Primary school students across Western Sydney, Australia, have been given the chance to share their vision for Western Sydney Airport through an innovative design competition coordinated by the New South Wales (NSW) Department of Education, the video game Minecraft and Liverpool City Council.
Students will be asked to tackle some of the real-world challenges involved in creating a greenfield airport and will create their answers using the popular electronic building blocks from the video game Minecraft.
Now in its second year, the design competition has a new ‘gold sponsor’ with Western Sydney Airport coming on board to provide a portion of the prize money.
Combined with sponsorship from Liverpool City Council, students will be competing for prizes worth A$40,000 (US$29,000), which can be spent on science and technology projects at their school.
“We are delighted to support such an exciting learning opportunity for the students of Western Sydney,” said Graham Millett, CEO, Western Sydney Airport.
“These primary school students will be finishing school the year the airport opens. It’s exciting to think that many may one day be working at the airport. We can’t wait to see what their imaginative young minds will dream up for Western Sydney Airport.”
The NSW Department of Education and Minecraft will run free professional learning days for teachers at Campbelltown, Liverpool, Penrith and Parramatta. These sessions will be hosted at the city campuses of Western Sydney University (WSU), which is a supporter of the competition.
Students will submit their entries online with the top schools invited to present their ideas to a judging panel of industry experts in August 2019.
“We are so proud of the success of the Minecraft Design competition,” said Liverpool Mayor Wendy Waller. “We launched it last year at a local level because we saw the importance of connecting the students of today with the opportunities the new airport would create. We had hundreds of students from 12 schools involved and our competition was highlighted on Minecraft’s global education site.
“This year, with the great support of WSA, WSU, NSW Department of Education and Minecraft, we have been able to expand the competition for students across Western Sydney. I am sure thousands of students will relish the opportunity to be involved.”