The Spark Issue 1 - Bright Sparks
←
→
Page content transcription
If your browser does not render page correctly, please read the page content below
The Spark Issue 1
Welcome back to
Skills Bright Sparks
2019!
Skills Bright Sparks is New Zealand’s longest running national competition for young inventors.
Bright Sparks continues to carve the way for young inventors and entrepreneurs to explore their
passion and talent in electronic and digital technologies.
So, what’s changed?
This year we’re thrilled to be kicking off Bright Sparks with our longest standing partner, Skills. You may not
know this, but Skills has been the backbone of Bright Sparks for over 20 years and what better way to
celebrate this than to rename it after them! You’ll notice the website has a new look and feel in support of
this, but don’t worry that’s pretty much all that’s changing – it will still be the same competition we all know
and love.
So, let’s get down to it. On Friday 27th of September competition entries officially open and you’ll be
able to jump on our website and enter your invention – remember, its video entries only just like last year.
Every year we are blown away by the remarkable ideas and effort you bright sparks put in. Whether your
invention is trying to improve our environment and/or communities, help your family out or just a simple life-
hack that saves you loads of time, we want to see them
all!
Our categories this year
We have a whole range of different categories which we
are sure will cover everyone’s projects. We have People’s
Choice, Overall Male and Female, Junior and Senior
Hardware Engineering and Software Engineering as well
as our Special Applications category which covers
specialist fields that combine science, tech and
engineering. Examples of subjects that might fall into this
category include the environment, health and wellbeing,
sustainability, and science.
Make sure your project is staying true to what your goal is
and that you actually enjoy developing it and have an
enormous amount of fun along the way. Who knows, you
may end up working for Google, Microsoft or Facebook,
like some of our past finalists and winners. Or you could
just start the next big thing in tech!
Also, make sure you’re thinking about your project
now and starting to get prepared, September seems like
a long way away but trust us, it will sneak up on you! To
get a head start register your project idea here.
Role on September and let’s see what you’ve got!
Meet our Skills Bright
Sparks Ambassador –
Mikayla Stokes
If you’re looking for a brilliant idea to
enter into the Skills Bright Sparks
Competition, “STOP!” says Mikayla
Stokes.
That, she says, is not what you should be
looking for. Instead, turn your attention to
looking for a problem.
And she might just know what she’s talking
about. Mikayla has been named a Skills
Bright Sparks Ambassador for 2019 after
winning the Bright Sparks Competition twice
– once in 2016 and again, last year, in 2018
– and, in the process, become known as one
of New Zealand’s up-and-coming science
and technology inventors.
“It’s honestly not actually coming up with an
idea,” says Mikayla. “It’s coming up with a
problem. Because you can come up with a
crazy brilliant idea, but if it doesn’t have a
purpose or solve a problem, then what is the
point?
“Every single project I have come up with,
Mikayla Stokes was solving people’s everyday problems.
Skills Bright Sparks Ambassador What I find is if you analyse different parts
and Overall Winner 2018 of both your own and other people’s lives,
that’s the key to finding a good problem. And
then building something to solve this.”
Think like an entrepreneur
Mikayla, who is now in her first year at the University of Auckland studying a
Bachelor of Engineering, describes herself as a science
communicator and entrepreneur. And she believes thinking like an
entrepreneur also helps when it comes to inventing.
“While I was coming up with my inventions, I realised that you
are actually engineering a product for a problem, which will be used by real
people, your customers. So, as an entrepreneur, for whatever I am building or
inventing, I think ‘how can I make it better and solve my customer’s problem?’
“So, try seeing your idea as more of a product to help someone. Why would they buy it? What is the
purpose of the product? What makes this better than any other solution that is currently out there?”
An example of solving a customer problem was Mikayla’s 2018 Bright Sparks project – an automated
vertical garden that could be controlled through a smartphone app, called
My Vege Wall. The garden incorporates an automated hydroponics system which maintains the pH and
nutrient levels of the plants. It was designed for apartment dwellers, or those with minimal space and
time to house a full garden.
It won Mikayla the Overall Female Award for Bright Sparks 2018 and a regional Young Entrepreneur of the
Year award – as well as offers to buy the business concept.
It’s a learning process
But even though Mikayla’s My Vege Wall involves a wide understanding of elements of physics,
biology and technology, she is quick to point out that she certainly didn’t start out with all the answers when
she began her project.
“The whole point of the project is that it is a learning experience,” she says. “So, don’t expect that you need
to know everything and have all the answers – in fact, you probably haven’t learnt half of it yet – but you will
learn new technical skills as you go along. These are all really useful skills to learn.”
It’s also a fallacy that you must be a rocket scientist – or top of the class in all your school subjects – to
enter a competition like Skills Bright Sparks.
“Back in primary school, I sucked at math, I wasn’t good at science, I wasn’t good at anything,” says
Mikayla. “But I went from failing at school to building robots that were bigger than I was. Because it is by
making these projects that you learn these incredible skills.
“Bright Sparks helped me turn down the entrepreneurial road because it gave me the ability to create
products to solve people’s real problems. I realised that this kind of entrepreneurship is what I really love
doing. I got that desire from just doing it, and trying and testing my ideas, and not being afraid to fail.”
“You can come up
with a crazy
brilliant idea, but if
it doesn’t have a
purpose or solve a
problem, then what
is the point?”
Mikayla Stokes with her winning invention, MyVegeWall, 2018
The worlds next techno-eco-warrior!
