Faith Macale
Finding something to be passionate about is not easy, but Creekside K-9 College student, Dylan found it when he was in year 4.
Dylan, now a year 9 student, has been winning major and minor bursary awards at the school’s science talent search over the years.
Now in his last year at the college, he brought home another major bursary award with his project ’Giving bridges room to breathe’.
“This year is about bridge expansion,” Dylan said.
“It’s about how bridges expand and contract due to heat and cold.”
His working model won the major bursary award in the intermediate category.
Dylan’s idea came about when he became curious about the “click-clonk” sounds we hear when driving over a bridge.
His model showed that the sound it made by an expansion joint; a mechanical device adapted for sealing an elongated gap formed between two adjacent concrete slabs on a bridge by providing continuous support for vehicles crossing the gap while allowing movement (expansion/contraction) of the concrete slab due to temperature changes.
“I’m proud and also surprised,” Dylan said when asked how he felt about winning again.
“I’m excited. My parents are happy and proud.”
Over the years, Dylan’s projects ranged from a game that navigates a maze with the use of a marble, to showing the impossibility of perpetual motion machines, to making a submarine model to show how it ascends and descends in water.
In the future, he wants to pursue robotics engineering.
“It’s mostly knowing that that (robotics) is the future,” Dylan said.
“I just like building things.”
His dream was also inspired by his mother, Geetha.
“My mum is a satellite engineer,” he said.
“I learned a bit from her, and then moved on from there.”
Dylan encouraged his fellow students to join in and learn about the competition through research or asking their teachers.
“I think they should join in because it’s a lot of new things,” he said.
“It inspires the future.”
