Dear Students (and Parents/Guardians), Welcome to this issue of the KAAEP Bulletin. This week, you will find a variety of livestreamed talks and pre-recorded lectures on all sorts of topics, as well as online exhibitions to visit and websites to explore. I have kept in the opportunity to contribute to an Art Exhibition as I feel that this is a very special offer. Do take a look at the competitions and challenges: entering an academic competition is an excellent way of really stretching yourself. For our older students, I strongly recommend having a look at Springboard, the new collection of introductory videos on all sorts of topics. The idea is that each video could act as a Springboard to further research of your own. As always, I would also like to draw your attention to some great Reading recommendations from Mrs Visser: all are great, thought-provoking reads. Finally, I challenge you to have a go at a little experiment in the item below, on the Ashmolean’s new Exhibition. As always, I would like to stress that there is no obligation for you to pursue any of these opportunities, but we would like to encourage you to follow up at least one of these per short term and make some brief notes on what you learnt, or what questions came to mind. If you get into the habit of doing this, by the time you reach Year 13 and start to write your personal statements or consider applying for work or apprenticeships, you will have bundles of material to draw on to demonstrate your engagement and motivation. This is all part of developing your own Super Curriculum, which is essentially pursuing your learning beyond what you are taught in school. The good news is that you are the master of your own Super Curriculum, and you only need to follow up on the topics that you find interesting. Your Super Curriculum is what will make you stand out from the crowd, and will develop your ability to think critically and arrive at informed opinions. I do hope you find something to tickle your interest! Pam Stokell Head of Academic Enrichment [email protected] The Ashmolean Museum’s new Exhibition on the work of the Pre-Raphaelites: Special Preview Virtual Tour Hoping to open the public on 18th May 2021 This Exhibition showcases both the drawings and watercolours from the Pre-Raphaelite movement. The Pre-Raphaelites were a secret society of young artists (and one writer) who were opposed to the Royal Academy’s promotion of the ideal as exemplified in the work of Raphael. On this occasion, the Ashmolean have put together an enticing 39-minute virtual tour film of the Exhibition prior to its opening, with expert commentary from the curator, the director and other experts. Find out more about the work of this radical group that called itself The Pre-Raphaelites – their lives, their loves, and their art. And once you have watched the film, you may well feel the need to visit the Exhibition in real life and observe the drawing and watercolours first hand. PRE-RAPHAELITES EXHIBITION FILM | Ashmolean Museum This might be an interesting experiment for you: Experience for yourself how much more interesting and meaningful an Exhibition is when you have some background information already in hand. And if you are thinking: “I am not really interested in looking at a bunch of drawings”, then perhaps all the more reason to try this experiment. Question for reflection: Will this change how you approach other exhibitions in future? 2 Mrs Visser’s Reading Recommendations for this week: Each week we will bring you three book recommendations from Mrs Visser, just in case you are wondering what you could read next. All three of these books will appeal to your emotions, in different ways. And remember: if the book comes recommended by Mrs Visser, you can be sure that it will be stimulating and well worth the read! And if you are thinking: these are just stories – how do they fit into the idea of Academic Enrichment? I would reply that you learn a great deal from reading “just stories”, and the more you read, the more you are likely to see connections between ideas and the real world around you. Key Stage 3: Cane Warriors by Alex Wheatle. Fourteen-year-old Moa is enslaved, toiling on a Jamaican sugar cane plantation. He has experienced the ‘backripper’ of Misser Donaldson, and he sees brutality, rape, amputation and a degradation of life for enslaved people. When Tacky begins recruiting for an Easter rebellion, Moa and his friend Keverton join, going against the wishes of Moa’s demoralised father. The fight for freedom that follows is harrowing, but also inspiring, showing resilience, heroism and the importance of African traditions. This newly published, well-researched historical novel is based on the true events of Tacky’s War, a rebellion against slavers in Jamaica in 1760; it is a must-read for our Year 8 students who have studied the Atlantic slave/sugar trade this school year, and for anyone who wants to better understand this notorious period. It disrupts the narrative that enslaved people were passive recipients of chattel slavery. And it is written by one of the best writers for young people, Alex Wheatle, who has a magical ability to weave words to create vivid images and characters. Key Stage 4: The Bunker Diary by Kevin Broo ks. In this Carnegie-medal- winning novel, sixteen-year-old Linus has been kidnapped and wakes up in a windowless bunker; he has no further direct contact with his captor, though at every moment he is being manipulated. Linus begins a journal. Then the lift, which is the only way out or in, opens, and a 9-year-old girl steps out, later followed by other prisoners: a junkie, a wealthy woman, a businessman and a dying philosopher. They are utterly dependent on the abductor, who seems to be watching their every movement. This is a disturbing and powerful thriller – I have seen students who haven’t voluntarily picked up a book in years be gripped by this novel. Key Stage 5: The Midnight Library by Matt Haig. Nora Seed feels she has failed at everything and life has nothing to offer her. On the day she chose to be her last day on earth, she finds herself in the Midnight Library surrounded by an endless number of books with different versions of her life. Nora’s secondary school librarian Mrs Elm is her guide, showing her the ‘Book of Regrets’, then allowing her to experience parallel lives she could have had if she had made different choices. The result is fascinating – she becomes everything from a pub owner’s wife, to a glaciologist encountering a polar bear, to a famous rock star, to an Olympic champion. It is interesting (and sometimes funny) to see Nora trying to settle into these lives as she doesn’t come equipped with the lived everyday knowledge needed to make sense of what is going on around her. Nora has the choice to ‘settle’ in one of these lives – but for various reasons she always ends up back in the Midnight Library. This is an entertaining and thought-provoking book to make you think about choices, regrets, and realising the possibilities that life offers. 3 One more fascinating Project from Zooniverse: If you are new to Zooniverse, the idea is very simple. Basically, our data-recording technology has so improved in recent years that all sorts of research projects across a large range of subjects are now able to collect substantial amounts of data. These data come in many forms, but essentially researchers need your help to sort through their data and help them to identify what is significant. You might be asked to identify or classify, to transcribe, or to draw around objects, depending on the project. There are short online tutorials to help you do this, and then you can get involved. There is a huge range of other projects to browse through at the Zooniverse website. Here is the latest addition: Iberian Camera Trap Project The primary research goal of this project is to set up a real-time, automatic monitoring protocol for species living in protected areas. However, there is no artificial intelligence without human intelligence. In this project, volunteers are asked to count and identify mammalian species in photographs taken in approximately 40 locations throughout the Doñana National Park (Spain), one of Europe's most iconic nature reserves. We use a camera trapping system that takes three photos every time it detects movement. The massive amount of images is collected continuously, 24 hours a day, giving a global view of what happens when no one is looking. Your contributions will help the research team determine the abundance and distribution of these species at Doñana (for the time being) and provide valuable training data for machine learning algorithms. Learn more, and get involved here. Modern Art Oxford’s Creative Call Out – contribute to the Exhibition! Sign Symbol Sound: Take Part! This is not a competition, but it does have a deadline: Modern Art Oxford are seeking to put together an Exhibition where you could be one of the contributors! Modern Art Oxford and Oxford Brookes University invite people based in Oxfordshire to submit their creative responses to Sign Symbol Sound, a new interdisciplinary exhibition exploring language and creativity. Sign Symbol Sound explores the variety of ways in which we communicate, connect, and seek to understand each other. From the language we acquire as children, to the creative interpretation of signs, symbols and sounds that shape our experiences of the world.