[contributed by Felix Grant]

One of the cases they worked on was a proposal currently under consideration and consultation for development of an area between school buildings and playing fields. Four main options have been mooted: a pair of asphalt tennis courts, a garden, or a semi wild “science area” complete with pond and simulated bog. There are also six funding options: split the available pot of money funds with a proposed new performance area in the school hall, annex all the money for the outdoor area, or work without funds and leave all the money for a better indoor development - and in each case work mount a special supplementary fundraising effort or not. So, they were planning in a twenty four cell grid like the one below.

These are my own pupils, I have known them since September, but I was astonished at how much they got from this and the degree of sophistication in their handling of it. The application to science was clearly seen and explored. Since they had followed a “funding vs benefit” example, I took them on to explore the idea of how finite public funding for science should be allocated: that, too, went extraordinarily well.

[contributed by Rose]