More than 70 Year 11 students from across Western Sydney gathered at the University of Sydney to present their responses to challenges set by academics across disciplines including quantum computing, robotics, geosciences and data science. 

The students are part of the first cohort of the Khuda Women in STEM Academy, a program supporting young women in Years 11 and 12 from partner schools in Western Sydney as they explore future study and careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

Working in teams, students spent six months tackling real-world issues, captured as challenges like designing a climate-resilient civilisation based on historical learnings, and creating a robot to make roads safer for pedestrians.

Proposed solutions to challenges include a species-specific AI tool that will deter wildlife from roads, adaptive pen grips informed by surveys of students across high schools in Western Sydney, and a quantum key distribution system for protecting hospital patient data.

Each group of students created a poster, video and a pitch to solve their STEM challenge, presenting the latter to a panel including Sarah Bradley, a University of Sydney alumna and Director of Data Science and AI at NASDAQ.

Ria Joshi, 2027 School Captain at Penrith Selective High School, was part of the winning team in the pitch competition. Working alongside three other young women from schools across Western Sydney, she tackled a challenge set by Dr Shila Ghazanfar from the University’s Faculty of Science. 

The team explored real-world applications of data science using Sydney’s public transport data, identifying accessibility gaps across the station networks. Their analysis found that Redfern Station had some of the highest passenger usage despite lacking an accessible entrance, helping secure first place in the competition.

Ria said the experience pushed her outside her comfort zone and helped build her confidence in pursuing STEM opportunities.

“We've been given so many opportunities to network and connect with new people, and that's really helped build my confidence.” 

Her school Deputy Principal Mr Grant Odei attended the showcase and said he was proud of the dedication the students demonstrated.

“It was a no brainer for us to get involved in the Khuda Women in STEM Program, and we’re already seeing the benefits,” he said. 

“It made me proud seeing the hard work that they’ve put in come to fruition. I’ve seen them stay late to work at school, and I'm particularly impressed with the fact that they’ve collaborated with students from other schools,” he said.  

Meeting before and after school, on weekends, and supported by dedicated University Student Ambassadors, alongside their challenge projects, the young women were encouraged to inspire the next generation of STEM learners. 

At Penrith Selective High School, students responded by designing and delivering hands-on STEM activities for younger students at Penrith Public School, introducing them to STEM in a fun, accessible and inspiring way.

“As part of the Khuda Academy, we were encouraged to inspire other students to explore STEM, and we wanted to visit a primary school and create a hands-on experience where we could help remove some of the stigmas younger students might have, like thinking STEM is purely technological or just mathematics-based,” said Ria. 

“We ran fun activities like the Coke and Mentos experiment and created rubber cars, and through that were able to introduce scientific and more technical terminology that younger kids might not have been exposed to otherwise.

“It really increased their exposure to different real-world applications of STEM. They were so happy, they loved every activity, and they were sad when it was time to leave.”