On 30 November the WiTWA team delivered our final techtrails STEM & Future Skills Incursion for 2017. Capping off a full program of 10 incursions throughout the year, our final event saw us visit Geraldton Senior College (www.gsc.wa.edu.au). With a cohort of amazing STEM and industry role models we presented to over 170 students from both Geraldton Senior College and John Willcock College (www.johnwillcock.wa.edu.au).
Thank you to all who made this event possible, and especially to our generous group of STEM professionals for making themselves available and agreeing to share their personal techtrail stories to inspire the next generation:
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Ms Bindi Isbister from the Department of Agriculture and Food who shared her exciting career which has seen her work as a researcher and agronomist with farmers and agricul suppliers across Australia to help farmers apply new technologies.
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Suzy Jackson from the CSIRO who has designed receivers and electronics for some of the biggest radio telescopes in the world, and is now working at the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder, in the Murchison.
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Shane Adams who is a Marine Technician with the Royal Australian Navy.
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Jen Hanrahan, Director, Owner and Web Designer from Blaze Digital, who used her unique skills to work with a global team of web developers and local graphic designers to build and manage websites for a broad range of businesses in Geraldton and Australia wide.
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Belinda Lycett Lecturer of Applied and Environmental Sciences at Central Regional TAFE. In her role she is able to work within an operational laboratory setting as well as in the field; and of course teach at the same time.
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Angharad Thomas and Danii Baron-Heeris from Scitech, Perth who brought the Scitech Robotics Challenge to Geraldton.
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Darren Lomman, Executive Officer, Bloom and Managing Director, Green Batch, as well as Director of Youth Innovation, St Catherine College @ UWA inspired the students after lunch with his interactive workshop on repurposing plastics to save our oceans.
Our special thanks also goes to Hazel Snell from Geraldton Senior College and Hollie Roberts from John Willcock College for their work and support in enabling us to bring this initiative to Geraldton. We also acknowledge the support provided by the Australian Government enabling us to deliver techtrails to thousands of secondary school students in WA throughout 2017.
