Australia : Minister for Defence Materiel Jason Clare today congratulated Australian students from Brighton Secondary School in Adelaide on winning the F1 in Schools World Championships in Abu Dhabi overnight.
The F1 in Schools program is an international initiative that encourages high school students to design, develop and build futuristic model Formula One race cars.
“Australian teams placed first, fourth and fifth in the international competition which involved teams from 25 nations – an outstanding result,” Mr Clare said.
The team from Engadine High School in Sydney came fourth and also won the ‘Best International Collaboration’ award.“I visited the team at Engadine High School in in May and saw the hard work that goes into a successful team,” Mr Clare said.
“They have to work together, develop marketing material, explain their plans to the judges and manage their project.”An Australian team made up of students from Trinity Grammar and Kyabram College in Victoria placed fifth.
This is the third time in the event’s history that an Australian team has been crowned World Champions. It is also the second year in a row that an Australian school has won – last year the team from Brooks High School in Tasmania won the World Championship in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Mr Clare said that the F1 in Schools program is a great way to get Australian students interested in engineering as a future career path. Since 2008 the Defence Materiel Organisation has provided funding of $982,000 to Re-Engineering Australia to conduct the F1 in Schools program.
“Over the next 10 to 15 years, the Australian Defence Force will replace or upgrade about 85 per cent of its equipment and a lot of that work will be done here in Australia,” Mr Clare said.
“We’ll need engineers to design, produce and maintain that equipment and that’s why Defence is supporting this program.”