The Kings School Partnerships

Student Philosophy Conference A Huge Success

We were delighted to host our second student philosophy conference and teacher CPD in October in conjunction with the University of Kent Philosophy department.

We welcomed 90 A level philosophy and RS students from across 7 local schools to join our philosophy students in a busy day of talks and discussion groups. Topics covered by the students included eating animals, Aristotle, evidence in medicine and time travel whilst the teachers had a full day’s CPD covering items such as teaching controversial issues, exam technique and the question of existence.

We were extremely lucky to welcome speakers involved in the production of Philosophy A level text books and syllabus and speakers from the University of Kent giving the students further insight into studying the subject at undergraduate level.

The day was finished off with presentations from groups of students on a topic of their choice.

The students found the day really useful and inspiring meeting with others studying the same subject and having a taste of studying philosophy at university. One of our 6b King’s philosophy students told us, “I’ve really enjoyed the University lecture style of the talks—I definitely like that. We heard from Alexandra Trofimov on ‘Can computers think?’ which was much more contextualised compared to what we’re used to doing at A Level. There’s much more detail.”

The teachers also found the day hugely beneficial and supportive and were very proud of their student’s who gave their presentations at the end of the day.