On 31^st January, the Geography department from MPW London headed east to the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park for the GCSE Urban Environments fieldwork. The aim of this trip was to study the level of regeneration in the area.

Having started from the Olympic Park, the winding route ended up in Hackney Wick. Stops were taken throughout the day, requiring students to engage in a range of data collection techniques. The trip appealed to everyone; with tallying for the analytical brain, questionnaires with the public for the socially active and sketching the landscape for the artistic maestros!

The area is one which was studied in class, so it was gratifying to see the extent of the regeneration. Several students came away from the day with fresh views on which apartment building they’d choose to live in, what the best shopping centre in London was and a new appreciation of how much planning had gone into the project leading up to the Olympics in 2012.

The enthusiasm from the students was encouraging, one could even say impressive, due to weather choosing to be especially difficult and we walked a long way! The sketches provided and the quality of the data collection were excellent given the cold winds. The trip has provided the students with a plethora of data to translate into a detailed write up, and will give them a strong platform for the fieldwork section of their GCSE Human Geography exam.