Students from the Barton Peveril Sixth Form College Linguistics Club have been victorious in the first round of the Advanced UK Linguistics Olympiad, which took place in mid-February.
Eight students from the Barton Peveril linguistics club passed the Olympiad, with one bronze medalist, two silver medalists, and one gold medalist. The challenge sets out to test students’ problem solving and logical thinking skills, as they confront five unfamiliar regional and tribal languages. Students that partake in the Olympiad learn macro, micro, theoretical, concrete, applied and creative skills, as they learn to translate phrases in unforeseen languages, through finding patterns in the text given.
Dougie Howells, a First Year student at the College, is one of the 90 gold medalists in the first stage of this year’s contest. A total of 1700 students took part in the national Olympiad. Howells began to be interested in linguistics early on, whilst he was studying Spanish and German in Year Eight. Whilst at secondary school, Dougie was introduced to the Linguistic Olympiad by one of his language teachers. His interest in linguistics was further supported by the facilities available at the college, such as the Linguistics Club.
Speaking on his success, the former Brookfield Community School student said:
I’m super pleased to have achieved gold in the UKLO, and I’m really excited for round two! I’m also really thrilled the club has been such a success, even without the strong results we got. I can’t wait for next year – hopefully there’ll be even more certificates!’
Howells will go on to compete in the second round of the Advanced competition on Wednesday March 22.
