ACADEMIC

HEYERDAHL

HOUSE CAPTAINS WRITE UP

PING TURONGPUN

It has been a very difficult year for everyone and adapting to school life has become harder, nevertheless, us Heyerdahlians have constantly endeavoured for excellence, quality and have showed high calibre when participating in every house activity. This year, we have had to face the challenges of competing in the house competitions during the pandemic. The once intense House Basketball was replaced with a lonesome basketball shootout, our usual house quizzes have been transformed into sitting in front of laptop screens, and our once most prized activity, Sports Day, has vanished, and was instead left in the hands of the House Captains. Despite all of these changes, every single one of us has persevered and made the most out of all the house events. The enthusiasm and determination brought into the activities, whether it being ‘Mask Design’, ‘Virtual Background Design’, competing in the fitness challenge and taking part in the typing challenge, it is evident that Heyerdahl has proven, once again, the ability to compete and drive our house to the new high!

HEYERDAHL

MARK BEZZINA

Through the dedication of the house leaders, the perseverance of the students, and the unconditional support of the Heyerdahl community, this year’s sporting activities went ahead despite the current situation. Activities that have not been seen in our school before, things like house tennis tournaments, class basketball shootouts and the very tiring fitness relay, were all introduced. Everyone who participated should be proud of what our house achieved this year, everyone’s best efforts were left on their respective courts, machines (and fields in the house captain tug of war). We had a few members of our house win gold for us in their individual events, special mentions go to to Robert (Year 7), Jessie (Year 7) and Mya Khurshid (Year 8) who all won their events in House Tennis. The support given to all of the students participating this year, was exceptional especially as the encouragement was yelled from 2 metres away and from under a mask!

ZEENAT JAVAID

Every single member of Heyerdahl this year has contributed massively to the house and has shown remarkable resilience in the face of the pandemic, as House Captains, it really made us proud. With the pandemic at hand, the role of the House Captains changed drastically, and along with all of the other members, we too have had to adapt the way that we function as a team. Over the year, instead of corralling students to take part in the swimming gala or house football, the leadership team has instead had to organise online events — almost fully integrating the house approach to be online, for covid safety of course. We have even created a house video as a replacement for our regular, live house assemblies! One key event that has dramatically changed this year was that we as a school did not get to experience Sports Day… Instead, the House Captains (in a slightly lonely mood) represented each house in our own mini-pseudo sports day, with (covid safe!) activities including tug of war, backwards sprinting and archery. We’ve had to change and adapt just like the rest of Heyerdahl.

MARIAM SIALI

This year, given the circumstances, the House Music Competition was, to say the least, unusual. Unusual, yet as exciting and inspiring as always. Participants from all year groups got involved and we had the pleasure of watching performances where students showcased their talents on various instruments, such as the guitar, the piano, the voice, and the saxophone. The standards were higher than ever and the level of competition was high! Our congratulations go to each and every student who took part in the competition, but particularly to Kevin Hu from Year 7, whose stunning performance on the piano led to him winning the junior category of the competition, and Sourav Roy from Year 13, who played the 'Mephisto Waltz No. 1' by Liszt, and was a joint-winner in the senior category. Well done!

JAMIE ANNAND

This year, we have pushed through adversity to result in another rather successful year for Heyerdahl in our merit competition. As a house, we have tallied up 3137 total points! At the time of writing this our top three ‘players’ are: Kevin Hu, 94 points, Sarah Kapoor, 92 points, and Saiyette Aima, 74 points. Well done to everyone who has contributed! It’s great to see that your efforts inside and outside of the classroom are being rewarded! This year we have been able to follow our house activities through our House social media! The ‘@DCol_Heyerdahl’ twitter has been our primary news source for results and house week updates. It has been great to see us

MR ASHBY’S WRITE UP

As has been said by the House Captains, this year has seen big changes to the House Competition. We have had to adapt and modify, be creative and innovative in making sure that the House Competition continues to thrive. And though it is different, we have managed to create a programme which gives us a little sense of normality and familiarity in a year where so many things are so alien.

