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Thank you Alex!

March 11, 2009 in News | No comments

We would like to express our appreciation and gratitude to Alex Viglienzone for the enormous effort she has undertaken as MyScience Mentor Coordinator from 2006 to 2008. Alex has attracted many talented scientist mentors into the program, carefully matched them with schools and coordinated classroom visits – quite literally a moving feast. Alex also accompanied many of the mentors on their visits to schools to ensure things ran seamlessly and to maximize the quality time mentors spent with students. Her attention to detail, superb service and calming influence have been invaluable to us all and to the success of the program.

Alex leaves us with a wealth of knowledge in a comprehensive Mentor Coordinator manual that she has produced. She will also be ‘mentoring’ our new Coordinator, Gillian Rowland.

MyScience wins BHERT Best Education and Training Collaboration award for 2008

November 30, 2008 in News | No comments

MyScience was awarded the 2008 Best Education and Training Collaboration at the Business and Higher Education Round Table (B-HERT) Awards ceremony on Friday November 21, 2008.

Anne Forbes accepts the BHERT award on behalf of the MyScience team

The B-HERT awards recognize outstanding achievements in collaboration between business and higher education in the fields of Research and Development, Education and Training and Community Engagement. The criteria for judging collaborations as worthy of an award are innovativeness, the strength of the relationship between collaborating partners, outreach inclusion, wider outcomes achieved and cultural impact on the partner/organization.
The purpose of the B-HERT is to pursue initiatives that will advance the goals and improve the performance of both business and higher education for the benefit of Australian society. B-HERT is the only body where leaders of Australia’s business, research, professional and academic communities come together to address important issues of common concern, to improve the interaction between Australian business and higher education institutions, and to help guide the future directions of higher education. In pursuing this mission B-HERT aims to influence public opinion and government policy on selected issues of importance. B-HERT believes that a prerequisite for a more prosperous and equitable society in Australia is a more highly-educated community.

The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Education, Julia Gillard, in her address at the Awards gala dinner challenged universities and business to work more closely with schools, including primary schools. This is in line with recent media comments from the new Chief Scientist Professor Penny Sackett, Rupert Murdoch, and Heather Ridout (Australian Industry Group).

Tags: award, BHERT

MyScience students take Young Scientist Awards

November 7, 2008 in News | No comments

The recent Young Scientist 2008 Awards presentation was a proud moment for all of us involved in MyScience – students, parents, teachers, principals, mentors and project team members from ACU, DET, IBM and Sydney University. This year, 50% of the awards in the primary category were given to MyScience students. There were over 500 primary school teams that submitted entries to the Young Scientist Award Scheme and only 24 finalists. Of these 12 were from MyScience schools: Beecroft PS, Beresford Road PS, Quakers Hill PS and Quakers Hill East PS. In addition, seven teams from both Beecroft PS and Quakers Hill Public School were each given a Certificate of Excellence, a secondary award also indicating submissions of a high standard.

The Budding Young Scientist Award, the K-2 equivalent of the Young Scientist Award was given to students from Quakers Hill Public School.

The Arup Built Environment Award, given to the primary entry that best demonstrates scientific/engineering efficiency, resource planning, structural design and/or environmental sustainability was awarded to students from Beecroft Public School.

In his address to the audience on behalf of the NSW Minister of Education, Lindsay Wasson, Director of the Department of Education, Western Region paid tribute to the efforts of those involved in MyScience and acknowledged the impact the program has made in primary science education so far.

Congratulations to all the award winners and their teachers, principals and mentors!

Tags: award, Young Scientist

Calling all scientists and engineers…

March 22, 2008 in News | No comments

MyScience is about to commence for the 2008 school year, in more classes and more schools. We need more scientist mentors!

Spark kids’ curiosity about the world…then help them answer their own questions. Be part of a team to inspire a whole new breed of young scientists!

Here’s an opportunity for scientists or engineers who would like to mentor primary school children as they carry out their own scientific investigations on a topic of their choice. The time commitment required involves two 2-hour classroom visits (along with other mentors) and about 1 to 2 hours a week of online mentoring from June to August 2008. To find out more, send us a note through the Contact page and come to the mentor briefing session on 31 March.

A Patron for MyScience

December 11, 2007 in News | No comments

We are delighted to announce that Professor Richard Collins has accepted our invitation to become our patron. We are confident that with his wealth of experience, Richard will be able to inspire a whole new generation of budding scientists to take up science in high school and later as a career.