RGS IN 100 YEARS –COMPETITION WINNERS

RGS

IN 100 YEARS

100 years ago in the NOVO, a student penned his image of the RGS of the future and wrote of walking around a building with glass bricks and transparent ceilings, of seeing automated teachers instead of human ones, of students being silent in lessons and when walking around school.

Today, some of that appears to have come true as we do indeed have some walls made of glass bricks.

With these thoughts in mind, we were curious to know how our current Year 6 (the Junior School 3rd Year) students envisage the school will look 100 years from now, and the results were varied and wonderful. Here are the three winning entries, securing Tess, Nandini and Aaran a £30 Book voucher each, presented by the ONA.

TESS PARR

AGED 11

The classroom was hot. The air was thick. The open window carried noises of bird song and play. We had been asked to write a long, boring essay on what the RGS would be like in 100 years. My pen hovered over the creamy white paper, waiting for an idea to spark. No idea came. And then, all at once, I felt a short sharp tug behind my neck, and the blank page, enveloped me. I closed my eyes and a feeling, not too different to an elastic band being tightened around my stomach, came over me. It stopped as soon as it had started. I sighed in relief as I was released from my bounds. Before I had time to think, I was pushed forwards onto my knees and I opened my eyes to find myself sitting in a vast, intimidating, and yet strangely familiar, building. The whitewashed walls were lined with books sat on shelves with glass doors. White, futuristic chairs sat around small bleached white desks, and groups of children were reading. I must be in a school! Out of the window I felt like I had seen the opposite building before. The red brick walls, the high windows. I was in the RGS! But not as I knew it. Everything had a strangely modern, angelic feeling about it; almost otherworldly. “Can you believe that building there was here 100 years ago?” whispered a dark-haired girl on a nearby table, pointing at the opposite window. “I know right, it's so old.” said boy sitting opposite her, “I mean, it's 2120, I bet it’s the oldest building at the RGS,” and then I realised, with a jolt, I was 100 years in the future!

A blonde girl looked at a digital watch and said, “An RGS fact file next I think.” She typed something into the device and pressed a few buttons. She got up and walked over to a machine that looked like a printer. “Autumn Frier.” said a flat disembodied voice, “The RGS compendium, by F.L Stanford.” A book on a nearby shelf disappeared and popped out of a gap in the contraption, into the girl’s open hands. She sat down at the table and opened the blue book. I read over her shoulder:

RGS has improved alot since 2020. Fields growing crops replace what was once the rugby pitch –to save money and to be more eco-friendly. Solar panels are on every roof and wind turbines are dotted around the school. Rugby is now played on the Astro turf as well as other sports. Education in the classroom, is made up of: control panel desks with built in iPads, rocking friendly chairs, and completed with all work done online on devices. Every student has a digital watch on their wrist that they can order library books that can be collected from book dispensers around for school, they can be used for researching something in a lesson or around school, they can be used to timetable and tell you when your lessons are and overall, everything an iPhone/iPad/laptop/computer.

Suddenly, I felt that same sharp tug behind the neck and I lurched back into the real world. There I was sitting at my desk my pen in hand and feeling like no time whatsoever had passed. I grinned to myself. Now I know what to write.

AARAN WAHIE

AGED 11

The lesson was about to start and I needed to quickly find my resources. I peered into my desk, hoping to find what I wanted. As I dug deeper, I didn’t notice that I was literally climbing into my desk! Suddenly, I fell through my wooden container and was surrounded by darkness. Before long, buildings started to form around me, and I found myself in a familiar place… school.

However, it looked different. The bricks had been replaced with some type of alloy that I didn’t recognise. Velvet banners hung down the side of the before me, were words on a grand statue saying ‘strong, calm, able and kind’. I thought that I heard those words somewhere before, but I couldn’t remember where.

My thoughts were disrupted by a commotion of chattering children shattering the silence. I wondered where they were going, so I followed. Entering the building, a man approached me and said, “Welcome to open day - be free to look around.” Now that was something I had a memory of.

Aimlessly wondering around, I came across a massive room with nothing in it. I looked around hoping to see if I could find anything to show me where I was.

