Latest News

One of the two consortiums bidding to create Australia’s lunar rover has created a program to allow children aged 5-12 to recreate their work.

One Giant Leap Australia Foundation, the Australian Space Agency and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) are excited to announce the selection of an Australian student experiment to be conducted on the International Space Station (ISS). Shingo Nishimoto, a student studying Aerospace Engineering at The Australian National University, will have his experiment conducted on the ISS after entering the Asian Try Zero-G competition.

Growing up in regional New South Wales, constructing model rockets and exploring careers in science seemed a world away for engineering student Nicola Baker. Now the 19-year-old is dedicating herself to ensuring kids — no matter where they live — have opportunities to explore career paths in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).

The Minister for Industry and Science, the Hon Ed Husic MP, along with dignitaries from the Australian Space Agency and NASA announced the EPE & Lunar Outpost Oceania Consortium as one of two successful groups to receive Stage 1 grant funding from the Australian Government’s Moon to Mars Trailblazer Initiative.

I was fascinated by the idea of space exploration and wanted to learn more about one of the most important missions in the history of space travel…

Thanks to the Department of Regional NSW, we have received a grant to deliver Aerospace Camp to our regions

Open to all ages, ‘To the metaverse and beyond’ is a tech expo for the whole family. Come along and try new technologies! Virtual reality, flight simulators and robots!

Space, by its very nature, must be innovative. The workforce required brings new ideas, experiences and perspectives.

The second round of scholarships will be open for applications very soon. Have a look at pages 44 to 46.

RMIT and One Giant Leap Australia working very closely together on the International SpaceCRAFT Exploration Challenge as well as ‘Mission: Sustainability”. Check our pages 40 and 41.

To celebrate World Space Week, Chris Boshuizen, One Giant Leap Australia Foundation, Moonshot and RMIT Space Industry Hub are proud to announce ‘Mission: Sustainability’.

Girls – are you in Year 5, 6 or 7? Looking for a fun, hands-on, STEM workshop? Join other girls in the Richmond area on 27 or 28 August at the Gadget Girlz Roadshow.

In September 2021, students from around the world participated in the International SpaceCRAFT Exploration Challenge. One Australian student, who was a One Giant Leap Australia Foundation participant, shared his experience. Rafael said, “Over the holidays, I participated in the International SpaceCRAFT Exploration Challenge (more information can be found on their website: https://www.space-teams.com and https://onegiantleapfoundation.com.au/). Our…

Inspired by the thought of having their own robot in outer space, the Dream Rover team work to transfer the skills that they have acquired from VEX robotics to JAVA coding. The Dream Rover team are high schooler students from Sydney NSW. Here is their story, in their own words.

Tom Nolan passed away December 31st, 2020 leaving behind a wife, grown children, grandchildren and thousands of people who loved and followed his passion of STEM education. An oceanographer by trade, Tom saw the best in everyone he met. Through twists and turns in his life, Tom worked in oceanography, space exploration and a host of education related trades.

Tom swapped ocean going ships for spaceships more than 20 years ago. Amongst other things in his life, he was recognised for his STEM outreach work by being awarded the 2019 NASA JPL Bruce Murray Award.

The Huddle is the internal newsletter for EOS and the program is mentioned on pages 20 and 2. Many thanks to Ben Greene, Dr James Bennet, Cinzia Nash, Jo Ramsay and the team at EOS. The future is bright!

Jackie and Bob Carpenter from One Giant Leap Australia Foundation have been a cornerstone in supporting Ella Stoodley (Axion Manufacturing Engineer) with the surface finish of the NSW State and National race cars. Bob Carpenter has extensive experience in the aeromodelling field and knows how to finish a plane with aerodynamics and a high end…

Students from Galen Catholic College, Wangaratta, have reached new heights in coding. The team of Galen VEX students coded their way into history, by being one of 3 teams that successfully completed the space mission for JAXA’s inaugural Kibo Robotic Programming Challenge: KiboRPC.

Sally Tindall, Shannon McConnell and Alice Gorman. A future astronaut, a Deep Space expert and a space archaeologist will inspire us and then answer questions about careers in space. An ‘out of this world’ event moderated by Coco Dobbie, a One Giant Leap Australia Foundation Ambassador. This teleconference will be on Thursday 24th September from 6 to 7 pm (AEST).

NASA ARTEMIS TEAM – a free teleconference with an Orion Engineer Join Heather Paul as she takes us on an inspirational voyage of discovery about Artemis, Orion and aerospace STEM careers. Heather is a highly experience science communicator who has a passion for education outreach. She currently is the Health, Medical and Technical Authority of…

The SpaceX Crew Dragon expedition was full of firsts. It was the first crewed orbital launch to depart from the United States since the final flight of the space shuttle fleet in July 2011. It was the first manned commercial space flight. And it was the first ocean landing return in over four decades, as the previous one occurred in 1975. So witnessing the splash landing of the Crew Dragon capsule and the safe return of NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley, signalling a successful end to this historic mission, was truly an amazing experience for many, especially those in younger generations who have never seen a live, return to Earth, ocean landing before. Student Ambassador Nicola said that this was the first all USA space mission she has personally witnessed (she was still quite young when the last space shuttle mission took place) and the first ocean landing during her lifetime.