After finding ourselves in last place for all of last academic year, at the time of writing this we are fighting again for the House Cup, and are very much in contention. We needed a year to regroup and refocus and we are now back where we belong. Heyerdalians once more have rallied together and shown much resilience and resolve to put us back at the top. Thank you to all of you for the outstanding effort you have put in this year. A massive thank you has to go to Mariam, Ping, Zeenat, Jamie and Mark for their outstanding leadership through the competition this year. It has been a tough year to encourage and motivate, particularly through masks, and they have done a superb job. Like an iceberg can only be partly seen above the water, what they are seen to do does no justice to the work which goes on behind the scenes. They have been immense!

Mr Case needs a big thank you too. He has been beavering away during the course of this year and, as you may have noticed, has designed outstanding shields for each of the four houses. Our mythical creature

adapt to new, socially distanced, sanitised and virtual activities that have run throughout this academic year. From online team jigsaws to basketball shoot-outs, we have certainly made the most of a challenging year. This reflects the open-minded and committed approach we have seen as a House this year, and everyone should be very proud of themselves! Thank you to everyone who contributed to Heyerdahl’s successes this year and got involved in the competition and the wide range of activities and challenges. We look forward to continuing with these achievements next year!

is a griffin but we will talk more about this next year… Amazing job Mr Case!

And finally Mr Jackson. Sir, it has been a pleasure. Your dry sense of humour will be missed next year and we wish you the best of luck in an exciting new step up.

Have a great summer everyone. Rest up and get ready for another pack filled house programme next year!

Mr Robert Ashby

Head of Heyerdahl House

HPQ AND EPQ:

The EPQ (Extended Project qualification) saw Year 13 students submit a record number of 73 projects in January 2021. The pandemic and its challenges failed to stop our enthusiastic students from continuing to pursue topics beyond the scope of the curriculum. Each student delivered a presentation to a live audience demonstrating academic engagement at a high level, as well as confident and engaging presentation skills. All four project types are flourishing with this year seeing an increase in the number of Investigation projects; these projects involve students designing and engaging in their own empirical research ranging from interviews to questionnaires to thought labs. Again our students delved into broad and diverse topics such as examining to what extent racism is prevalent in the Hollywood film industry to how important product defence firms are in industry efforts to cause regulatory paralysis in the USA. Stem cell research, use of CRISPR, AI, climate change and art in therapy are to name but a few of the topics students have researched. Performance projects saw some excellent piano recitals and an electric monologue in the role of Mary Queen of Scots. The Artefacts are still a popular option and really showcase how innovative and creative our students can be. In response to the pandemic one student wrote and illustrated a children’s book for children to address the virus. We also had a student who hopes to be an architect in the future who designed a zero carbon house.

The HPQ (Higher Project Qualification) for the GCSE students was completed in December. We have been really impressed with how Year 11 have engaged in the sessions and managed their time. Their course runs more along the lines of a university seminar set-up so their presentations took place in these seminar groups. Students were articulate and had really done their research. Many of the projects would have given the EPQ a run for their money. Topics such as whether EQ or IQ is more important and exploring whether you can ever really separate the artist from their work if they have engaged in criminal behaviour saw the projects responding to current affairs and the world around them. The HPQ is becoming a more and more popular option with students then opting for one of the practical EPQs having produced a dissertation at this level. Both courses offer the students the opportunity to engage in an independent research of their choice to enrich and extend their experience but also give them a bit of a university experience. Well done to all our EPQ and HPQ 2021 entries.

Ms Helen Bastable EPQ Coordinator

ISMTF MATHS COMPETITION

ISMTF (International Schools Mathematics Teacher Foundation) organises a yearly international mathematics competition for high school students. This year, 18 students were selected from Years 8, 11, 12, and 13 to represent DC and compete in the ISMTF. These students prepared over several months, meeting in D13 with Mr Almond every week to solve numerous problems of varying difficulty. The competition was held online at DC at the end of March and consisted of two rounds.

