2022-23 Perse Aristotelian Award winners announced
This year’s Perse Aristotelian Award winners have been praised for the quality of their investigations.
The sciences category was won by Woodford County High School for Girls pupil Shravani Bacchu, who researched whether technologies from her favourite science fiction film The Matrix could become possible in the 20 years. Highly commended were Calvin Dean (Dulwich College), Rishi Showan (Loughborough School), Roberta Doe (Royal Grammar School, Newcastle) and Hannah Wiseman (The Perse School).
Shravani commented: “I am keen to build my research and analysis skills and this competition seemed like the perfect opportunity to do so, therefore I decided to enter.
“This question was a great chance to delve deeper into the overlap between science and technology, areas which I find intriguing due to the evolving nature of the fields.
“Writing the essay was a great learning experience and I am thrilled to have won the sciences category.”
Perse pupil Lili Angus won the arts/humanities category with her investigation into whether history is written by the victors. Lily Haines (Barnwell School), Diva Bansal (The Grammar School at Leeds), Sara Kanjirathingal (The Cathedral School, Llandaff) and Sissi He (The Perse) were highly commended.
Lili said: “I have always loved researching topics in depth, be it inside or outside the curriculum.
“When I heard about the Aristotelian Award, I knew that I would enjoy participating in it immensely.
“Upon looking at all the research questions, I found that the history topic was the one that truly resonated with me.
“The writing of history has always fascinated me, and to finally get the chance to properly delve deeper into whether ‘History is written by the victors’ was an opportunity I knew I couldn’t miss.
“However, I was completely taken by surprise when I learned I was the winner of the arts/humanities category.
“I feel so honoured that my essay was chosen out of so many other excellent entries for this category across the country.”
Open to Year 9 pupils across the country, with the aim of inspiring them to develop independent research skills, the competition offered a wide range of essay titles across a breadth of topics.
Split into two categories of sciences and arts/humanities, the winners of each section received £70 while the four highly commended pupils in each section were awarded £20.
Perse Head of Research Matt Fox was thrilled with the level of interest in the competition and the standard of entries.
He said: “We were delighted so many students across the country wanted to take part and experience the process of doing some research.
“It was the most entries we have ever had and the judging panel were blown away by the quality of submissions this year.
“They felt the top entries showed incredible skill by analysing and comparing across multiple sources and coming to logical and nuanced conclusions.”
The 2023-24 Aristotelian Award will open in autumn 2023. For more information on the competition, click here, and read the winning essays below.
- Shravani Bacchu (Sciences) – Are the technologies from your favourite science fiction film possible in the next 20 years?
- Lili Angus (Arts/Humanities) – History is written by the victors. Discuss
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