The One Giant Leap Australia Foundation Student Ambassadors were in their homes watching the recent live Mars 2020 launch, but they were still able to share their joy and excitement with each other via Messenger.

One Giant Leap Australia Foundation Student Ambassador Ezra recently completed a multi-day hike for his Duke of Edinburgh Gold Level Award. The walk started at Thornleigh train station and ended nearly eighty kilometres, and six days later at Wondabyne station. This walk covers a number of sections of the Great North Walk, which extends between Sydney and Newcastle.

One Giant Leap Australia Foundation student ambassador (Jessica, Coco, Nicola and I) were chosen to lead and present in a STEM Girl Power event for the Queensland Education Department. We presented our journey into STEM, our motivations for wanting to pursue a career in STEM, how we incorporated STEM our daily lives and how we…

Four of our female One Giant Leap Australia Foundation Student Ambassadors (Nicola, Coco, Jessica and Suzana) have been selected by a representative of the Queensland Government to make a presentation via teleconference to girls registered for their STEM Girl Power Program. Our ambassadors will be talking about their individual journeys in Science, Technology, Engineering and…

The two day workshop: When we first saw the KIBO Robot Program Challenge (KIBO – RPC) it excited us all. Even though we are from a small regional area, we had the confidence to give this a go. We got our heads around the concept of the challenge. However, once we started looking more closely…

One of our new student ambassadors, Ezra Miller, joined us today. Before his arrival Ezra said, “I am super excited to connect with like-minded passionate students and participate in experiments and programs about space and technology. I love learning and these opportunities to make and meet new and old friends.” Ezra hadn’t met some of…

Today was a day of fun and creativity with Jenna coming to spend some time with the Student Ambassadors. Jenna is a photography and visual arts teacher in an all girls’ public high school in Sydney. She is a huge supporter of One Giant Leap Australia and is extremely creative. She is a cosplay guru…

Over the last few days One Giant Leap Australia Foundation (OGLAF) facilitated and hosted a special training and support program offered to all Australian teams registered for this year’s KIBO Robot Programming Challenge (RPC). There are many keen teams participating in the challenge but over the last few months there were gaps identified in some…

This morning the student ambassadors did a hands-on activity, simulating and comparing various orbits to calculate the best time for launch to Mars. They learnt and discussed why there are launch-windows, times in which is it suitable to launch to Mars and if that opportunity is missed, whole programs might need to be scrapped and…

The Gadget Girls team are competing in this year’s KIBO Robot Programming Challenge (RPC). Most of their team have been able to travel to north-west Sydney to participate in the KIBO RPC Training and Support Program offered by One Giant Leap Australia Foundation (OGLAF). The program has been organised by OGLAF to help address gaps in knowledge and experience identified amongst many of the challenge participants, especially as the teams have been facing extra challenges due to COVID-19 restrictions and a later start to the challenge than originally planned.

‘The Gathering’ is the name given to the most recent Future Leaders Academy event. One Giant Leap Australia Foundation student ambassadors have come from all over New South Wales to gather with some of their fellow ambassadors. Some know each other from when they attended our Space Camp USA Tour. Some have also met at previous events. Others are meeting each other for the first time.

Imagine coming home from school and there is a knock on the door. Your mum opens the door and a stranger walks in and gives you a cheque for $4,000 and a robot. This is exactly what happened to Luke Aylmore from Western Australia.

He recently received a wonderful surprise when Andrew Waddington turned up at Luke’s home to present him with an UBTECH scholarship. The scholarship is to assist Luke to achieve a long-held dream to go with One Giant Leap Australia on their Space Camp USA Tour in 2021. Andrew also presented Luke with one of UBTECH’s robot kits. Andrew said, “It was wonderful to see the excitement in Luke’s eyes when we were able to fulfill one of his dreams. It is one of those moments I will never forget!”

When I attended the One Giant Leap Australia USA Tour in 2019, I had so many amazing challenges and experiences. One of those was to try scuba diving. I was super keen to start scuba after I got back home. I love it as much as I thought I would.

Several of our One Giant Leap Australia Foundation student ambassadors joined with some of their friends to create a team , ‘The Gadget Girls’, to enter this year’s KIBO-Robot Programming Challenge (RPC). This is an educational competition to solve various given problems by designing code to control real robots in the International Space Station (ISS).…

Since returning from the One Giant Leap Australia Space Camp USA Tour in 2019, I have been following my passion for open water swimming. To be more specific – my goal of swimming the English Channel in 2021. I have a renewed enthusiasm and belief in myself. Swimming training has been a bit tough with…

In January I was invited to travel to Sydney to participate in the ‘Future Leader Academy’, run by the One Giant Leap Australia Foundation as part of their Student Ambassador Program. It was such a great time spent with other student ambassadors, where were given so many opportunities to try new things and speak to…