Two of our Upper Sixth Form pupils have received awards in the prestigious John Locke Essay Competition 2020. Both Isabella Ludlam (D) and Brioni Leung (D) were Highly Commended for their essays on theology and psychology.

Based at Oxford and Princeton Universities, the John Locke Essay Competition invites students from across the world to explore a wide range of challenging and interesting questions across seven subjects: philosophy, politics, economics, history, psychology, theology, and law.

This year, the judges received nearly three thousand entries from eighty different countries. It took the panel of thirty-five university examiners from Oxford, Cambridge, Princeton, Harvard and Chicago, two weeks to assess all the entries, taking into consideration independent thought, depth of knowledge, clear reasoning, critical analysis and persuasive style.

Isabella tackled the essay question in the theology category titled: “Many people have committed acts, execrated and deplored by others, in obedience to sincerely held beliefs. Can we reasonably ask anyone to do better than simply to obey his own conscience?”

Brioni submitted an essay in the psychology category titled: “Are the psychological differences between genders greater or smaller than those between sexes?”