Technology

Ms O’Brien’s Textile Class

Students from Ms O’Brien’s Textile class have used the overlocker to stitch their bag straps. Also starting to hand-stitch the felt appliqué to the front of their market bag using Perle thread. Students are enjoying the relaxing atmosphere of the Textile class. 

ABEL CONNORS – ICT AND BEYOND

Congratulations to Year 8 student, Abel Connors who has just taken out the title of winner of the Victorian Schools and Games App Challenge. In fact, Abel not only won his own category of Year 7-8, but then went on to be announced as the overall winner, beating teams of Year 10 students from metropolitan private schools.

Abel is a student in the VMG class “ICT and Beyond”, taught by Jo Burgess. As part of a work requirement, students were asked to create an Application- the design brief mirroring the requirements of the competition. Students could then elect to submit their project into the Victorian challenge.

Abel was short-listed as a finalist and was invited to Melbourne on Friday 27th October to present to 5 judges; 2 were Microsoft representatives.  Abel’s final presentation was preceded by two, 45-minute coaching sessions with Jon Yeo, curator of TEDxMelbourne. Jon Yeo shared with Abel the art and science of what it is to be a good public speaker, helping Abel to refine his “pitch” for the judges.

Abel’s App is titled, “Planet Peace”. The aim behind the App development was to create a better world by uniting people for a good cause- creating a platform to share what peace means to you. The App allows all contributions to be gathered and the data created can be handed off to a musician, writer, poet, or visual artist. Abel said it could result in, “a song by the people for the people”.

Microsoft provided support to develop the 2016 winner’s App “Anxiety” and Abel is hoping that Planet Peace may be given the same privilege.

Abel’s future lies in the field of Information and Communication Technology. He hopes to complete secondary school, attend a university like RMIT and then either be hired by a company in the ICT field, or, start his own!