Success for Northern Ireland students at the 53rd BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition

The winner of the 53rd BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition (BTYSTE) has been announced.  Shane Curran, aged 16, a 5th year student from Terenure College, Dublin, has taken home the top prize for his project entitled ‘qCrypt: The quantum-secure, encrypted, data storage solution with multijurisdictional quorum sharding technology’. Shane competed in the senior section of the Technology category, and his winning project was announced at an awards ceremony in the BT Arena at Dublin’s RDS.

Northern Ireland students, who this week showcased their projects at the prestigious event, were also formally recognised at the awards ceremony.

Beating off stiff competition, Loreto College Coleraine picked up the ‘MATRIX Best Northern Ireland School’ Award at the Exhibition. Dónal Close and Sian Donaghy from Loreto College Coleraine were also awarded the ‘BT – Northern Ireland Best Project’ prize for their entry ‘Phone Book Physics’, which was entered in the Chemical, Physical and Mathematical Sciences category at intermediate level. They were also highly commended within this category.

Further awards were presented to a number of other Northern Ireland schools at the ceremony:

• Emmett Brolly from Loreto College Coleraine received 1st place Senior Individual in the Chemical, Physical and Mathematical Sciences category for his entry ‘Bead Fountains’.
• Alexander Baine from Ballyclare High School in Antrim picked up 2nd place for his project ‘Augmented Reality Sudoku Solver’ in the Chemical, Physical and Mathematical Sciences category at intermediate level.
• Sean Connolly, a teacher at St Killian’s College in Antrim, received the ‘Analog Educator of Excellence’ award.

The following schools were also highly commended at the Exhibition:

• St Mary’s College, Derry~Londonderry for their project ‘SCOBY SCOBY Do’ in the Junior Individual section of the Chemical, Physical and Mathematical Sciences (CPM) category
• Ballymena Academy Antrim for their project ‘Branch Strike Detector’ in the Senior Individual section of the Technology category;
• South Eastern Regional College Bangor Campus for their project ‘Investigating the link between habitat and the antibacterial effect of honey’ in the Senior Group section of the Biological and Ecological category.

Northern Ireland’s Education Minister, Peter Weir, said: “I would like to congratulate all of the students from Northern Ireland who have taken part in the Exhibition this year, you should all be very proud of what you have achieved. I would like to acknowledge the hard work that the students have put into their projects but also the support shown by all the teachers and schools who have helped these students to bring their projects to life. The BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition is a real highlight in the school calendar and the continued support by BT is vital, helping this event to go from strength-to-strength and become bigger and better each year.”

Mairead Meyer, Managing Director of NI Networks, said; “It has been an incredible exhibition that has captured the imaginations of tens of thousands of visitors who came to support young people and their ideas. I want to congratulate every student that entered, and in particular Shane, our overall winner. Technology skills are critical to companies like BT, and we are delighted to help discover home-grown talent in critical skills such as security and data storage that are needed by organisations based here and globally.”

Over 1,100 students from 375 schools across the island of Ireland competed for the coveted title of ‘BT Young Scientist & Technologist of the Year 2017’.

For footage of the Northern Ireland schools that took part in the BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsQAJtXy-Z8