Academic Exploration

The breath-taking range and depth of knowledge in our Sixth Form was celebrated this week at the annual Ithaka Evening. The twelve pupils selected as finalists took the opportunity to showcase what they had learnt during their academic journey to complete either an Extended Project Qualification (EPQ) or PGS Extend project during Year 12.

The diversity of the projects was incredibly impressive, with students presenting on such topics as bi-pedal robots to sustainable fashion design, psychosurgery to dictatorships, and the possible benefits of eating chillies to the wellbeing that a particular painting provides observers. Nonetheless, all 12 finalists were united in their passion for their topic and were able to highlight the excellence in research that made them worthy of such an accolade.

"The projects presented this evening were quite simply superb and each of the pupils were advocates for the enrichment that undertaking an EPQ has given their studies as well as the value of independent learning," said Mr David Wickes, Head of The Portsmouth Grammar School. "The pupils were engaging, impressive  and, I would say, presented in a more relevant and thought through way than those given by much more seasoned professionals that I've heard speak recently."

The Guest of Honour was Matt Bryan, the winner of the Ithaka Prize in 2020. Matt has gone on to study at Cambridge University where he achieved a Double First in Engineering. Currently he is undertaking a PhD at Cambridge, sponsored by Bose, into hybrid physics/machine-learning models for active noise cancellation. Matt confirmed that the presentations were of a higher standard than many that he had heard at academic conferences in recent years.

This year the Ithaka Prize was awarded to Rowan R for a study into the ancient Egyptian game “Hounds and Jackals” which led to the creation of an artefact that the Petrie Museum in London have expressed an interest in exhibiting.

"I'm very grateful to have won and also very surprised, since everybody else's projects were so good that I never thought I'd be the one to win it," said Rowan. "It means a lot to me because recreating an Ancient Egyptian board game was something that I had wanted to do for a long time and was passionate about, and I had really hoped that it would be successful."

During her project, Rowan contacted the British Museum and the Petrie Museum in order to get an evaluation of the project. The curators of the British Museum's Department of Ancient Egypt and Sudan sent back an evaluation saying Rowan had successfully recreated the board game and pointing out certain features which were especially accurate. The Petrie Museum also sent an evaluation. "They told me that they would like to promote my EPQ on their social media and exhibit it in the museum, which I didn't expect," said Rowan.

This year significantly more pupils than in previous years undertook an EPQ at The Portsmouth Grammar School, with 57 pupils, now in Year 13, submitting projects. Of these, 30% of entries were awarded an A*, 63% A*-A, 86% A*-B and 100% at A*-C. 

The programme for the evening with a synopsis of each project can be found by clicking here.