The Davidson Young Inventors Challenge (DIC) is a school outreach initiative aimed at Year 11 and 12 students interested in STEM
It was launched in honour to the late Emeritus Professor John Davidson, one of our former Heads of Department. He was known as “the founding father of fluidisation” and worked in chemical engineering since 1952, including the areas of fluid flow, process dynamics, gas absorption and fluidisation technology, remaining very active until his death in December 2019. He was passionate about his students, and he was interested in both their well-being and their learning enjoying their inquisitive questions. He was always committed to the highest standards of teaching and research and often had simple solutions relying on a profound understanding of the fundamentals.
Aims
Critical thinking and problem-solving are key skills chemical engineers and scientists learn, develop, and put into practice on a day-to-day basis. By taking part in this challenge participants will not only get first-hand practical experience and become familiar with the diverse applications of chemical engineering and biotechnology, but also learn about the important role chemical engineers and biotechnologists play in tackling the toughest global challenges.
Having chosen a sustainable development goal to work towards, registered teams will then be asked to research a current problem or challenge and come up with an innovative, sustainable solution.
DIC theme
The theme for DIC Invention is the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) developed by the World Health Organisation to address global challenges as noted in the SDGs strategy. The teams are therefore required to select a global challenge and a problem form the list given and invent a product and/ or process that could be a potential solution that can make a positive impact on solving the problem, hence working towards achieving the SDGs selected.
Entry criteria:
Year 11 and 12 students ( 15 to 17 year-old) in UK schools are encouraged to enter this competition as a team of 3 to 5 students max. We welcome entries especially from state schools in UK, and we especially welcome talented students from underepresented and lower socio-economic backgrounds.
Every school Year 11/12 can register as many student teams as they like.
The task
The DIC challenge is conducted as an online competition involving the submission of two outputs by student teams to be assessed by our team of mentors:
1. an intitial project outline
2. a final, short project report based on the team's problem researched and the solution proposed.
Each registered student team will be expected to submit a short paper, based on the student participants’ analysis of the problem and their proposed solution. If it involves a working prototype and/or a working scaled model, you may describe it in your paper, but do note that only your paper will be marked.
Participants are welcome to produce a prototype and/ or a working scaled model of their invention in addition to the submission of the paper but this is not compulsory. If you produce a working prototype or model, you may describe it in your paper, but do note that only your paper will be marked.
What happenst next
When registration closes on 8 January 2023 all registered teams will receive a more detailed brief and be invited to a launch introductory webinar with more information.
Important dates:
Deadline for registrations: 8 January 2023.
Launch webinar: 16 January 2023
Deadline for final report submission: 8 May 2023
The Final and Awards Ceremony: Friday 23 June 2023
The three finalist teams will present their invention at the Final and Awards Ceremony in June taking part in a Zoom webinar with an audience of our department staff and students, mentors, and graduates in industry. The judging panel at CEB will then appoint a winner at an awards ceremony (physical or virtual- format to be confirmed at a later stage).
Important notice:
Please note that Higher Education Institutions are required to enter details of their widening participation and outreach activities, including some personal details of any prospective students they have engaged with, on the Higher Education Access Tracking (HEAT) website
https://heat.ac.uk - hence every student participant taking part will be asked to complete a form to just confirm basic details.
