Canford Blog

Congratulations to Lower Sixth pupil Harry Young who recently entered an economics essay into the 2021 Minds Underground essay competition and was 'highly commended' You can read Harry's essay titled 'Is austerity ever necessary?' here.

Given that up to 120 global governments are urging their citizens to wear masks whenever possible, it is natural to inquire how effective they really are in stopping the spread of SARS-CoV-2 (and other such pathogens). In this essay Milind explores how the various common types of mask work before discussing their efficacy and effectiveness in a wider setting.

In light of the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been considerable focus on the fragility of global supply chains and the possibility of ‘slowbalisation,’ a term coined by Dutch writer Adjiedj Bakas referring to a “slowdown in global trade.” Through the use of ecomonic theory and empirical data, Harry assesses why the events of the last three years have not only disproven the ostensible inevitability of globalisation but have entailed a drastic reversal of globalisation, from an economic perspective.

The Oxford English dictionary describes a stereotype as “a widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing”. The single story creates stereotypes, and the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story. Almost all of us stereotype, whether it be consciously or subconsciously, in one way or another, on a daily basis.

Congratulations to seven of our pupils, and to Wimborne House, who are the overall winners of the inaugural House Poetry competition. You can read each of the winning poems here.

This fantastic publication is edited by Imi Parker, Saskia Green and Cata Taylor, and all the articles are written by our talented pupils.

Lower Sixth Former Harry Young entered the John Locke Institute Essay Prize for History https://www.johnlockeinstitute.com/2020-essay-competition with a paper entitled “Is a strong state a prerequisite or an obstacle to economic growth?”

He is one of just 35 pupils selected for Very Highly Commended awards from school entries spanning the globe including America, Hong Kong, Thailand and Singapore as well as the UK.  Named in honour of the eminent seventeenth century Oxford philosopher, John Locke, and run in conjunction with Princeton University USA and Oxford University, the competition invites students to explore a wide range of challenging and interesting questions beyond the confines of the school curriculum.  All entries are judged by senior academics from Oxford, who choose from essays submitted across seven subjects: Philosophy, Politics, Economics, History, Psychology, Theology and Law.  The John Locke Institute is an independent educational organisation that works to embolden the best and brightest students to become more academically ambitious and more intellectually adventurous through various programmes - residential courses, revision seminars, essay competitions, and special events.  This is a particularly fine achievement in the U18 category with Harry in the Fifth Form when the entry was submitted.  Read Harry’s submission here.

Inspired by her experience of online learning in lockdown, Lower Sixth pupil Rosie wrote this poem titled "It's At Canford You Really Want To Be."

These speeches were made to Upper Sixth pupils at the sports dinner at the end of the Christmas Term 2020, but the sentiments have relevance for us all in terms of the positivity of sport during these difficult times.

As part of Black History Month, the History department ran a Black History of Dorset workshop where pupils investigated the Black History of Dorset through the use of courses and archives. One Lower Sixth pupil Alex produced a write-up of  his findings and here is the result.