The Society and the Financial Times are pleased to announce our School Essay Competition. We are seeking thoughtful and well-argued responses from sixth form geography students for this joint competition.
The winning essay will be published on the Society’s website and may also be published on FT.com and in Routes journal.
2021 competition details
Theme
The UK will host the 26th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26) in Glasgow on 1-12 November 2021. The COP26 summit will bring parties together to accelerate action towards the goals of the Paris Agreement and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
The COP26 conference will consider, among other actions, how changing our methods and practices of transporting people and goods will help towards the goals of the Paris Agreement. Consequently, the question for this year’s essay competition is:
Explain how transport changes might help the world to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement.
Your essay should focus on the geographical implications of one of the following bullet points and include reference to data and FT articles, where relevant.
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The movement of people – focusing on cleaner transport methods and/or choices about whether movement is necessary. You may decide upon a narrow focus, like the switch from fossil fuel to electric vehicles, or you may decide to comment on a broader range of ideas.
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The movement of food – considering how food miles, transport methods, behavioural changes and other relevant considerations might help to reduce the impact of food supply and distribution to shops and our homes.
Eligibility
This competition is open to sixth form geography students aged 16-18 who are registered to study A Level geography or equivalent in Year 12 or 13 on the closing date. Unfortunately, it is not open to 16-year-old GCSE level students who will be in Year 11 in September 2021.
Format and requirements
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A clear essay or ArcGIS StoryMap which is well-evidenced and reaches a clear conclusion
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Submissions should not exceed 1,000 words
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You should provide referenced sources of information and data
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Submissions must be your own work and be relevant to the title and guidance
Entering the competition
The competition closes on 1 October 2021 at 5.00pm. Entries will not be accepted after this time.
Please read our Terms and Conditions carefully before entering.
Entries will be judged by a panel of judges including representatives from the FT, Royal Geographical Society (with IBG) and a third party. The judging criteria will include:
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A clear essay or ArcGIS StoryMap which is well-evidenced and reaches a clear conclusion
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Submissions should not exceed 1,000 words
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You should provide referenced sources of information and data
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Submissions must be your own work and be relevant to the title and guidance
Submissions can be uploaded by individual students or teachers. Teacher and school contact details must be provided. If you are a teacher sending in entries, please note how many students took part in the competition. We cannot accept or judge any entries by post.
All entries must be made electronically by uploading the files online and must be accompanied by an online entry form. We encourage schools to run an in-house competition and only send their top 10 entries into the national competition, if more than 10 students are interested in entering.
The submission process has two steps:
Enter competition here
ArcGIS StoryMaps should be provided as a hyperlink in a PDF, with your name, a title and brief description less than 60 words in the document (not included in the overall word count). You should check that your StoryMap opens for all users, so it is accessible without additional authorisation to members of the judging panel. If it does not open, we will not be able to consider it.
Essays should be provided as a PDF and include a title and your name in the document.
Please email eduadmin@rgs.org if you have any problems with your uploads.
Winner announcement
There will be one overall winner and up to five highly commended awards. The winner will be notified around mid-November 2021 by email. We will aim to announce the award winner on the competition webpage around the same time. Please do not email us to ask for details or exact timescales before the results are published online.
The winner will receive a £50 Amazon voucher, which may be delivered directly by email. The winner and highly commended entrants will also be offered a free ticket to the FT conference on Global Food Systems on 30 November 2021.
The decision of the judging panel is final.
You can find further information about sustainability and climate change using the Society's and FT for Schools online resources
The Society is running this competition in partnership with the Financial Times as part of its Education Programme to support geography teachers and their pupils. Your school can become a School Member of the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG), and you and your pupils can join as a Fellow or Young Geographer, respectively.