Mount St. Joseph Girls’ College, Altona (MSJ) was lucky to be chosen to host the Victorian state finals of the Aurecon Bridge Building Competition this year.
Aurecon Bridge Building Competition offers secondary school students a ‘real-world’ experience of what they can look forward to as future engineering students and professionals. Students are given a set of specifications and they use them to build the strongest bridge possible. The College team that builds the strongest bridge that can sustain the greatest weight is named the winner.
Congratulations to the MSJ student team, Augustina Baw Baw, Tam Maryoe and Sarvleen Kaur who won first prize for the strongest bridge and $500 prize money for the College. This was an outstanding achievement considering the competition from 42 other Colleges from across the State. Thank you to their teacher, Thy Nguyen, who has supported the students throughout the competition and organised MSJ to be the host College.
We look forward to seeing what these three very talented potential engineers achieve in the future and life beyond MSJ.
In the students’ own words:
“On September 18, MSJ hosted the State Final of the Aurecon Bridge Building Competition, an engineering challenge for secondary schools across Australia and New Zealand. This year we were up against 42 other schools in Victoria. Augustina, Tam and I worked together to design a bridge using the materials provided, including balsa wood, string and glue. We named our team The Three Bridgeteers. After many practice runs, we designed a bridge which was made up of a lot of triangle trusses, which are very strong structures.
We named our construction the Royal Trust Bridge. It weighed less than 200 grams and held 85.6kg. Our team won first place for the strength award and collected $500 prize money for our College. We were very happy with our achievement which was a great improvement from last year when our bridge only held 44kg.
It was amazing how many different and unique designs schools came up with for their bridges. We are very inspired by this competition to follow a career in engineering. We enjoyed this experience and wish we could do it again. It was very rewarding and something that we will carry in our hearts for the rest of our lives.”
Augustina Baw Baw, Tam Maryoe and Sarvleen Kaur
Nicole McGee
Marketing & Communications Officer
Mount St Joseph’s Girls College
Altona, Victoria