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For the first time since 2019, prize-winners, parents, VIP guests and staff assembled for a full Junior Awards Ceremony – complete with tea and cakes on the lawn afterwards.

After last year’s restricted event, 2022 saw the welcome return of a guest speaker, with Old Elizabethan Hemang Hirani (2008–2015) passing on to the boys lessons he has already learned in his blossoming career in investment banking.

The ceremony saw pupils from Years 7–9 awarded around 75 prizes for academic subjects and  extra-curricular activities such as chess, drama and public speaking & debating, as well as other endowed prizes and special awards.

Headmaster Neil Enright said afterwards: “Junior Awards is one of the highlights of our Summer Term, so it was splendid to be able to hold the ceremony in full once again, giving the boys and their families an afternoon to remember. It was a really enjoyable time and the young musicians who performed during the musical interludes played to an exceptionally high standard.”

VIP guests included The Representative Deputy Lieutenant of the London Borough of Barnet, Mr Martin Russell and The Deputy Mayor of the London Borough of Barnet, Councillor Nagus Narenthira.

In his speech during the ceremony, Mr Enright alluded to the heatwave and to the legend of Icarus, who flew too close to the sun and paid the price. “Boys, you have kept your cool in the academic heat of QE – in its own way a record-breaking environment; one which absorbs and re-radiates aspiration, intellectual curiosity and positive energy.

“In our proud meritocracy, we will always want to publicly recognise and celebrate absolute performance, but maximising your personal potential is why you all have unique targets each year; why we spend time doing bespoke tutorials. To help you to be realistically ambitious in what you do; to let you fly; but to make sure that your wings are fit for purpose and don’t melt in the heat.”

In the few short years since Hemang Hirani took a First in Geography and Economics at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), he has forged a career in investment banking and is now an analyst with Barclays.

He has served in various voluntary capacities, including as a mentor to pupils at under-performing London schools and as an intern in Mumbai, fundraising and raising awareness in support of poor cancer patients. He previously returned to QE to lead a Sixth Form discussion on Economic Geography.

Hemang passed on various pieces of advice to the boys, pointing out that he had been a Junior Awards prize-winner himself just 12 short years ago. He concluded his address with a plea to the boys to remember to enjoy themselves: “Life, as we all know, is far too short – we spend a lot of time sweating over the small stuff – worrying, complaining, gossiping and always wanting something we think is bigger and better, rather than appreciating and focusing on what we have, and are fortunate to have.

“It takes a single moment to change everything that we take for granted…we are all blessed in one way or another, so live life and leave no regrets.”

Music award-winners from each of the three year groups performed during the musical interludes. Year 7 violinist Jamie Lam played Italian composer Vittorio Monti’s 1904 piece, Czardas; Year 8 pianist Noah Morley played Claude Debussy’s Dancers of Delphi, and Ryuki Watanabe, of Year 9, performed American composer Clarence Cameron White’s Levee Dance. Piano teacher Tadashi Imai was the accompanist.

This year’s School Play, originally set on the hottest July day in the USA in 1954 and staged at QE in one of the hottest UK Julys on record, proved a tour de force.

12 Angry Men was written by prolific playwright and TV dramatist Reginald Rose and turned into a critically acclaimed film by multi-award winning director Sidney Lumet. Although penned nearly 70 years ago, the themes of prejudice, race, status and justice still resonate strongly today.

Set in a jury room during a case where the death penalty looms, the play gives the cast the challenge of delivering compelling drama through tense and heated debate in a claustrophobic environment with inhibited movement – a challenge they pulled off with consummate dramatic skill, according to Crispin Bonham-Carter, Assistant Head (Pupil Involvement).

The play hinges on juror 8, played by Henry Fonda in the 1957 film and by Year 10’s Augie Bickers in the QE production. This character is the first to seek a non-guilty verdict and sets out to persuade the other jurors of the gravity of sending a young man to his death.

Staged ‘in the round’ the audience were drawn into the taut atmosphere around the deliberating table as Augie set about consensus-building amongst peers who had to confront their own preconceptions and prejudices.

“Augie was a picture of calm, as he gently unpicked the easy assumptions of the other jurors, while the Bhowmick brothers – Krishn and Koustuv, of Years 9 and 10 respectively – were exceptional in their portrayal of embittered, middle-aged jurors 3 and 10,” said Mr Bonham-Carter.

“This was real ensemble acting, with great American accents, too! It provided yet more proof, if proof were needed, that drama at QE is flourishing!” he added.