The individual round comprised of a total of 50 questions, each worth 4 points for a correct answer. The competition attempts to discourage guessing, thereby rewarding 1 point for each question left unanswered. Typically, 10 sets of 5 questions are given, each set lasting 10 minutes with a small break in between. This year, the format of the questions and timing deviated from the previous ISMTF competitions: the individual round was broken into 2 sub rounds of 25 questions, each lasting 50 minutes. All DC participants performed splendidly well in the individual round, with 3 students placing in the top 20. Pranav Sangwan (Year 11) came 1st overall in the individual round, scoring an incredible 175/200. Jakub Skroban (Year 13) ranked 9th this year, and Subhag Pandit (Year 13) ranked close behind at 14th. The team round comprises of 6 sets of 3 questions each. Per set, 90 points are awarded for 3 correct answers, 50 points for two correct answers, and 20 points for one correct answer. The total points across all sets are summated to give a final score per team (each team consisting of 3 members). DC’s 6 teams of 18 students once again gave a splendid performance with 2 teams placing in the top 10. Pranav (Year 11), Jakub (Year 13) and Aman (Year 12) placed 5th and Aryaman (Year 13), Emma (Year 12), and Pritvik (Year 12) placed 7th.

Combining both team and individual scores, Pranav, Jakub and Aman placed 1st overall in the ISMTF competition.

Aman Doshi, 12MDH Jakub Skroban, 13SCH Pranav Nanda, 13BCH

NATIONAL KENKEN COMPETITION

Well done to Aritro Chatterjee (Year 8) who recently secured the National Rank 1 in the KenKen International Maths Competition. #dcproud

My 2020 KenKen journey:

When I was first introduced to the KenKen maths puzzle in 2016, I was intrigued by how brain-stimulating, yet addictive it was. On hearing of the dream prize of a free trip to the USA and the opportunity of competing internationally against other country toppers, I was quite motivated and enthused. I worked hard and won in the KenKen International Championship at NYC twice in 2017 and 2018, including winning the ‘Champion of Champions Trophy’ in 2018 winning among all age-group winners combined (8-10, 11-14, and 15-18).

Last year, in 2020, I faced a different challenge – getting used to solving puzzles online with its challenges of poor network connectivity and sometimes, unresponsive web-portals. Nevertheless, with rigorous practice and a prayer for good internet connectivity, I won the KenKen National Championship again. However, the international Championship was cancelled due to the pandemic, and with it, the prize of another US trip.

What this experience has taught me is that doing well progressively takes continuous hard work and not getting complacent due to past laurels.

Aritro Chatterjee, 8SOR

UKMT INTERMEDIATE MATHS CHALLENGE

On Thursday 4th February, 170 students from Dubai College in Years 9, 10 and 11 sat the annual UKMT Intermediate Maths Challenge.

The UKMT Intermediate Maths Challenge consists of 25 multiple choice questions that should be completed within 60 minutes. The challenge requires reasoning and fluency in the basic rudiments of the subject to solve unique problems, quite different to the questions we usually face in our curriculum. Despite seeing plenty of nervous faces, the enthusiasm for Maths was clearly visible.

We spent an hour on a Thursday afternoon delving into the demanding yet exciting set of questions. Despite how the paper went, we all felt a sense of accomplishment and we are eager to receive the results!

The Dubai College Mathematics Department were amazed at the uptake and found it pleasing to see so many students enjoying mathematical puzzles during these strange times.

Salinaa Naik, 10CRI Vansh Gadhia, 10LRU

UKMT SENIOR MATHS CHALLENGE

The Senior UKMT (United Kingdom Math Trust) challenge is one meant to stretch bright minds to the very limit. It consists of 25 questions of increasing difficulty. The senior paper starts with every student having a free 25 marks and all of the questions are worth 4 marks with negative marking of one mark for each wrong question. The 'free' 25 marks that you get helps avoid the issue of students getting marks lower than zero due to negative marking. The questions are fun and intriguing, while demanding a clear conceptual knowledge and often being mind-twisters. The challenge aims to instigate a love for problem solving and so aims to have you feel a sense of satisfaction once a problem is solved instead of having guessed the answer, hence the negative marking. It’s a competition where the usual expectations of high percentages are often in direct proportion to concept clarity and applicability to challenge students in problem solving.