All I discovered was a little screen with a light blue button in the middle, placed gently on the floor. Stooping down to press the button, a voice appeared and boomed, “What do you want to play?” Perplexed by this strange voice, I took some time to figure out what it was saying. Confidently I replied, “I want to play dodgeball.” Abruptly, a pitch of balls and team of people appeared. It was madness - balls were flying everywhere! Commanding loudly, I screamed “Shut,” but nothing happened. I repeated it and magically all the balls disappeared with the people. Out of nowhere, a plump man approached me and poshly said, “Ah I see you’ve met our ATP 2000. Obviously, it came out a week ago and is still new to us. It is 2120 so we are all very advanced.”

I thought the man was crazy, but I couldn’t help but think that if he were right it would explain why the RGS looked so different. I ran out of the hall trying to find a room which looked similar in any way, hoping to prove the man wrong.

Nothing appeared in any way the same to the RGS I fondly remembered. As I was about to give up hope, I stumbled across a room. It had buttons laid out on desks. Perching on one table, I pressed a red button and a holographic screen appeared out of thin air.

It had miniature screens on it labelling different subjects. Beside it was a pen. I picked it up and pressed the spring at the top. Out of the pen capsule came three little pens. They were marked: pro, pencil and pen.

As I was trying to figure out what these devices were meant to be used for, all my vision went blurry and I heard a voice shouting, “I SAID WHAT IS THE ANSWER TO QUESTION FIVE?” I blinked my eyes and saw my teacher staring at me screaming, “Stop dreaming!” I realised it must have been a dream. Or was it?

NANDINI MENON

AGED 11

Istared at the worksheet in front of me. I was exhausted. After asking to go to the bathroom, I dragged myself towards the sink and splashed some water onto my face. I felt refreshed. While walking back, I noticed a trapdoor on the stairs. I heard somebody come by, so I clambered in and waited for the footsteps to recede…

I released my breath and peeked out of the trapdoor. Oddly, I couldn’t see the teachers anywhere. I lifted myself out of the hatch and brought my eyes to the place I was in. I rubbed them and looked again. I was in some sort of large tower. It looked beautiful, but this wasn’t the place I was in before. Had I dozed off and was I in a dream? I pinched myself. Nope, not a dream. Suddenly I noticed that the trapdoor I had been using to conceal myself had disappeared! I looked up. There were stairs rolling up and up as if never to end. I thought if I climbed them, maybe I would be able to rid myself of this place. Soon enough I became tired. I reached a set of chairs and slumped down on the comfiest one.

I heard a voice behind me –a girl was quietly talking to herself. I enquired about where I was, and she simply replied with: ‘The Towers’. The answer left me confused. I told her about my situation and how I got there. She said she would give me a tour of the building and explain everything on the way.

Firstly, the girl explained that the trapdoor I had come out was no ordinary one. It was one that could time travel. I asked her what year it was. She replied with “2120”.

“I’ve travelled 100 years in time! So, this is still the RGS? How do I get back?”

She said that if I found another trapdoor and wished hard to go back to my time, it would work. The girl decided to help me find another trapdoor. She told me that she could get me around the school a lot quicker using her panel. I asked what that was, and she said that a ‘panel’ was what they used to get around school. The pupils handed their panels in at the end of the day, and the robot in the reception gave it to them in the morning.

We both stepped onto the panel and sped off. The building was like a cathedral. It had glass slabs in the classrooms. Many pupils were swishing around on their panels. It reminded me of the traffic on the way to school. There were hundreds of classrooms, all of them unique – like snowflakes. A huge playground lay by the marvellous school. I felt like a tiny speck of dust compared to such a magnificent building.

A tense knot began to form in my stomach. I was afraid. What if it didn’t work? What if I was sent into a time frame where no one could help me? My thoughts ceased as the panel stopped abruptly. She had spotted a trapdoor. We exchanged a short goodbye and I clambered into the trapdoor.

I thought hard and counted to 60. Afterwards, I carefully lifted myself out and opened my eyes…

I was back in 2020! I raced back to the classroom where the students were writing about what we thought the future would be like. I knew exactly what I would write.