STUDENTS at Dubbo College South campus showed off their engineering and problem solving skills this week, when Engineers Without Borders came to town.
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The outreach group visited 15 classes around Dubbo on Thursday, and engineer Anna Cain said they to "try and get kids excited about engineering and aware of it as a career".
Students were tasked with designing and making a wind turbine that could generate enough power to turn on seven LED lights, with two teams in one class both managing the feat.
The group of Bailey Aitken, Hanna Starr, Jaymealea Mofafi and Heath Irwin had great success with three long blades.
"We went with toothpicks, thick, strong cardboard and long blades with little pitch," Heath said. "If there's less pitch then it needs less wind to spin at a higher rate." The other winning team, of Darcee Nixon, Hannah Bass, Emily Crampton and Olivia Watmore, turned on the seven lights with their short, pitched, lightweight blades.
Ms Cain said many students don't think of engineering when they are choosing subjects for years 11 and 12.
"A lot of kids want to contribute to society and they think of doing medicine or social work, but they don't think of using maths or science," she said.
"But you don't get far without a water supply, and that's what engineers do.
"Every kid in this room had potential to use their science and maths, and we were just amazed by the designs and the creativity."