Tireless work by students rewarded

Papatoetoe schools have trumped the rest of the country in the Transpower Neighbourhood Engineers Awards.

Papatoetoe High School won a merit award in the senior catagory and Papatoetoe Central School won the middle school category.

The awards have been sponsored by Transpower since 2003 with the aim of creating a greater awareness of the engineering profession and encouraging innovative thinking in engineering and technology.

Year 13 students at Papatoetoe High Tajinder Basra, Issa Yaquonan, Ansil Chand and Nabeel Dada were faced with the task of constructing an electronic sign to keep the community informed of school events.

"The boys have worked tirelessly through a challenging process that involved council consent, physical construction of the sign and support structure, research of existing school sign-age, ditch digging, software training and implementation among other things," says associate princi-pal Vaughan Coulliault.

Papatoetoe Central students put their creative energies into designing a station for the school fitness trail.

The project team of year 4 and 5 students was guided by Dihendra Singh, a senior structural engineer at Beca Infrastructure.

Students contributed ideas but also did the practical work, from measuring and surveying the potential site to identifying budgets, property and legal requirements.

- © Fairfax NZ News