BY Eleazar Barrick Peter & Fasiha Khushiri
KUCHING: The third edition of the NASA Space Apps Sarawak event aims to attract over 3,000 participants from across the state compared to the previous participant count of 2,500.
Deputy Minister of Education, Innovation, and Talent Development, Datuk Francis Harden Hollis, stated that this event is intended to expose participants to future critical thinking through challenges in earth and space sciences from NASA.
“To achieve this goal, we have planned visits to 50 schools across Sarawak, including locations like Bau, Mukah, Sarikei, Sri Aman, Saratok, Baram, and others. During these visits, we will introduce the ‘NASA Space Apps Challenge,’ providing exposure to the James Webb Space Telescope, hands-on activities like paper folding and origami.
“So, students will have a great opportunity to embark on the NASA Space Apps Sarawak journey with attractive rewards and prizes,” he said.
He made these remarks when speaking before officiating at the 3rd edition of the NASA Space Apps Programme at Swinburne University of Technology here yesterday.
According to him, this challenge is open to all regardless of technical background, and it does not involve technology or application development at all.
He emphasised that this edition of the event is more focused on rural areas, with the hope of attracting the interest of Sarawak residents to engage in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) fields.
“After this, the organising team will be divided into several groups to initiate visits from Bau to Mukah and Miri. We are making efforts to reach rural areas so that more students are interested in pursuing STEM,” he said.
Further commenting, Harden believes that the organisers have their own plans in arranging activities to capture the interest of participants, particularly among students.
For the record, a team of teachers from Pujut Miri Secondary School advanced to the global finals with a space-themed board game, showcasing space architecture and challenges faced.
Furthermore, an inspiration for this effort came from the Change Maker Team at SMK Bintulu, which was named the global winner in the NASA Space Apps Challenge 2021.
Their innovative mobile application empowered homeowners to monitor electrical output and estimate solar panel savings using NASA meteorological data.
The excellence of the Change Maker team was acknowledged with a top 10 position in the award for best use of technology from 162 countries.
