By Michelle Ho and Kimberley Creek
Twenty four mentoring sessions, two surveys, countless innovative ideas… and this is just the first two weeks. Welcome to the 11th BrainSTEM Innovation Challenge (or 11BIC in short)!
Every fortnight, we aim to bring you updates with how our 12 teams are travelling during the 11BIC. Although our mentoring sessions have transitioned online due to the current global pandemic, it has not stopped the future generation of Australian STEM minds working on real-life challenges with their STEM industry or academic mentor.
Interested in joining our next BrainSTEM Innovation Challenge as a student participant or STEM industry/academic mentor?
In the 11BIC, we have 7 schools participating across Victoria and New South Wales with 46 students and twelve mentors. Highlights from this cohort include our first New South Wales school (Bethlehem College), five new schools and the returning of our long-standing mentors Charlie Ranscombe and Michelle Hall for their 9th and 7th BICs as BrainSTEM mentors respectively.
In this issue, we look at what the Trinity Grammar, Ruyton Girls' School and Korowa Anglican Girls' School teams have gotten up to.
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According to Jamie from Trinity Grammar (Team 02), the inquisitive minds over in their team brainstormed a variety of ideas, which led to the dilemma of decision paralysis over which idea to proceed with (a good dilemma to have!). The students then created a survey which was circulated among their friends and their wider school community to gauge interest on their ideas. We applaud the Trinity Grammar (Team 02) team for their methodical way of deciding which idea to pursue, and we are looking forward to finding out the results!
Twenty four mentoring sessions, two surveys, countless innovative ideas… and this is just the first two weeks. Welcome to the 11th BrainSTEM Innovation Challenge (or 11BIC in short)!
Every fortnight, we aim to bring you updates with how our 12 teams are travelling during the 11BIC. Although our mentoring sessions have transitioned online due to the current global pandemic, it has not stopped the future generation of Australian STEM minds working on real-life challenges with their STEM industry or academic mentor.
Interested in joining our next BrainSTEM Innovation Challenge as a student participant or STEM industry/academic mentor?
In the 11BIC, we have 7 schools participating across Victoria and New South Wales with 46 students and twelve mentors. Highlights from this cohort include our first New South Wales school (Bethlehem College), five new schools and the returning of our long-standing mentors Charlie Ranscombe and Michelle Hall for their 9th and 7th BICs as BrainSTEM mentors respectively.
In this issue, we look at what the Trinity Grammar, Ruyton Girls' School and Korowa Anglican Girls' School teams have gotten up to.
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According to Jamie from Trinity Grammar (Team 02), the inquisitive minds over in their team brainstormed a variety of ideas, which led to the dilemma of decision paralysis over which idea to proceed with (a good dilemma to have!). The students then created a survey which was circulated among their friends and their wider school community to gauge interest on their ideas. We applaud the Trinity Grammar (Team 02) team for their methodical way of deciding which idea to pursue, and we are looking forward to finding out the results!
Snippet of Trinity Grammar 2's online survey.
Our Ruyton teams are also off to a strong start with overflowing ideas! Cindy from Ruyton (Team 01) recalled how they used Mentimeter to explore how they were feeling about the BIC and learnt from their mentor Kim O’Sullivan about Design Thinking, which is a five-stage approach to solving problems. The three ideas they are considering at the moment are: waste in the medical industry, waste in homes and reducing screen time. Poppy from Ruyton (Team 02) shared that they have fifteen ideas currently on the table - lots of ideas to debate and analyse. Tune in to our next BrainSTEM Beats Blog to find out which idea they decide on!
Our Ruyton teams are also off to a strong start with overflowing ideas! Cindy from Ruyton (Team 01) recalled how they used Mentimeter to explore how they were feeling about the BIC and learnt from their mentor Kim O’Sullivan about Design Thinking, which is a five-stage approach to solving problems. The three ideas they are considering at the moment are: waste in the medical industry, waste in homes and reducing screen time. Poppy from Ruyton (Team 02) shared that they have fifteen ideas currently on the table - lots of ideas to debate and analyse. Tune in to our next BrainSTEM Beats Blog to find out which idea they decide on!
Source: https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/article/5-stages-in-the-design-thinking-process
A topic that came up a lot in Korowa (Team 01) team's discussion was the importance of social equity. As a result, they are keen to ensure that their idea either addresses a challenge that vulnerable people in our community face (poverty, homelessness or starvation) or creates something that is accessible for all (not only those who are 'well off'). Their first potential idea is developing a bra that can test its wearers for breast cancer, with each student researching a different area during the first few weeks.
However, mentor Alexandra Nance reminds her team of the 'fail fast' mentality: fail fast so you can learn quickly and continue to reiterate and progress.
This 'fail fast' mentality is encouraged by BrainSTEM's founder Sid Verma: "We encourage our students to 'fail fast': get comfortable with the idea of exploring new ideas but not being afraid if those ideas 'fail'. Failing and learning from your failures is integral to the Innovation Challenge. It is how we improve as learners. We want our student participants to get comfortable with failing, but we definitely don't want them to get too used to failing, as this is how innovation halts.”
Incredible advice for our students and mentors in our 11BIC! We look forward to how our talented teams progress over the next few weeks, and will keep you updated on the successes and 'failures' of their innovation journeys.
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The BrainSTEM Innovation Challenge is a twelve week program, where high school students across Australia work on a real-life challenge with their STEM industry or academic mentor. With this 11th iteration of the challenge, we are encouraging our teams to link their projects to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals as a way to demonstrate their real-world relevance.
Find out more about our BrainSTEM Innovation Challenges and how you can get involved in our next one here!
A topic that came up a lot in Korowa (Team 01) team's discussion was the importance of social equity. As a result, they are keen to ensure that their idea either addresses a challenge that vulnerable people in our community face (poverty, homelessness or starvation) or creates something that is accessible for all (not only those who are 'well off'). Their first potential idea is developing a bra that can test its wearers for breast cancer, with each student researching a different area during the first few weeks.
However, mentor Alexandra Nance reminds her team of the 'fail fast' mentality: fail fast so you can learn quickly and continue to reiterate and progress.
This 'fail fast' mentality is encouraged by BrainSTEM's founder Sid Verma: "We encourage our students to 'fail fast': get comfortable with the idea of exploring new ideas but not being afraid if those ideas 'fail'. Failing and learning from your failures is integral to the Innovation Challenge. It is how we improve as learners. We want our student participants to get comfortable with failing, but we definitely don't want them to get too used to failing, as this is how innovation halts.”
Incredible advice for our students and mentors in our 11BIC! We look forward to how our talented teams progress over the next few weeks, and will keep you updated on the successes and 'failures' of their innovation journeys.
--
The BrainSTEM Innovation Challenge is a twelve week program, where high school students across Australia work on a real-life challenge with their STEM industry or academic mentor. With this 11th iteration of the challenge, we are encouraging our teams to link their projects to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals as a way to demonstrate their real-world relevance.
Find out more about our BrainSTEM Innovation Challenges and how you can get involved in our next one here!
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