The play focuses on the personalities and prejudices of the jurors as much as on the details of the crime. Unusually for a court drama, the defendant, a young man accused of murdering his abusive father, is not one of the main characters,

The cast were unanimous in their enjoyment of exploring the play’s themes and the rehearsal process leading up to the performances.

Juror 7, Saim Khan, of Year 10, said: “Drama has been a uniquely amazing experience in that it has enabled me to work closely with people from different year groups. Whilst there have been many challenges such as learning lines, the length of the play and learning cues, it has been immensely rewarding.”

Rehaan Shaikh, of Year 8, who was juror 11, said: “I’ve really enjoyed being able to rehearse every week with people I’d never known prior to the play. It was great as we all were making progress while having lots of fun. The funniest part of rehearsals was just saying something wrong and everyone breaking character.”

And Year 9’s Suhaas Sabbella, who played juror 1, said: “We were given a lot of freedom to develop our characters and think about their personality traits and then perform around it.”

Mr Bonham-Carter added: “My special thanks go to the director, Mr Gavin Molloy, for his creativity, inspiration and support.”

Paarth Aggarwal is among just ten global winners of the Microsoft Imagine Junior Cup after dazzling judges with his AI-powered application to reduce food waste.

The competition, which challenged participants to submit creative ideas to solve some of the planet’s biggest issues using the power of artificial intelligence (AI), attracted thousands of entries from around the world.

Year 8 pupil Paarth was the only winner from the UK, with the judges praising the detailed analysis he provided of how ‘deep learning’ was leveraged in the design of his app.

Headmaster Neil Enright said: “I congratulate Paarth on this impressive achievement, especially as he was one of the younger entrants in a competition open to 13–18 year-olds. Whilst many of the other participants entered as teams, Paarth took part as an individual, making this success all the more remarkable.”

Paarth entered under the ‘team’ name Earthatarian and conceptualised an AI-powered app that would reduce food waste by predicting the actual expiry of stocked food items and monitoring food consumption. As required by the competition, he used Microsoft APIs. (Application programming interfaces [APIs] enable computer programs to communicate with each other.)

“I was exultant to win, especially as it was the first time I have entered such a competition,” he said.

He explained why he chose food waste as the issue he wanted to tackle.

“I was very annoyed – and intrigued – about food waste. Lots of the food we buy we never eat. In many countries, there are lots of people who don’t have much to eat, whilst we do in the West,” said Paarth. “The aim is all about efficiency. Food waste plagues the world – it is not talked about enough.”

His app-based solution to this problem was to utilise cameras and sensors in people’s fridges and rubbish bins to see how much they are wasting. The app would use machine-learning to tell people the actual expiry date of food – judging freshness to predict when it would be at a point that it would no longer be safe to eat.

“This is to tackle consumer confusion around ‘use by’ and ‘best before dates’,” added Paarth. “The app would also look at patterns of consumption and recommend recipes based on this. It could also calculate calories using Bing API [using Microsoft’s search engine technology] and then recommend what people should buy.”

The judges said that with “so many amazing projects” they had a difficult task on their hands picking the top ten. They chose winners from countries as far apart as Nepal, Australia and the USA.

As well as receiving a trophy and a certificate, Parth won a prize worth $300.

In addition to being impressed by the Earthatarian project as a whole, they specifically praised Paarth’s thoughtful approach in using an AI-powered application to predict the ‘actual expiry’ of stocked food items and monitor food consumption, the presentation of his entry (which included a ten-slide electronic presentation and a video), and the thoroughness of his research.

Paarth says he’s “a believer in AI” and can see its potential to help tackle major problems. He plans to enter this competition again next year and then get involved with similar initiatives when older (the Apple and Google equivalents being open to those aged 16 and over).

His next project is to work on Amazon’s AWS DeepRacer – a machine-learning model aiming to get round a track as fast as possible.

Three QE teams all won two of their three debates in a competition against other leading schools, even though they had had no time to practise – and members of one had not even met up before the event.

Ten boys went on the trip to the South Hampstead High School (SHHS) Friendly Debating Competition, where they were given only 15 minutes to prepare ahead of each debate.

They covered a range of topics, debating whether trials should be televised, how to handle refugee settlement in the UK and whether the rise of social media is good for society.

Their debating coach for the trip, Economics teacher Sheerwan O’Shea-Nejad, said: “The boys really thought on their feet well; they were able to persuade the judges of their arguments using a brilliant blend of analysis and examples (with no use of electronic devices for research allowed).

