The 2023 Solar RASE (Rivers Academy of STEM Excellence) began in earnest on Friday when Year 5 and 6 students from Modanville, Dunoon and The Channon Public Schools took part in a heat to see who could make the fastest solar car.

The three primary schools met at Modanville for the first time collectively, due to Covid, to put their solar cars through their paces and see who progresses through to the finals on Tuesday, August 22, at the Kadina High School campus.

The Solar RASE competition involves both Primary and High Schools. Primary Schools race down a 20-metre white track to see who is the fastest, while High Schools compete in a pursuit where teams start on opposite sides of a track and each team tries to catch the other, the same as pursuits in cycling competitions.

STEM is an approach to learning and development that integrates the areas of science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Through STEM, students develop key skills, including problem-solving. This was put to good use throughout the Solar RASE project.

As Karen Ramsay explains, the Rivers Academy of STEM Excellence is part of a government program called SIS, School Industry School Partnership.

"We work with 10 or 11 primary schools plus the three public high schools. We're doing STEM-related stuff, but our main focus is using the design thinking process. So we've got these kids building up resilience, looking at a problem and learning how to solve it."

(Zane Vandenberg explains how race day will proceed at Modanville Public School on Friday)

"So, when it doesn't go right the first time, they've got to work out why and what they need to do to improve it."

The program will help create our future engineers, scientists and physicists.

Back to the fun part of the program for the students who have been working on their cars for the last term.

"This is the culmination of a term's work," Karen said, "learning all about circuitry, and some are learning about alternative power sources, sustainable power and energy."

Principal of Dunoon Public School Amanda Vandenberg said her school was represented by 25 students out of the school's 84 students. Amanda was confident in the cars that her students had built.

"I saw the kids testing ours yesterday, and they were working well with battery packs because there wasn't much solar power due to the lack of sun. We know that they go, and they've done a lot of testing and redesigning, and really getting into it. It's been good."

Lotte and Marvel from Dunoon Public School said the project is fun.

"It's really fun, the designing and then the technical work. Mr Henderson explained what we needed to do. It was just fun to get everything right. It works well."

"The biggest challenge was probably the wiring and things like that. It was a bit tricky with say, the red wire going to the battery pack. Twisting it on and making sure nothing falls off."

For the record, the fastest team on the day was the Chunky Monkeys from The Channon Public School: Bohdi, Fred, Max, Tianna and Arlo. Their best time on the day was 6:24 seconds over the 20m.

The Chunky Monkeys will move on to the finals at the Kadina High Campus on Tuesday, August 22, with three teams from Dunoon and Modanville Public Schools. They will join the other eight primary schools to see who can claim the fastest solar car title.

Now all Karen and the students need is sunshine and plenty of it so they can put the batteries away.