An adventure through time

Last week, pupils in Year 7 took a trip to the Royal Society of Chemistry for an event entitled “1001 Inventions: Journeys from Alchemy to Chemistry”. Through various talks and practical experiments, they discovered how the science we now know as Chemistry evolved throughout the ages. Highlights of the trip included workshops on making oobleck – a cornstarch-based substance that acts like a liquid when being poured, but like a solid when a force is acting on it – and a workshop on soap and perfume making. The visit was a fantastic opportunity for pupils to learn about chemistry whilst also finding out about the history of science. In the words of the students: “We all loved it and we all came out with a different perspective on science.” Thank you to science teachers Ms. Mummery and Mr. Turner for organising! 

Joint Year 11 forensic science project comes to a close!

September 2018: a ‘murder’ is committed within the walls of Ecole Jeannine Manuel in Paris. Following the discovery of the body, a team of Year 11s from our schools in London and Paris are tasked with identifying the culprit! After nearly nine months of close scientific collaboration with their Parisian peers, our students headed over to Paris to close the case.

Since September, pupils had been using forensic techniques, such as fingerprinting, blood typing, Henssge Nomogram or hair sample analysis, to whittle down the original list of 15 suspects. Throughout the year, students in Paris and London worked together to collate data from their experiments and reach conclusions. By early June, the number of suspects had been reduced to three and the students travelled to Paris to carry out the final stage in their research together. Using DNA Gel Electrophoresis to analyse DNA samples recovered from the crime scene, they were able to clearly identify the killer.

For Science Teacher Mr Smyth, “this project was an excellent opportunity for Year 11 pupils to become familiar with some of the forensic techniques used in crime labs around the world, and to collaborate with students at Ecole Jeannine Manuel in Paris.”

Pupils come first in Faraday Challenge Day!

We are extremely proud of our pupils in Year 8 who have won the the Faraday Challenge Day! The Faraday Challenge is a STEM competition organised by the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) meant to give pupils the opportunity to research, design and make prototype solutions to genuinely tough engineering problems. Teams must race against the clock to solve a real-life engineering problem, putting their technology and teamwork skills to the test. Congratulations to them all!