QE hosts Geography quiz - Queen Elizabeth's School

QE was the top-placed state school in the local round of a national Geographical Association quiz.

The school, which has hosted the competition for a number of years, was placed fourth out of 11 competitor schools drawn from Barnet and parts of London.

“The boys performed very well in a high-calibre field,” said QE Geography teacher Dr Sarah Jones. “The event helps to engage boys with the subject as well as offering them the opportunity to meet students from other local schools.”

Rahul Kanwar, Abbeykeith Kugasenan Chettiar and Karnan Sembian, all from Year 10, made up the QE team of three, with Dhruv Kanabar as reserve.

The competition was won by Westminster School, which retained the trophy for a second year and is now eligible to go through to the national final. City of London School finished in second place, with The Haberdashers’ Aske’s Boys’ School in third.

The local round of the competition is run by the schools themselves, with guidance and question sets supplied by the Geographical Association. “It was great fun to organise and we had a really enthusiastic team,” added Dr Jones, who was the organiser of the round in which QE took part.

The face-to-face quiz comprised eight rounds, ranging from map-reading to identifying the Commonwealth; some rounds were team rounds, and some were individual challenges. This year an innovation was a Google Earth round. Below is a sample of some of the questions.

1. Which African country was the last to leave the Commonwealth? (Answer: Gambia)
2. What U is the native name for the rock named after Ayer by explorers? (Answer: Uluru)
3. What is the natural vegetation of Savannah? (Answer: Tropical grassland)
4. What is the main type of rock on Dartmoor? (Answer: Granite)

The Geography department organises a number of other competitions each year, including the monthly Where in the world? – a photo-based quiz – as well as Anagrams and Dingbats. There are also the annual Young Geographer of the Year for all year groups and Through the Window for Year 7.