Students Crack the Code

27th Jun, 2008, by Jude Owens

Students at The Kings of Wessex School enjoyed some declassified Mathematical history when they hosted a visit by one of the World War II Enigma machines escorted by Nadia Baker of Cambridge University.

Year 10 Mathematicians were treated to a presentation by Ms Baker who took the machine apart and explained its workings; before the students had opportunity to try to crack their own codes. This was a rare opportunity for the students to see an Enigma machine close up - and outside a box in a museum.

This was one of the school's Maths Enrichment events to provide a glimpse of Maths in the working world albeit from World War II. The Intelligence Service is the biggest employer of Mathematicians. Appropriately, in the 100th anniversary of James Bond's creator Ian Fleming students were enlightened about using Maths in the Secret Service. Codes in the form of encryption continue to play a fundamental part in modern society underpinning much of the IT revolution.

Commenting on the day, Maths Enrichment Leader Tim Powell said, "I am delighted that all our young Mathematicians got so much out of the Enigma machine visit and I hope that some of them might go on to consider a career working for the Government."

There has long been a tradition of Kings' Maths Department being a top secret Bletchley Park for the day as students discover more about the cipher-encoding Enigma Machine. Originally, Enigma expert Simon Singh brought one of the treasured machines to the school and visits are now funded from the school's Specialist Technology College fund.

During the evening parents and local groups were also excited to visit the school to see the machine close up. However, sixty years on, neither they, nor the students were sworn to secrecy.