By Derek Schlennstedt
Year 9 and 10 students at Sherbrooke Community School have once again proved their technical prowess at the regional Thales Design tech Competition.
Jem Toland, Barnaby Major-Smith and Rohan McGowen from Sherbrooke Community School took out the Honours at the event, winning from the two finalist schools -Belgrave South Christian School and Mountain District Christian School.
The competition, supported by THALES – a global technology business operating across aerospace, digital security, transport and space – aims to encourage students to think about how they can use sensor technology.
The Sherbrooke team won the regional competition for developing a system that sits on a car dashboard and detects fatigue.
Materials and Technology teacher at Sherbrooke Community School, Denis Dempsey said the facial recognition program detected eye lid movements and sent data to a computer which runs an algorithm to detect if your eyes are closing slower or more often than normal.
“When it determines you are falling asleep, it will beep loudly, and if the beep is not switched off the autopilot takes control of the car,” Ms Dempsey said.
As part of the THALES competition the Sherbrooke Student were able to collaborate with Yarra Ranges Tech School at Lilydale, who provided a wealth of knowledge to the budding designers.
“The students bought a little car with a sensor, and built a prototype that connected with their computer and would show when someone’s eyes closed.
“When that happened there would be a beeping signal and if the eyes stayed shut, the small car would pull off to the side when safe and stop.”
“They did programming and coding, and worked out the grid, so it was all very impressive. “
Ms Dempsey said she was extremely proud of the student who progressed through to the state finals on November 12. Sadly, it wasn’t to be, with the group unable to make it through to the next round.
Though, Ms Dempsey said the students had shown great resilience through the competition and were already planning to improve their design for next year.
“Things didn’t work and go to plan at the State Finals, but they’ve been so resilient and they’re raring to go for next year.”
“They’ve already made a list of things that they would do differently and are going to keep it for next year.”
