By GEORGIA WESTGARTH
FOUNTAIN Gate Secondary College students took their ideas to the United States and came home with more.
As part of the Future Problem Solving International Conference six Year 9 students had been compiling their ideas since March 2014 but unfortunately didn’t place at the world conference.
English teacher Stephen Hughes said the team did an amazing job, sacrificed so much and gave everything they had.
“The competition from other teams all around the world really was very tough, the judges did comment that the standard was such that teams that did not place would have won in previous years,” Mr Hughes said.
Mr Hughes said the judging was quite technical.
“The students need to know their area of concern, underlying problem and need to be able to communicate that to the judges effectively.
“I think one of our problems was that our project was so vast that it became difficult to encapsulate the entire scope of what was achieved in simple terms,” he said.
The team of five girls and one boy chose to solve the problem of student disengagement and looked at ways of improving the way career education is taught in high schools.
Mr Hughes said regardless of the result the students got the opportunity to shine in their own way and had all become better public speakers.
“They have all grown so much throughout the course of the project, I think the experience has made the students feel lucky they are Australian, America was exciting, but Australia is the best,” he said.
The international conference was held at Iowa State University, and the students got the chance to meet and speak with other participants from the US, Korea, Turkey and New Zealand and Mr Hughes said the experience had matured the students considerably.
“It’s expanded their horizons and taught them to think globally, they have also gained a better understanding of how politics and business work in the real world,” Mr Hughes said.
Mr Hughes said this year the judges were looking for a different method.
“The Fountain Gate Secondary College team that attended the international conference in 2014 was awarded second place and this year’s team took on a similar approach to them.
“This was a surprise, but we live and learn, and it looks like the program will run again next year,” he said.
