SARAH Debreceny has earned a place in the National Youth Science Forum meeting in Canberra in January of 2014.
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Sarah, a year 11 student at Macintyre High School, was in a field of 1300 national applicants for one of the 150 students in her session at Canberra.
The National Youth Science Forum is an annual event, held in Canberra and Perth this year.
The forum is an opportunity for students to experience science and its applications on a broad scale. Participants also have exposure to research as well as industry, giving them ideas about what direction study in science might lead them.
For some young people, the forum can open up a world of previously unconsidered options and some-thing Sarah knows she will get out to the program.
“Seeing the practical application of things I’m interested in and also honing down what I want to do, maybe for a career and seeing the jobs and what people do and how they use it in the real world because it’s something that you don’t see a lot.”
Mum Kate Debreceny said Sarah has always been inquisitive.
“She’s very questioning; all her life she’s always asked questions all the time about everything.
“(She) loves to know why things are and how things are. She’s very interested in sciences, she’s got a lot of very diversified interested, languages, English, so who knows where she’ll end up?”
Sarah reflected: “There’s a lot of subjects that I enjoy and there’s a couple that I’m good at and I like seeing how they intertwine and everything meshes together and it’s interesting to see how the world works from lots of different perspectives.”
Inverell Rotary Club is sponsoring Sarah’s participation and helped guide her through the process.
Rotarian Brian Baldwin said Sarah’s interview must have impressed the interview committee because they made complementary notes on her paperwork.
“They’ve never made comments before-whether it’s something new or she is absolutely outstanding,” Brian said. Sarah already knows she will get a lot out of the experience.
“I’ve always been interested in the science topics, and I’ve gone through the epiphany and realised that that’s what I want to do later on in life.
“But just talking to the past students and realising, just the great time they’ve had spending time with like-minded students … it’s something you don’t have much of an opportunity to do in everyday life, so I decided that I’d love to go.”
