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QE’s new Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Ambassadors have been encouraging their fellow pupils to reflect on the need for a more gender-balanced world on International Women’s Day 2019.

Year 12 pupils Leo Kucera, Vithusan Kuganathan and Josh Osman have been appointed to the new positions within the prefect body.

They are working to further understanding and celebrate diversity, both within the context of the School and in broader society. The trio started their work in style by putting together a colourful and informative display on the School’s prominent new equality, diversity and inclusion noticeboard for International Women’s Day, which has as its theme #BalanceforBetter – the forging of a more gender-balanced world.

Headmaster Neil Enright said: “I am delighted that we now have increased peer leadership in these areas. Since we are a single-sex boys’ School, it is important that we ensure pupils have an awareness of gender issues and reflect on the challenges faced by women in our society and in different parts of the world, while also celebrating women’s achievements.

“Leo, Vithusan and Josh have done well to seize the opportunity presented by International Women’s Day to further these aims.”

The appointment of the new ambassadors is only one of a number of developments at the School in this area.

A new Diversity Society has started meeting on Mondays, run by Year 13 pupils Aashish Khimasia (last year’s School Captain), as well as Jonathan Ho, Yushin Lee and Omar Taymani. In their promotional material, they state that the society meetings will be an opportunity to look at ‘Mental health, sexuality, gender equality, identity politics, animal rights and whatever more you want to discuss’.

An Equality, Diversity and Inclusion calendar has also been created at the School to highlight relevant key events throughout the year, and the new noticeboard will be used to celebrate these, while also highlighting case studies of influential, successful and inspiring women.

In recent months, a number of guest speakers have addressed issues of equality, diversity and inclusion, such as:

• Alice Fookes, of UN Women – the United Nations organisation dedicated to gender equality and the empowerment of women
• Natasha Devon MBE, who speaks on mental health, body image, gender and social equality
• Gabriella Rutherford, from Survival International, who spoke about the rights of tribal peoples
• Emily Whyte and Andrew Macklin, of charity Tender, which is working to end abuse and domestic violence.

In addition, the School seeks to address such issues both through the weekly Personal Development Time provided as part of the School’s pastoral support and through the academic curriculum.

Leading activist and writer Laura Bates impressed QE sixth-formers with a wide-ranging lecture on modern feminism.

The founder of the Everyday Sexism Project covered topics including definitions of feminism, transgender matters, the approach feminists should adopt to cultures elsewhere and the advice that should be given to young men in relationships with women. She also discussed her new Young Adult fiction book, The Burning.

After an invitation from hosts St Albans High School for Girls, a dozen Year 12 A-level Politics students attended the lecture, accompanied by Head of Year 12 and History & Politics teacher Lottie Coleman and Head of Politics Liam Hargadon. The School has selected feminism as an option within the A-Level Politics core syllabus.

“It was a really excellent talk,” said Miss Coleman. “She was so articulate and informed on the subject of feminism without being dogmatic, making her an incredibly impressive speaker.”

One of the QE sixth-formers, Rushil Shah, praised Ms Bates’ “well-articulated and convincing talk…which was not repetitive or droning at all,” adding that he had been impressed by her use of statistics. His classmate, Leo Kucera, praised her for addressing male stereotypes in society and for “confidently and accurately answering questions”.

Ms Bates started the Everyday Sexism Project website in 2012, five years after graduating from Cambridge with a degree in English Literature. The aim of the site is to document examples of sexism from around the world.

She spoke initially of her own experiences of sexism, including a Cambridge don who wore a black armband on the anniversary of women’s first admission to the university.

To illustrate her claim of the inequality facing women, she cited the fact that there are more men called John leading FTSE100 companies than women!

She stressed the need to discuss sexism and feminism with young men in relationships, saying that the suggestion sometimes made that this is a ‘minefield’ area is actually insulting to young men.

Regarding trans matters and how feminism applies in this area, she pointed out that women are not an homogenous group anyway, so the variety of experience seen among trans people should not be an issue.

Ms Bates felt that it is not the job of western feminists to impose their ideals in other parts of the world; they should instead concentrate on giving feminists from other cultures a platform.

Issues raised in a question-and-answer session after the lecture included:

• Discrimination against women in careers – Ms Bates said that the fact that women have children is not sufficient to explain this away
• Why women and men tend to choose certain careers – her view was that this is due to nurture, such as children being given ‘gendered’ toys
• Workplace gender quotas – the current situation is not a true meritocracy, so quotas are not inherently unfair, she said. They might speed up the process of attaining equality as a short-term step, alongside other measures.

Besides Leo and Rushil, the QE attendees were: Alex Beard; Chris Hall; Senan Karunadhara; Tohgo Kimura; Mehdi Reza Lilani; Aditya Mukopadhyay; Josh Osman; Ryan Ratnam; Oscar Robinson and Teg Singh.

Four Year 10 boys shone in this year’s Maths Feast competition, rising to the challenge of tough questions that even included topics from the A-Level Further Mathematics syllabus.