Genevieve Cartmell
How many young adults can tell you at age 12 what they want to be in life?
Very few. Genevieve Cartmell can. She wants to be a scientist, with an
interest in technology for environmental conservation. Already she has
designed and created a piece of scientific equipment that is turning heads,
winning awards, and will soon be field-tested.
Genevieve’s prototype creation resulted in her being named the Joint
Winner of the Skills Bright Sparks Junior Hardware Engineering Award for
2018. And she picked up a special prize in the field of conservation for
health and well-being.
Her invention is the cleverly named H20 EQB8TA. It’s an E. coli incubator
that promises to transform the troublesome monitoring of polluted water
ways. Scientists and Citizen Scientists can’t wait to get their hands on it.
Genevieve’s incubator is less expensive because all the materials are
open source. “But I experimented with quite a lot of equipment. Transistors
can get really hot. I went through a few of those!” Nigel says to overcome
Genevieve Cartmell that problem she installed a relay to control heating levels. “She wired it up
with her winning invention herself.” Genevieve's ability with electronics is at a level where she
the H20 EQB8A researches a component on the internet, finds the correct wiring diagram
and source code, and adapts the code for her own needs to install on an
Arduino microprocessor. We bought a new 12-digit keypad that didn't have instructions. After a bit of
tinkering she got it working, which had me wondering could she MacGyver an old telephone keypad if
Jaycar was closed?
She designed and drew the incubator using Fusion
360 modelling software which she learned off
YouTube. “She coded and debugged the software,
designed the electronics and soldered the circuits.”
Nigel said his role was mainly watching over the 3D
printer late at night when Genevieve was tucked up
in bed. “The things parents do!”
Finally, an application was made to Bright Sparks
and was accepted. Genevieve was on to her
3rd prototype by now. Then she heard she was a
finalist. How exciting the night of the awards was she
says. “Winning two awards, I was over the moon!”
What’s next? Have a read of Genevieve’s full story
here!
So, what are previous
Bright Sparks up to now?
Back in 2004, Refael Whyte entered the Skills Bright Sparks
competition and had no idea the impact it would have on his
tertiary education and career choice.
You may be surprised to find out that Refael didn't win a prize, but the
exposure and mentoring he received gave him something far more
valuable - a career choice he hadn't considered before. "Bright Sparks
was a big help by exposing what an electrical engineer does. At high
school you're exposed to the traditional professional careers, such as
doctors and lawyers,” Refael says.
Refael Whyte with his ToF Camera at MIT
“Engineers are kind of these magical things and no one really
knows what they actually do."
Achieving his dreams
Finishing high school, Refael began his studies at the University of Waikato and graduated with a first-class
honours degree in electrical engineering. He specialised in Time of Flight (ToF) cameras, which create 3D
images. He built his own ToF camera which included designing the print circuit board, circuitry construction
and programming of the camera.
After graduation, Refael won an internship at Microsoft Silicon Valley, California, where he worked on the
3D imaging capabilities of the Xbox One. Refael returned to NZ to complete his PhD and as a consequence
of his specialism spent ten months studying at MIT, Boston. Through all his studies and work he was able
to really explore his field of interest and the world by spending time in Brussels and United Kingdom for
Microsoft as well as attending conferences in Israel and Spain.
He credits Bright Sparks for this, "When it came to choosing a major at university, I knew I wanted to do
something Science and Engineering related. I think having the exposure to electronics when I entered
Bright Sparks really influenced my decision to go with Electrical Engineering and cascaded into where I am
today."
Refael is now a co-founder of the 3D vision technology developer, Chronoptics. The company designs 3D
camera systems, building on a decade of ground-breaking research conducted in the Range Imaging
research group of the University of Waikato, developing technologies and algorithms to improve the quality
and overcoming limitations of ToF imaging systems. See his full story.
Refael’s advice to young inventors
Refael tells young Kiwis to dream bigger and that with hard work and
dedication you can achieve your goals.
“I think the competition is a great opportunity, deadlines are a fantastic
motivator. It’s great to have an idea and do something about it and with Skills
Bright Sparks you get the support and mentorship to really give it a go.”
Newsworthy Updates! Black hole image proves Tauranga mathematician's half- century old theory Article originally published in The NZ Herald 12th April 2019 While the world stood with an open mouth, wowed by the first image ever captured of a black hole, University of Canterbury’s distinguished Professor Roy Kerr was not surprised at all. If anything, it looked precisely what the award-winning mathematician suspected it would and proved his half-century-old theory correct. “It would have been a great surprise if what they saw contradicted what I had found” Kerr told the Bay of Plenty Times from his home in Tauranga. The picture released shows a halo of dust and gas, tracing the outline of a colossal black hole, at the heart of the messier 87 galaxy, 55 million light years from Earth. It has been heralded as a game-changing event for New Zealand science as it illustrated Kerr’s 56-year-old theory of rotating black holes. Source : https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12221407
If you would like to continue receiving the Skills Bright Sparks newsletter, please email brightsparks@skills.org.nz and let us know! We can sign you up to our mailing list right away. *By emailing us, you are consenting to your email address being used solely for us to send you ‘The Spark’ newsletter. You will not be added to any other mailing lists and your details will remain confidential. POSTERS! POSTERS! POSTERS If you would also like to get your hands on our awesome posters email us your postal address and we will send them right out to you!
You can also read
