Solutions of the Future 

On Friday 21st February, I travelled to Parliament House in Melbourne with the Ballarat Tech School for “The Solutions of the Future event”. This event was held by the Victorian Parliament and the Royal Society of Victoria for the International Day of Women and Girls in Science. 

When we arrived we went to the Parliament and were taken to the Legislative Assembly (where Parliament meets) and sat down to meet Ruwini Cooray, a neurologist who is CEO of her own company trying to develop a brain implant to cure Alzheimer's, Dr Kim Reid a climate scientist who is passionate about communicating science to wider audiences as well as researching rainfall and the reasons behind how floods happen and Dr Morley Muse a chemical and environmental engineer who is helping to find ways to make renewable energy a constant solution and is passionate about getting more women into STEM and gender equity. 

The three ladies formed the panel for the day and told us a bit about themselves and then answered any questions anyone had. The key takeaways I got from the talks were:

• to be well rounded and to try everything you can because you never know where you could find yourself. 

• if you don’t know what you want to do in the future take some time to think about your likes and interests and see where they connect. 

• learn to communicate, it’s one of the most important things to know.

• sometimes if things aren’t working, the best thing to do is walk away and come back later when your mind is fresh and you’ll have different ideas.     

Belinda Wehl

Year 11 Team Leader