Bosch Smart Future Challenge
What does smart future mobility mean to a 15 year old and how does STEM relate to this?
This is the question we answered whilst piloting the Bosch Smart Future Challenge for Year 10 students at St Michael’s Catholic School in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire
The school is the first to participate in a Bosch bespoke STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) activity in the UK, which gives students the opportunity to share their ideas on how smart, innovative technologies could improve mobility in their local area.
Run in collaboration with the STEM Ambassadors, the competition draws on Bosch’s expertise in smart solutions and Internet of Things (IoT) and challenges students to think about the wider implications that these technologies will have on their day-to-day lives, particularly in the area of mobility and transport.
The Smart Future Challenge, Bosch’s most ambitious STEM initiative yet, culminated in an awards ceremony on Tuesday 4th December. The excitement was palpable as the Year 10 students from St Michael’s Catholic School in High Wycombe gathered to find out which teams had come out on top in the smart mobility innovation challenge.
Patron of the initiative Steffen Hoffmann, President of Bosch UK, attended the event to meet the students and announce the winners. “Engineering is creative. You have to break barriers and think outside the box to create the solutions that will shape the world of tomorrow. The innovation I have seen here today reflects that,” he said.
The winning teams – Aquatak, COUP and iDos – impressed the judging panel with their well-thought-out and smartly presented solutions. Amongst the winning ideas were inbuilt breathalysers in cars to prevent drink driving, buses that rise above traffic to reduce congestion and an app that monitors pollution levels. Students from the winning teams were rewarded with a private screening at a local film studios as well as a £500 donation to go towards the school’s future STEM activities.
“The Challenge equally educated, engaged and inspired the students about careers in STEM and the future of mobility and was a great example of what schools and businesses can achieve when they work together.”
The Smart Future Challenge gave students a concrete taste of what a career in STEM might entail. Instead of an abstract scenario, they had to use their knowledge, creativity and teamwork to solve a real-life problem they had identified
