THE next generation of technology entrepreneurs were all in one room as this year’s Tech Girl Superhero winners were announced.
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Other than their skills, talent and passion, the innovators had one thing in common – they were all females aged between nine and 16 years old.
The Tech Girl Superhero challenge is an initiative of the Tech Girls Movement, founded by Jenine Beekhuyzen to promote positive female role models in the information technology field and raise awareness of career options for girls.
The competition encourages school groups from across the country to get involved in information technology and draft, create, code and design an app over a few months. This year there were more than 650 girls and 110 mentors involved. More than 130 teams from across Australia developed their own apps with 72 teams registering for the competition.
It’s exciting, inspiring and overwhelming seeing girls build confidence in tech skills.
- Tech Girls Movement founder Jenine Beekhuyzen
“We are here to help you all to reach your potential,” Ms Beekhuyzen told the entrants. “It’s exciting, inspiring and overwhelming seeing girls build confidence in tech skills.”
St Philip Neri School in NSW and Mount Gravatt East Primary School in Queensland were nominated as finalists in the primary school competition.
In the secondary school competition the finalists were Nagle College from NSW, St Michael's Collegiate School from Tasmania, Bialik College from Melbourne, St Mary's Anglican Girls' School from Western Australia and Clayfield College from Queensland.
The winners were announced at the Tech Girl Superhero Showcase held at the Microsoft centre in Sydney on September 29.
St Philip Neri School in NSW won the primary school competition with their app Reading Republic and Western Australia’s St Mary's Anglican Girls' School won the secondary school competition with their app Vocabulary Voyagers.
Other apps pitched to the crowd at the Showcase covered topics as diverse as curing boredom to identifying problems in the Murray River.
All 72 teams that entered the Tech Girl competition can now apply for the Global Technovation Challenge, which will take the winning team to the United States.
Fairfax Media, publisher of this masthead, is a partner in the Tech Girls Movement.