Four of our Year 11 students recently took part in the UniSA Creative Challenge, an exciting program held at MOD. The challenge brought together students from multiple schools to collaborate with engineers and develop innovative solutions to real-world problems.

Day 1 began with an early meet at Gawler Train Station, braving the cold in anticipation of an inspiring day. After some creative warm-ups to get us thinking, we were introduced to Sean Rooney and Nicholas Quadrio from Southcott Hydraulics and Control Systems. They shared the company’s fascinating history — from saddle-making to hydraulic innovation — and explained the mechanics behind hydraulic systems, which use oil and pressure to power tools and machinery.

The central challenge? In mixed-school teams, students had to develop a solution to ensure the safe operation of a hydraulic crimper — a tool unfamiliar to most of us. We learned about four key safety approaches: electrical, physical, procedural, and educational, and each group was assigned one area to explore.

• Eloise’s group focused on agricultural use. They proposed replacing hydraulic oil with bio-oil for environmental safety and implementing a key-start system to simplify use and prevent accidental activation.
• Katie's group tackled usability and injury prevention. They designed a smart screen interface with safety features, a troubleshooting guide, and pressure settings, along with an emergency stop button and warning lights.
• Jessica’s group engineered an electrical safety solution. They designed a sensor to detect human presence in the crimping area and automatically shut off the machine, supported by a manual override with a large emergency stop button.
• Ruby’s group addressed user error through education. Their solution was a comprehensive six-day training program, including hands-on learning, testing, evaluation, and certification to ensure safe operation.

It was a hands-on, collaborative experience that gave our students a taste of creative problem-solving in STEM and showed how innovative thinking can lead to practical safety solutions in industry.

Teala Cameron

Science Teacher