In September, 2016, UCL invited the Departments of Religious Studies, and of Science to participate in UCL’s Institute of Education’s work on improving the understanding of Year 9 students of the interaction between religion and science in the contemporary world.  We decided to accept their invitation, and became one of six schools participating.

The RS Department had already taught what we call, ‘The BIG Question: How do science and religion get along?’  UCL’s surveys and lesson plans made a good addition to what we had already done.  After online interviews with some of our students, the UCL interviewer was impressed by the grasp that students at Fulston Manor already had of the issues and ideas involved.

The lessons prepared by UCL were taught by Mr Seppala to two of his Year 9 groups, 9GL and 9GR.  The lessons delivered to 9GR were videoed so that UCL could accurately gauge the success of their preparation.  As a consequence, the RS Department will be revising its ‘BIG Question’ for teaching in September, 2017, to incorporate some of the good ideas in UCL’s lessons.

Events of the 21^st century have once again shown the importance of both science and religion in the world, for good and for ill: whilst some humans are developing the means to eradicate malaria, others are inventing evermore destructive weapons; and whilst some religious believers are seeking to help heal the world’s divisions, other are set upon a course to increase those divisions.  It is therefore of paramount importance that people today are both scientifically and religiously informed so that they can contribute to what benefits humankind and planet Earth, and help convince others to abandon violence as a means to achieve their goals