Students from MET School Mt Victoria put their engineering skills to the test amid fierce competitors this month at the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation’s (ANSTO) Discover Engineering Day.
Challenges included designing and building a functioning bionic leg out of basic materials, and building a stable tower out of paper.
The event, organised by Engineers Australia, gave 149 students from 16 schools the chance to meet with some of ANSTO’s inspiring young engineers.
Rod Dowler, from ANSTO’s Discovery Centre, said that it was a great opportunity to make students aware of the important role of engineering in our society.
“ANSTO is home to some of Australia’s best engineers and research infrastructure including the OPAL multi-purpose reactor, and we’ll need the next generation of engineers to help us to continue to meet some challenges of the future,” said Dowler.
ANSTO is part of an international collaboration that is constructing the world's largest tokamak, a magnetic fusion device that harnesses the energy of nuclear fusion to produce electricity.
Called ITER, the sheer scale of this project is mind-blowing, involving temperatures of about 200 million degrees and 100,000 kilometres of superconducting cables to create the magnetic field.
The next generation of engineers will play a key role in overcoming some of the major hurdles of this project, to enable us to realise the opportunity to redefine the way the world produces energy.
“Engineers work in every area imaginable – from building skyscrapers, to artificial limbs like the students got to try their hands at, through to the next-generation of advanced technologies,” said Mr Dowler.
“More and more we are seeing the importance of STEM skills, and that they will be key to students in the future – and, for many of them, the jobs they’ll have in 10 or 15 years don’t even exist yet.
“Building their skills now, and encouraging their interests is key to getting them to really start to think about the applications and outcomes of science and engineering, challenging them to look more broadly at where STEM could take them.
“Discover Engineering Day is a great opportunity for the students to get a better understanding of what it might mean to be an engineer, as it’s a field that has a great diversity of applications and could take you down any road.
“ANSTO is always thrilled to welcome new groups of students to our campus, to help them understand more about what a career in science, technology, mathematics or in this case, engineering, could mean for them outside the classroom.
“All of our participating students showed ingenuity and enthusiasm, and that is always wonderful to see. Congratulations to the MET Mt Victoria students for their amazing engineering feats.”
ANSTO encourages people of all ages to get involved in science, and welcomes more than 15,000 visitors each year to the main campus at Lucas Heights, to see science in action.
Each school holidays, ANSTO runs dedicated programs for school students in many different areas including coding, robotics, engineering and more. For more information go to www.ansto.gov.au/events
