insideKENT Magazine Issue 36 - March 2015

EDUCATION IN ASSOCIATION WITH A Round Square weekend One weekend in January, teenagers from six countries around Europe converged on all-girls independent day and boarding school, Cobham Hall, in Kent, for an environmentally themed Round Square conference. Conference delegates, aged between 13 and 14 years, spent the weekend listening to keynote speakers, held student led discussion forums, and participated in environmentally focussed projects including constructing a greenhouse in the school grounds from used two-litre plastic fizzy drink bottles. In their own right, these activities were commendable and valuable to young minds, but the weekend went far beyond this; these simple undertakings formed a structure, which allowed something much more profound to occur. For it is while they are nailing together the greenhouse, building solar-powered windmills, discussing ways in which they might reduce their energy consumption and wrapping up the day with a disco, that bonds formed between these young people who were, moments ago, strangers. Over the relatively short space of a weekend, an element of transcendence enveloped the group and, as they dealt with issues of universal importance, the superficiality that can plague the early teens melted away. “It’s more about what you’re doing; it’s more about the environment than about you, so you forget all of the things you don’t like about yourself,” said Cobham Hall Year 9 student, Isabelle. Another, Zara, commented: "I realised that it’s nice to be yourself sometimes; I think in the disco everyone was just themselves, and it was really nice.” 131 It is these realisations, which make Round Square schools, like Cobham Hall, so great. The Round Square network is worldwide (operating over six continents), and each year several gatherings like this are held in the different geographical regions challenging young people to look beyond themselves to discover the truth behind the motto: “there is more in you than you think”. www.cobhamhall.com

insideKENT Magazine Issue 36 - March 2015 | Page 131