CUMBERLAND KIDS CREATE CARS FOR MARS
Six Cumberland students created exciting designs of future Mars Rovers for scientists and engineers from European Space Company, Astrium, as part of an educational challenge for students aged 8–16 using their Mars Rover prototype, Bridget, as inspiration.
Astrium Engineering Manager Lester Waugh, Science Ambassador Victoria Hodges and Heather MacRae from Venture Thinking judged entries for their imagination, technical description, field trials, science, landing systems and design. The team from Cumberland School designed the NIewenhuys Prototype 4 which was chosen as the best working prototype and overall secondary school winner. The winning Cumberland students of the design challenge were presented with certificates at a VIP reception at the Royal Automobile Club, Pall Mall London.
The young spacecraft designers from Cumberland included: Alina Shevchenko, Elizabeth Battle, Ishrat Jahan, Ruzzel Pescozo, Tobi Olaitan and Trieu Minh Ho.
The winning Cumberland students of the design challenge were presented with certificates at a VIP reception at the Royal Automobile Club, Pall Mall London.
Heather MacRae, the Challenge Co-ordinator from Venture Thinking commented: “The students came up with some great concepts and designs. They could be scientists and engineers involved in future Mars Missions!”
The challenge has been inspired by the real challenge that scientists and space experts in Europe and America are working on to plan future missions to explore planets such as Mars. The ExoMars probe is scheduled to launch in 2018. On board will be a scientific cargo including an exploration rover with many special features such as a drill to collect samples, a ground penetrating radar, a science lab to photograph, measure and analyse soil and rock samples for signs of life, panoramic cameras and a radio to communicate with Earth. The rover will travel around 100 metres a day guided by a hazard-avoidance system to prevent collisions with rocks.
Lester Waugh from Astrium commented: “It was really hard to choose the winning entries. I was amazed at the quality. Over 100 entries were received in a range of formats – film, powerpoint, drawings and scientific reports. Submissions were shown to a panel of experts which included Professor Sir Colin Pillinger, Astronauts Richard Garriott, and Space shuttle astronauts.”
Science teacher Vijay Munian said:
The students were speechless when I announced to them they won an award! But so excited! Cumberland school is an inner London school and fully inclusive. It was great news to the whole school. The pupils were very dedicated to the project and spent a lot of their afternoons after school working on their robot. We are all very proud of them!
The Bridget rover will be on field trials in Tenerife, testing imaging equipment for interplanetary missions and providing example images for new software designed to create information rich 3D models of the surface of other planets – a street view of other worlds. To follow Bridget’s progress check out:
bridgetrover
Alina and Tobi said: “We were pleased that our hard work was noticed. We are proud of our team and our school.”
Elizabeth, Ruzzel and Ishrat commented: “Cumberland School has a new building with really good science resources and we are encouraged to do fun experiments. Our Design and Technology Department work closely with the science department. This is the second robotics competition we have entered.”
As part of the challenge, educational resources have been made available to students and teachers to help them plan their missions.
The resources include a model of Bridget that students can make, and can be downloaded from:
designmarsrover 23
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