Aerospace engineering in sight for Ivy Doak

TRENDING NOW

June 2, 2023

At the end of 2022, then Year 12 STEAM student Ivy Doak, was accepted into the University of Canterbury Women in Engineering Residential Programme (WiE CAN). Ivy headed down to Christchurch earlier this year to attend the 5 day/4 night WiE CAN programme which featured a range of interactive workshops, inspiring presentations, and fun social activities.

“WiE CAN 2023 was a fantastic week hosted on-campus in the University of Canterbury’s newest hall of residence. The benefit of my time there was fully maximised by the jam-packed schedule, which involved three workshops for individual engineering disciplines followed by a group challenge each day and social occasions in the evenings.

“The workshops themselves were run by the University’s respective engineering departments and involved real hands-on experience to engage students with each discipline. Amongst others, the projects included creating a solar panel, coding robotic fingers to play music on a piano, building and optimising the performance of a solar-powered car, and using small motors to create kinetic sculptures – the latter two participants were able to keep.

“The group challenges again targeted key areas of interest: an amazing race engineered to help students navigate the University’s enormous campus; an entrepreneurship challenge to give participants a taste of the product-development process and the support offered by University of Canterbury’s Centre for Entrepreneurship; and finally the Aerospace Challenge, which my group was thrilled to have won. Organised and conducted by Dawn Aerospace, students were challenged to program their own simulations, and use these to ensure the rocket’s reusability through the timing of a parachute release whilst maximising altitude. We were then able to witness a fantastic real demonstration and were lucky enough to meet current engineers at Dawn Aerospace and hear about their career paths.

“It was also a wonderful opportunity to get a taste of life at the University of Canterbury and meet many other like-minded other students of the same age.

“I am exceedingly grateful for this singular opportunity and would strongly recommend the programme to other students who are interested in pursuing an engineering degree.

“The STEAM programme at Westlake Girls has been instrumental in inspiring me towards an engineering degree with a view to entering the STEM field in robotics and aerospace.”

Ivy Doak – Year 13 (pictured above in yellow vest).