2020 saw the inaugural Connect to Create initiative. Constrained by COVID travel restrictions and unable to compete in interschool  programmes, the decision was taken to look within our school for new opportunities for our students that would provide an additional layer of challenge and stimulation for young, eager minds. The programme was launched with a view to further strengthening our cross campus connections and provide opportunities for both young and old students to collaborate around common areas of interest.  

As part of the IB Diploma CAS Project (Creativity, Action Service), Year 11 boys planned, organised and delivered a series of workshops to like-minded Junior School boys with a view to presenting a showcase of their work at the end of the course.They quickly saw that pitching their level of instruction, pacing the lesson and also managing behaviour and output, were huge learning opportunities that gave them new understandings and demanded that they reflect, evaluate and adapt.  Their flexibility and patience was evident and the younger students responded with enthusiasm and relish at the prospect of learning form such wonderful role models.

Our Junior School students benefitted from workshops in Debating, Drones, 3D printing, Philosophy, Music and Creative Writing. However the most profound reflection was that both sets of students learned form one another, grew new respect for each other and better understood the whole journey of a Scotch boy. We are already looking forward to running this programme again in 2021 after such a successful outcome.