They won two of the four rounds at the London Academy of Excellence in Tottenham, taking the maximum possible points total in the Dessert round, as well as winning the Starter round. At the end of the event, they had netted 109 points out of an overall possible total of 121, placing them first out of the 15 schools taking part, with the QE boys playing as team no. 8.

The team, who were selected by the School, comprised Andy Kwak, Alexandre Lee, Sheikh Mohiddin, and Dan Suciu.

Congratulating them, Mathematics teacher Kirtan Shah said: “This was a truly commendable achievement. All four students worked well together as a team, strategising and using each other’s strengths to their advantage.”

The competition, which is held at locations across the country, is run by the Advanced Mathematics Support Programme (AMSP) – a Government-funded initiative – and is billed as a “fun educational challenge for Year 10 students which tests problem-solving and teamwork skills”.

Each Maths Feast event is a one-off, with no further heats or finals, so participants and their accompanying teachers can take materials back with them to their schools.

This year’s challenge involved teams working on a variety of problems, ranging from a Merry Go round requiring a large amount of independent work to a relay that involved working in pairs. The A-Level Further Mathematics content came as the ‘surprise’ element of the competition; it was based around networks and algorithms.

Afterwards, team member Andy said: “I found the whole event a way for me to improve my problem-solving skills, especially in the individual round, where we had to work by ourselves and had no one else to depend on.”

Two Sixth Form pupils secured well over £11,000 when they organised their first-ever major charity event – easily beating their £5,000 target.

Year 13’s Parth Gosalia and Year 12 boy Rishi Shah put together a grand dinner, including entertainment, because both have roles as Youth Teachers at the Shri Chandana Vidyapeeth Jain School in Edgware and they were keen to demonstrate young people making a positive difference in society.

The dinner, which took place at the Shishukunj Community Centre in Edgware, was held in aid of two charities: Debra, which supports people suffering from a skin condition called Epidermolysis Bullosa (EB), and Veerayathan Nepal, which is raising money for children orphaned by the large Nepal earthquake of 2015.

Some 120 people attended the event, including committee members from the Jain School, charity representatives and local business people. Parth and Rishi worked with a third Youth Teacher, Shyam Shah, who is not a QE pupil.

The final total – not including Gift Aid – came to £11,434, which was amassed through sales, a raffle and pledges. The entertainment at the dinner included a guitarist and a magician.

Parth, who has an offer to read Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE) at Christ Church, Oxford, and was a QE Vice-Captain last year, compered the event. “It was daunting at first and I was nervous to begin with, but in the end I really enjoyed the night,” he said.

“Organising the evening was a good experience for us as youth leaders: we got ‘tighter’ and learned much more about each other through the process. It was eye-opening and very rewarding.”

Rishi, who is a current Vice-Captain, delivered a 25-minute presentation on the charities’ work.

Two years ago, he visited a school run by Veerayathan, which is an Indian NGO operating internationally. The dinner was, however, raising money specifically towards its work in Nepal, where the organisation is building a centre close to Kathmandu to house and educate children orphaned in the earthquake. It will also offer adult education courses.

Jenny Jackson, Debra UK’s Business Development Manager, and Christo Kapourani, a sufferer from EB, both spoke at the dinner, and Mr Kapourani also announced the final total towards the end of the evening.

Rishi said: “I feel personally connected to these charities, therefore it was easy to present with passion. That, allied with the presentations from the Debra representatives, had a high emotional impact, which undoubtedly inspired the guests to be generous with their pledges.”

Rishi hopes to go to Nepal this summer to work as a volunteer and to present the money raised.

Another QE boy, Aaryan Sheth, of Year 11, also assisted on the day.

A Brexit specialist from UCL’s European Institute gave boys some expert insights into the current political turmoil in a lecture to Years 10 and 11.

Clément Leroy, a Research and Policy Engagement Associate at the institute, came to QE to explain the background of the recent ‘meaningful vote’ in Parliament and looked at all the major issues involved.

Although he did not, of course, know how things will play out in the coming weeks, he suggested that a ‘no deal’ outcome is quite possible – and even likely – given that this is the default position if a deal is not agreed and approved by Parliament.

Mr Leroy worked on Brexit at the French Embassy in London and on EU economic policies at the French Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Paris prior to his appointment to the European Institute.

Nisha Mayer, Head of Academic Enrichment, thanked Mr Leroy for his visit: “He did a good job of explaining the current situation, bringing some clarity – if not solutions!.

She added: “With wall-to-wall media coverage and lots of material on social media, it is important that we help the boys sort through the ‘noise’ to understand the key facts and issues about matters as significant as the Brexit process. We seek to develop the critical thinking and questioning skills that will equip them to formulate balanced and informed viewpoints, even if they may still respectfully disagree.”

Among the topics Mr Leroy covered during the lecture were the initial referendum, the negotiations, the Irish backstop and the potential outcomes and how we might reach them. Boys also had the opportunity to ask questions.