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Thursday, 31 May 2012

If you're at the age where police and doctors seem to be getting younger, wait until you see the engineers.

Governor Stirling Senior High School is about to seal a partnership with UWA and some leading engineering firms to help them start teaching engineering at high school level next year.

While engineering is already a subject students can take in year 11 and 12 for their WA Certificate of Education, the plan at GSSHS is to run the program from year 8, with projects designed by UWA staff and students, and mentoring from UWA and companies including Sinclair Knight Merz and Beacon.

Associate Professor Jeremy Leggoe, Deputy Dean, External Relations, in the Faculty of Engineering Computing and Mathematics, has been liaising with the school for more than a year to help set up the program. It will begin at the start of the school year in 2013, when GSSHS moves back into its newly refurbished premises.

"They are building purpose-designed workshops for the engineering students," Professor Leggoe said. "There are still lots of details that need to be sorted out, but the plan is for us to help them design a couple of projects a year for each year group. Then students from groups such as Engineers Without Borders and Robogals will participate in activities with the students, and staff will go out to the school from time to time. There is also a possible opportunity to get the school teachers involved in projects with our courses here."

The school is part of the WA Education Department's gifted and talented program and will become a specialist centre for engineering education. It is also part of the UWA Aspire program which targets schools whose graduates seldom come to UWA .

The UWA -GSSHS engineering program has several goals, one of which is to encourage the high school students to study at UWA and to promote engineering as a career pathway.

Dean of Engineering, Winthrop Professor John Dell, said a two-pronged initiative was needed to achieve this.

"First, we need to get high school (and primary school) students to maintain their interest in mathematics," he said. "We believe that showing students, through practical engineering examples and projects, how maths works to get practical answers, will be a strong motivator for them to continue their maths studies.

"We also need to show them that engineering is the biggest tool for social change that our society has. Engineers not only implement this change but can influence the direction of this change.

"Engineering is more than calculating the right answer. It is about sustainability, social impact and environmental responsibility and finding solutions to the very big problems facing the world, including climate change, poverty, supply of clean water and health services."

The school will offer two streams in its engineering program: academic and vocational. "The academic stream is likely to appeal to the students in the gifted and talented program, who want to continue on to study engineering at university," Professor Leggoe said. "The students in the vocational stream will learn engineering skills that will set them up for taking on a trade when they leave school."

It is also hoped the program will attract more girls to the study of engineering.

A memorandum of understanding between UWA and GSSHS will be signed soon.

Published in UWA News , 28 May 2012

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