Building Communities Schools Competition

Welcome

To celebrate Warwick University's 60th anniversary, the Department of Classics and Ancient History ran a competition for local schools and schools across the country with a focus on ancient buildings and the communities who interacted in these spaces. Just as our own community here at Warwick has been created through the interactions in the buildings on campus (our amazing new Faculty of Arts Building - the FAB - for example is a place where people from across the Faculty can interact and share ideas), so too did ancient communities come together and evolve through the shared spaces they inhabited.

The Competition

We wanted pupils to create a piece of work on the theme of 'Building Communities' which looked at ancient buildings/spaces and how these were used by communities in the ancient world. The winning entries each won a Lego pyramid for their school and a copy of Bettany Hughes 'The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World' (or for younger winners, 'How the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World Were Built' by Ludmila Henkova and Tomas Svoboda) with a few runners up also receiving copies of their preferred book.

We were looking for entries from Primary and Secondary Schools in the categories of Minecraft, Creative Design, and Creative Writing, with each entry to be accompanied by a short piece of writing (around 200 words) explaining why they chose their building/space and how communities used, interacted in, and maybe were even created through using this space

Judging and Winners

The entries were judged by a team of our students, Prof Alison Cooley, Dr Paul Grigsby, and as chief judge, Prof Michael Scott (left). Michael is best known for his work on the BBC including Ancient Invisible Cities, and Ancient Greece: The Greatest Show on Earth among others.

The winners have now been announced and you can view their work here.