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Forty students recently participated in the STEM Festival, which aims to inspire and engage students, parents and teachers with STEM subjects.
Stem Festival 2019 was held in partnership with LeapEd Services, Heriot-Watt University Malaysia, GREAT UK Challenge Fund and Youth Made Malaysia.
It aimed to encourage students to consider Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects as study and career path options.
Forty students from four secondary schools within the Trust Schools programme participated in the event – Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Cyberjaya, Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Pulau Indah, Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Bandar Sunway and Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Salak Tinggi.
The festival, held at the Putrajaya campus of Heriot-Watt University, included a series of workshops and theory-focused sessions for students, culminating in an exciting drone flying challenge.
Throughout the day, students had hands-on experience in designing and building pre-engineered micro drones, mentored by students and lecturers from the University, as well as representatives from Youth Made Malaysia and LeapEd Services.
“Since 2016, Heriot-Watt has organised annual STEM Festivals for school children to further emphasise the importance of innovation and STEM-related subjects. As the first Mechanics Institute in the world when it was established in 1821, Heriot-Watt has had a long history in producing STEM practitioners and graduates since the first industrial revolution. Now as we are faced with the fourth industrial revolution, we are keen in supporting the promotion of STEM among the youth to lead the way in a challenging work landscape in the future.” - Professor Mushtak Al-Atabi, Provost and CEO of Heriot-Watt University Malaysia
The STEM Festival 2019 aims to inspire and engage students, parents and teachers with STEM-related fields and its importance as well as impact on the future job market. Teachers who participated in a number of activities also explored ways of adopting technology applications in project-based learning in their respective schools.