Top scoring students are put into three categories - bronze, silver, and gold. Students coming in the top 60% are awarded with the bronze certificate, around the top 30% are awarded with silver certificates and the ones coming in the top 10% are awarded with gold certificates. Yet, this is only the first round, next comes the UKMT Kangaroo and the Olympiad. Out of the hundreds of thousands of students taking part each year, top 1000 are selected to do the senior Olympiad and next around 6000 are selected to do the senior Kangaroo. The kangaroo consists of 20 questions only of a higher level with one hour for the paper while the Olympiad is a lot more extensive and longer where you must give proofs for all your answers. Hopefully, next year you will want to participate, after all you are just challenging yourselves!

Pranav Nanda, 13BCH

MATHALON 2020

Mathalon is a yearly competition hosted by the UOWD (University of Wollongong Dubai). This year, three students from Year 12 competed in the senior division of the competition; these students were Ashrita Ganesh, Khwaish Lakhiani and Aman Doshi. As the competition went online this year, UOWD was able to bring in a guest speaker for the introduction ceremony: Arlo Caine, an associate professor of Mathematics and Statistics at California State Polytechnic University. During his speech, he primarily discussed how he and his fellow statisticians modelled the Covid-19 at the start of the pandemic using exponential curves and how these models were used to predict the severity of the outbreak.

Round 1 was the Multiple Choice Questions round where we were given an hour to complete ten international, Olympiad-level questions online. Despite the high level and advanced concepts demanded by the questions, we were able to persevere and score well. Round 2 was a Rapid Bee round testing our mental maths under time constraints. In this round, each student was given two minutes to answer as many of the questions as possible – with a maximum of ten mental maths questions provided. Our approach to the questions required quick thinking, problem solving skills and high mental aptitude. Round 3 was the Application and Concepts round, which was the most challenging part of the competition. For this, we were given two problem-solving questions to attempt within 20 minutes. In this round, the top 9 students from the two previous rounds were graded.

After around 6 hours of the competition, the results were finally in. Ashrita managed to place in the Top 9 out of 100+ students in the Senior Category. Overall, it was a really interesting and enjoyable competition and we would like to thank Mr Almond and the UOWD team for the opportunity to participate in the Mathalon 2020.

Ashrita Ganesh, 12CMM Aman Doshi, 12MDH Khwaish Lakhiani, 12BCH

THE MODERN WORLD DEBATES

The Modern World Debates is an annual competition with over 50 teams and 250 debaters from across the world. After a series of trials, the DC team was selected with Aman Doshi, Tanvi Buddhavarapu, Manaal Saadaat, Vedant Bhansali, and Shrish Janarthanan representing the school. From topics ranging from female superheroes to youth quotas to the nationalisation of energy companies, this debate competition never failed to surprise us with their original and rather intriguing motions.

Dubai College fared extremely well in the preliminary stage with our team progressing to the knockout rounds as one of the higher seeds. In the quarter finals, where we discussed the importance of youth quotas in parliament, we won a unanimous decision from the panel of judges to progress to the next round. The semi-finals was a grueling and tense debate that revolved around the importance of prioritizing modern day literature over classics. Despite it being a tough debate, we lost this semi-final debate to the hosts of the competition.

Aside from the result, the team benefited enormously from the feedback provided by the experienced adjudicators and the level of international competition that was present. Dubai College memorably concluded the 2020 Modern World Debates by earning many individual honours out of the 250 debaters present:

Aman: 2nd place Shrish: 5th place Vedant: 19th place Tanvi: 31st place

We would like to thank Mrs Hodge and Mr Rushworth for their continual support and guidance in debating and for giving us this wonderful opportunity.

Shrish Janarthanan, 12LHO

INTERNATIONAL ROTARY CLUB DEBATE CHAMPIONSHIPS

At the end of October 2020, a team of Dubai College’s most experienced debaters where invited to participate in the International Rotary Club Debate Championship. The annual Rotary Debate Championship went online for the very first time and Dubai College was honoured to be part of such a prestigious competition. After years of practice and preparation, the team, consisting of Vedant Bhansali, Aman Doshi and Shrish Janarthanan, were ready to face their first international debating competition.

The competition began with two preliminary rounds after which the top 8 best teams were selected to compete in the knockout rounds. Not only did Dubai College qualify to move on but we were ranked the 2nd highest team overall. The second day of competition started with a bang; short prep times and a new digital format meant that all of the teams were excited to begin the knockout rounds.

