NATA Young Scientists Award 2009
Award Guidelines
Rules of the NATA Young Scientists Award
How to Enter
Competition Entry Form
The NATA Young Scientists Award (NYSA) is under way for 2009. The award, which is now in its third year, is designed to raise awareness of NATA’s activities as well as to foster an interest in science and careers in science among school students. This is especially important given how Australia's technical and scientific expertise is shrinking at an alarming rate.
Students can win up to $5,000 in science equipment for their school.
The competition encourages students to look at how science impacts on people’s lives. Entrants are invited to conduct a practical scientific experiment and in the first instance submit a 300-word summary on-line. Finalists are then asked to prepare a poster illustrating in more detail how they conducted their investigation.
This year, the Award has been extended from Years 5 and 6 students to include those from Year 7. In addition, individuals as well as classes are invited to submit entries and win prizes for their school.
The Award is open to public and private schools throughout Australia.
Teachers are encouraged to plan the activity as part of their classroom work in science.
Entries close on Friday 7 August 2009 and must be submitted online
Download an information flyer for your school notice board.
See the posters produced by the 2008 winners
See the posters produced by the 2007 winners
The National Association of Testing Authorities (NATA) is a government-endorsed, not-for-profit organisation that conducts technical audits of Australia's laboratories and other testing and inspection facilities. Find out more About NATA and its quarterly magazine NATA News.
Award Guidelines
Who can enter:
Participation is open to individuals and classes enrolled in years 5, 6 and 7 (or the equivalent thereof) in primary and high schools in all Australian states and territories.Rules of the NATA Young Scientists Award
- Each participating school can submit only one entry - whether class or individual - judged by a panel of teachers to be the school's best.
- Entries must include a short statement by the class teacher that the brief description was written entirely by the student or students, and that the investigation was conducted by the student or students under the supervision of a teacher.
- Teachers will pick the best entry from those produced by each class or individual and submit it to NATA no later than 5pm Friday August 7, 2009.
- A special panel of NATA judges will decide on the winning entries.
- Finalists will be announced in late August and invited to submit their poster entries by 5pm Friday 25th September, 2009.
- Winners will be announced in October 2009.
- The judges' decisions will be final and no further correspondence concerning their decisions will be entered into.
How to Enter
All entries are to be made online by a class' or individual's teacher.
Go to the NATA Young Scientists Award competition entry form
Announcement of the winners
- First and second prize awards will be announced in October
- Two Highly Recommended Certificates will be announced and posted following judging
Prizes
$10,000 worth of science equipment will be awarded to the first, second and third prize-winning schools as follows: first prize $5,000; second prize $3000; third prize $2000. The three prize-winners will be notified by post.
Award certificates and consolation prizes for finalists will also be issued.
Here's what you need to do
Part 1 - Scientific brief - Deadline: Friday August 7, 2009
Conduct a scientific investigation of your choice. Then, in the first instance, write a brief online description of no more than 300 words, clearly describing your scientific investigation, why you chose your investigation, how you conducted it, what you were trying to find out from your investigation, what you thought you might find out, why, what you measured and how you measured the variable, along with any other interesting things you discovered.
Part 2 - Scientific poster (for finalists only) - Deadline: Friday 25th September, 2009
Produce a scientific poster telling us the story of what you did in your experiment. Detailed information will be forwarded to all finalists on how to go about presenting the posters.
View poster instructions for finalists
Publicity
The media - newspapers, television and radio stations - may contact some schools to find out more information about submitted projects.
In addition, schools (with permission of their Department's media unit) may like to use Award applications to promote themselves to the local media.
Publicity of this nature provides an opportunity to highlight the practical and fun side of science.
Information about each winning school entry will be publicised in a range of media.
Contact
If you have any questions regarding the NATA Young Scientists Award, please contact:
Conan Elphicke
Corporate Communications
National Association of Testing Authorities
Phone: (02) 9736 8222
Fax: (02) 9743 6664
Email: corpcomm@nata.asn.au
Go to the NATA Young Scientists Award competition entry form