Schools Writing Competition Trinity Term 2019


We are pleased to announce the winners of the Trinity Term 2019 Oxford Scientist national school science writing competition! Through our science writing competitions, we hope to encourage school students to think about science outside of the classroom, and give them the opportunity to explore their own scientific interests in a creative way. This term, students in Years 10-13 were asked to write a short article about ‘how science can change the world’.

The articles were judged by our panel of experts, who selected the winning article to be published in the TT19 issue of The Oxford Scientist and win a £50 Amazon voucher, sponsored by .

The winning article, as selected by our panel of judges is:

Science Can Change the World – If it is Given the Chance to by Ben Bradley, Year 12, Reigate College, Surrey.

Runners-up were:



Our Judges

  • Dr Jack Rowbotham is a researcher in inorganic chemistry at Oxford University, and is a Junior Research Fellow at Linacre College. He is interested in catalysis, and exploring new methods for making valuable chemicals in a greener and more sustainable manner. Jack is also keen to promote chemistry to audiences beyond the lab, and has twice been a regional finalist in the Famelab competition.
  • Dr Nikita Ved is a Novo Nordisk Research Fellow at the department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics, and also a EPA Cephalosporin Junior Research Fellow at Linacre College. She researches into why diabetes during pregnancy causes congenital birth defects.
  • Thomas Hornigold is an atmospheric physics DPhil student, where he studies climate models run on climateprediction.net, a huge set of volunteers’ computers. In his free time, he hosts a podcast about physics (Physical Attraction) and writes popular science articles for Singularity Hub.
  • Jacqueline Gill is a DPhil student in Evolutionary Microbiology. She was a co-founder of The Oxford Scientist magazine, established the first national Oxford Scientist school science writing competition, and has continued running the competition ever since.

If you have any questions about the competition, please take a look at our new FAQs section, or email [email protected].


If your school, sixth form or college would like to subscribe to The Oxford Scientist for just £15 per year, please contact [email protected].