Round after round, Dubai College progressed further and further and soon enough we were in the finals. The tensions were the highest they had been all competition as spectators from the UK, Bangladesh, India and UAE tuned in to watch. The pressure was on but like most DC teams, Vedant, Shrish and Aman thrived on the pressure and went on to deliver one of their best performances all day.

The culmination of two days of fierce debating finally arrived and the awards ceremony did not disappoint. Dubai College were crowned overall winners after beating Shishya School in a tightly contested motion about social media. Even more accolades were to come as Vedant was named Best Speaker of the entire competition. All in all, it was a rewarding experience for the whole team but none of it would have been possible without the guidance and mentorship of Mrs Hodge.

Vedant Bhansali, 12VHO

This year has seen the development and inauguration of the Dubai College Geography Society (Geog Soc). We have eight Year 12 students and three members of staff who have jointly united to form a committee with the aim to explore and promote Geography beyond the curriculum. The world of Geography is dynamic, it is a discipline evolving and adapting rapidly. As Geographers, we look to challenge misconceptions about our world. We started the year with a discussion on ‘A life on our Planet’ by David Attenborough – climate doomers, and this has opened our eyes to human impact and the future of the planet. understanding. This, married with facilitating opportunities to debate and enquire on a variety of topical and current topics, is what creates the diverse and marvellous nature of the Society.

Some of the highlights from the year have been presentations from:

Lorcan Fallon on Hong Kong and Ireland and looking at the characteristics that shape a place.

Janice Walder looked at the cultural, historical and economic globalisation of Morrocco.

Madilyn Allen-Paver presenting on the role of Palaeontology, Glaciation and Economic change that has shaped Loch Ness in Scotland.

Nina Hindocha looked at the culture, economy, politics and tourism in Kenya.

Megan Levitt presented on Mauritius and how climate change is affecting the landscape.

Part of the Society’s mission is awaking the experience of Geography to all year groups and thus, we launched our first GeoSquish competition to Years 7 and 8. Congratulations to the winner, Zoe Clarke (Year 7), with her entry seen in the picture on the right. This term we are starting to see the development of our augmented reality sandbox by a group of Year 11 students, a project involving complex computer programming. We have also scheduled events for the future, ranging from interviewing world class Geographers to Movie nights, Alumni visits, university guidance as well as quizzes and competitions, all to illuminate our Geographical Gracie May looked at the impact of 20th Century Migration to the UK.

We welcomed back George Hosking (ODC 2020) to discuss an essay he wrote in his first semester at Oxford University on Global politics and the role of territory to gain power (South China Sea).

The highlight of the year was our key note guest speaker Mr Huw Jones the Manager of Big Pit Coal Mine in South Wales in person who discussed the Deindustrialisation of South Wales and the impact Coal has had upon a society. This thought-provoking presentation was reflection of 42 years of mining experience but also looked at the geopolitical views of the changing Welsh landscape and the impact globalisation has had upon a community. Are there winners and losers to globalisation?

Madilyn, Megan, Janice and Lilly Geldhof participated in the Youth Earth Summit 2021 competition, exploring the scalability of Liquid Nanoclay Technology in the UAE. They were successful and came away with the Audience Choice Award.

Nina, Janice, Madilyn and Lilly also took part in the Emirates Environmental Group Speaking Competition on sustainability in a post pandemic world, placing 10th overall and winning the Audience Choice prize, giving them the opportunity to visit the International Centre for Biosaline Agriculture.

We also started our essay competition where students entered an independently written response to a set question.

The Key Stage 3 question:

Outline the potential consequences for climate change on a country of your choice?

And the winners were; Year 7: Cushla Corrigan, Year 8: Kai DeBenedictus, Year 9: Jimin Park.

The Key Stage 4 question:

Is combatting climate change a local or international problem?

The winner was Tarn Timmermans from Year 10. Well done to everyone who entered.

I would like to thank the Year 12 Geog Soc committee for all their hard work and look forward to applications from next year’s Sixth Form for membership to the committee.

Mr Noel Thomas Head of Geography