Page 24 - SASTA Journal 2017

22 SASTA Journal Number 02 / 2017
Without sponsors, events like the Oliphant Science Awards cannot happen, and I would also like to thank the sponsors of this competition for providing prizes and lling the recipients with a sense of pride and achievement in their work.
In addition, I would like to thank all of the teachers who have shaped me into the young scientist I am today.
My story starts in the early days of school. Born too
late in the year to be in the grade above, I was content with being a freakishly tall reception for six terms at Walkerville Primary School before entering Grade One
in 2008. My teacher in my nal terms in reception had seen something in me, and started the ball rolling for
me to skip from Grade One to Grade Two. This gift has fuelled me and helped me to push myself throughout my academic career. I made amazing friends with similar interests and started on my path in science. In Grade Three, my science teacher organised for CSIRO’s Lab on Legs Program to talk to my class. This is where I learnt the joy of Forensic Science, and since then I’ve known that that was the career I wanted to spend my entire life working towards. This small story shows how teachers can completely change our lives with such simple acts. By simply kindling my potential, Mrs Ewens helped me on the path to my scienti c career very early on and for that I’m incredibly thankful.
One more amazing Walkerville teacher I would like
to mention is Mrs. Sheppard. Mrs. Sheppard and her homework activities are the entire reason that I am
here today talking to you. One week in Grade Three
she decided that we should make board games for homework. I created my rst game; Tree Frog Trouble. I was so enamoured with the process of game making that I decided to enter the Oliphant Science Awards Games Category the next year. And I’ve been entering the Awards every year since.
So thank you Walkerville, for everything.
Another teacher I would like to mention is Pulteney’s own Mr. Johnson. For my rst two years in Secondary School at Pulteney Grammar, he always made sure I had what I needed, and even when I left, he gave me a promise that their facilities would always be open to me, which means the world. So thank you Mr Johnson for all your support and I hope I continue to see you each year at these Awards with the newest batch of Pulteney’s potential scientists.
Thank you.”
As another Oliphant Science Awards Presentation Night comes to a close, SASTA wishes to thank the sponsors that support the Oliphant Science Awards.
Now for OSA 2018 ......
My last teacher thank you goes to my newest Science teacher Mr Robinson for his lessons, and my Science Co-ordinator at Norwood Morialta, Chris Felsted, for his uncontrollable excitement when he told me I had won this incredible Award. We both had a mini freak out for a few minutes when he pulled me out of English class, as he stressed upon me that “NO ONE MUST KNOW”. Being the blabber mouth that I am, this was super dif cult, but
– and I’m proud of this – when I was met with a chorus of “What was that about?” when I re-entered class, I kept my lip zipped and simply said “stuff.”
Finally, I would just like to thank all of my science teachers; from Mrs McLachlan in primary school to Mr Robinson this year, you’ve all been inspirational.
Now that I’ve nished thanking every person that ever lent me a pencil in science class, I’d like to talk to you about my game. The earth and how we take care of it has always been a subject of great interest to me, and so I created a game that centred on sending off teams of scientists to revegetate each of the world’s biomes.
‘Race to Save the Planet’ has been my favourite game thus far, because of all the small details that make it beautiful. I designed the characters myself, drawing
a pro le for each, and naming them after some of my closest friends. Their bios are full of puns about their specialist biomes and there are even name tags. I’m
so proud of this game, and, as I do every year, I have learnt so much through creating it. People may think of the games category as just a fun thing to do, but all up
I spent about 80 hours researching and creating this game and pulled a few late nighters in the last week of production to get it all nished. My parents have always been a massive support to me throughout these Awards, sticking with me when I have a hissy t about something not being perfect, and helping me to re ne my ideas when I get a bit too excited. They’re constantly there for me and I love them very much, so thank you mum and dad, you’re amazing!
I never thought that I would be here, accepting this Award, and I’m honestly still in shock a little bit.
Thank you very much to the judges for seeing in me the makings of an Oliphant Trophy Winner, as it is a massive honour, and to everyone in the audience that doesn’t think that they’ll ever get here; just try. Try your hardest, do your best, make yourself work harder and in a more determined way than ever and never give up, because even the greatest scientists were kids with toy microscopes at some point.
I’d like to leave you with another inspirational quote from Sir Mark Oliphant, one that typi es a man whose love was for creativity and invention, and which strikes a chord in the world that we live in.
“I’ve always felt that if one felt strongly about something, one should be outspoken about it; that one shouldn’t tolerate what one regarded as evil.”
So continue to invent, create, inspire, nurture, care for the environment, stand up for what you believe in and above all, just as Sir Mark did, move forward in life with peace and humility.