Competitions

ThinkQuest Australia Competition - Registrations open from 24 March to 13 October 2010. Entry is free!
ThinkQuest Australia Developing 21st Century Skills. ThinkQuest is a competition that challenges teams of students to engage in a topic of their choice, researching information and presenting the results of their work as a website resource for other students. The research, analysis, creativity and teamwork required provides students with an opportunity to develop the very skills so often cited as necessary for the twenty first century. Three age groups: 12 and under 15 and under 19 and under Prizes to be won!

• 1st Place - A First Place prize will be awarded for each age division. Individual team members will each receive digital equipment valued at $ 700 and be invited to attend a ThinkQuest Australia awards ceremony. A school trophy will be provided.
• 2nd and 3rd Place - Members of teams ranked second and third in each age division will receive certificates and the school registering each team will receive an award trophy.

For more information visit ww.thinkquest.org/competition/local/australia or tqsupport@acce.edu.au

More competitions for 2010 will be announced soon!

Competitions held in 2009

Young Aus-Innovators National ICT Prizes - www.acs.org.au/competition/ictprize

As part of National ICT Careers Week, the Australian Computer Society (ACS) and NICTA, Australia’s ICT Research Centre of Excellence have developed the Young Aus-Innovators National ICT Prize for high school students High schools from public and private schools are invited to send a two-page submission through to the ACS website, describing an ICT project of interest. One entry per school will be accepted. Entries must be sent by a school Principle or ICT teacher. Students from years 10 to 11 are eligible to compete. They should form small groups of four to six students to develop their entries.

The Young Aus-Innovators National ICT Prize provide opportunities for students to:

• gain real work experience in ICT with NICTA;
• be recognised and win a total cash prize of $5000;
• experience if a career in ICT is most suitable for you;
• work on an exciting technology project;
• receive support and supervision from experienced mentor.

The prize opens for entries on 21 September and closes on Friday 26 March 2010. Terms and Conditions Apply.

Google Student Day Competition

In conjunction with 2009 National ICT Careers Week, Google Australia has announced a Google Student Day competition.

The competition is open to all students under the age of 18 and will give 40 students and their parents the opportunity to attend Google Australia’s new head office in Sydney for a behind the scenes tour of innovation and geekdom at play. Google was recently voted best place to work in the inaugural BRW Great Place to Work Survey. (BRW's Top 50 Great Places to Work list, April 2009)

Entries open Monday 27^th July and close Monday 10^th August 2009. Winners will be announced Monday 24^th August 2009 and the Google Student Day will run on 15 October 2009 from 5.30pm - 7.30pm.

To enter the competition, tell us in 25 words or less why you think IT is cool?
Students from around Australia can enter, however travel and accommodation costs are not included in the prize.

ACS Foundation's ICT+U YouTube video competition

Students and Young IT Professionals are encouraged to create a short video about Information Technology. In the process, they could win one of 7 i-Pod Touches. Video entries will address 1 of the 7 themes of ICT Careers Week and each video will be promoted across You Tube and other social media. The closing date is 1 st October 2009 with winners (based in the number of views of their video) to be notified on 15 th October 2009. Consider submitting your own entry and encourage others to spread the positive IT message in this innovative and exciting way. More details can be found at www.youtube.com/acsfoundation

NCSS Challenge 2009

The NCSS Challenge is a programming competition run by the School of IT, University of Sydney. It is unlike any other programming competition because we will teach you how to program as we go along rather than expecting you to be an expert coder already. However, if you are a seasoned coder, we have something for you too because the problems will range from relatively simple through to mind-bendingly hard. This is an ideal opportunity for enthusiastic novice and experienced students to gain exposure to Python programming. The challenge is open to all Australian high school students, although it is most suited to Year 10/11 students and will develop students' programming skills for their major software projects. Teachers are welcome to register as non-competitors to gain more Python experience.To participate, visit www.challenge.ncss.edu.au, competition starts from Monday 10 August 2009 - Monday 7 September 2009.

So you think you can rock ...?

"So you think you can rock ...?" is a fun and educational initiative to get students and teachers involved in collaborative gaming. The competition will be open to schools throughout Victoria and will develop enthusiasm about the world of gaming. The competition will be open to schools throughout Victoria and will develop enthusiasm about the world of gaming.

Schools will form a 'band' of three students and one teacher to participate in heats of the popular Guitar Hero World Tour game during ICT Week. Each bank will consist of a singer, guitarist, bass guitarist and drummer.

Finalists will then go on to compete at the VITTA Conference where the winning band will be announced. The highest score at each heat/final wins and the overall winner will receive a prize. Schools will also be offered professional development if they are not familiar with the game.

There will be three categories for this competition - Medium, Hard and Expert

Interested in becoming a rock star? Stay tuned to this website for more information.