw an incredible increase in daily activity levels, with many participants setting and achieving personal goals, and even fostering a sense of camaraderie and friendly competition among colleagues. We can’t wait to do it all again next year!'

Check out 2025's leaderboards in full.

Our next challenge

Race for Life—the annual 5K and 10K event supporting Cancer Research UK—is back on Sunday 27 July in Hyde Park. This event, organised in partnership with Move Imperial, will bring our community together for this fantastic cause.

Last year, over 100 staff and students from the Faculty of Engineering took part in the event, which was a huge success.

This year, we’d love to see even more of you get involved—whether you run, jog, or walk. Every step makes a difference.

Find out more and register for Race for Life.