“Logistical issues meant the teams had not been able to practise even once together, while our Key Stage 3 team, drawn from various year groups, had not even met before their first debate, which made the successes even more remarkable.

“Special credit must also be given to our other two teams, who were all from Year 10 yet managed to defeat Year 12 students representing some of London’s leading independent schools.

“All in all, it was another great advertisement for how QE produces intelligent, knowledgeable and confident students.”

The boys took full advantage of the opportunity to get some expert feedback, reported Mr O’Shea-Nejad. The judges included some on the world’s best young debaters, drawn from universities across London.

Among them was Umar Buckus, who has judged at the European, Asian and World debating championships. He said: “The QE debaters showed great potential and talent, despite their lack of experience. I look forward to hopefully seeing them triumph at a future tournament.”

Afterwards, QE2 team captain Ady Tiwari thanked Mr O’Shea-Nejad, adding: “It was an enlightening and thought-provoking experience that nurtured my development.”

The teams were:

QE1: Keshav Aggarwal, Year 8; Rishan Virmani, Year 7; Simi Bloom, Year 9, and Adithya Raghuraman, Year 9

QE2: Girish Adapa, Year 10; Ady Tiwari, Year 10, and Shreyas Mone, Year 10

QE3: Vaibhav Gaddi, Year 10; Harrshiv Vyas, Year 10, and Akshat Bajaj, Year 10

This year’s leavers may have missed out on a few things because of the pandemic, but they enjoyed one opportunity not open to their predecessors: their own Valediction ceremony.

With their A-level examinations now behind them, all of Year 13 gathered in the Shearly Hall together with parents, teachers and guests for the inaugural event, which brought a mix of fun and the formal to their QE farewell.

As well as a small gift for all the leavers presented by Guest of Honour Robert (‘Judge’) Rinder (OE 1989–1994), the ceremony included prize-giving, with awards bestowed for: all the curriculum subjects; ‘contribution & responsibility’; ‘leadership & involvement’, and for extra-curricular activities ranging from chess to drama.

In his speech, Headmaster Neil Enright told the sixth-formers: “Today, we thank you for your fantastic contribution to the life of the School; congratulate you on the completion of your A-levels; wish you the very best for your bright futures; but also repeat our hope that this is not the end of your relationship with QE – merely the beginning of a different phase.

“Circumstances have been such that your year group has missed out on a number of opportunities and experiences due to the pandemic, not least your GCSEs and the full-throated celebration of those deserved results. I hope that today goes a little way to compensate for the loss of some of the School-based social events you may ordinarily have enjoyed.

“I hope in the years to come that you will come back and see us; tell us about your adventures and careers; and, more importantly, tell those following in your footsteps through the School. That you will show them and their families the great variety of things that an OE can do and an Elizabethan can be.”

Mr Enright also thanked parents for their “huge support, both moral and financial, over the years”.

In his vote of thanks, the 2021 School Captain, Siddhant Kansal, reflected on how he and his peers had changed since they arrived at the School in September 2015. Over the intervening years, most had grown “about 2ft taller” and would now be completely unrecognisable as the same boys.

“One thing that never changed, however, is the fact that all of us stood together the whole time and always looked out for each other,” said Siddhant.

He also paid tribute to Simon Walker, the group’s Head of Year from Year 10 onwards, who is leaving QE at the end of term. “I think I speak for most people when I say that the day he became head of our year was the most terrifying day of our lives…Four years later, we are still terrified, but also grateful for all that he did for us.”

Mr Walker was the afternoon’s Master of Ceremonies. After the speeches and presentations were finished, he invited the leavers and parents on to the Stapylton Field at the front of the School for afternoon tea in the sunshine.

The ceremony was accompanied by music performed by some of the School’s leading musicians. After vocalist and guitarist Aadarsh Khimasia entertained the audience before the ceremony started, the Trumpet Ensemble then performed the processional, Henry Purcell’s Trumpet Tune. Music award-winner saxophonist Conor Parker-Delves enjoyed his swansong as a QE musician, leading a quintet as they played a piece of his own composition, Cherry Fizz, during a musical interlude. The recessional music, played by the Saxophone Ensemble, was Karen Street’s All in Good Time, followed by Coldplay’s Paradise. The Jazz Band played while tea was served.

The ceremony also featured a thoughtful and entertaining address by the Guest of Honour, Robert Rinder, who reflected on how his own experiences at QE had contributed to his varied and successful career, calling upon the Class of 2022 to hold onto those QE values of love of learning, hard work, and service.