Rosadah Abd Majid

Space Weather Monitoring System Competition for Secondary School Students in Malaysia

Competition is one of the best and most popular tools in the educational process. Through competition, new talent emerges in specific areas. This research focuses on secondary school students’ interest in space weather monitoring systems during and after their involvement in this competition. The objective of the research was to highlight the competition process. The competition was held in Malaysia and was open to all form 4 and form 5 secondary school students between the ages of 16 and 17. Each school was represented by one team and each team was comprised of four students guided by science teachers acting as mentors in a competition based on a module developed by researchers from Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM). Each team was required to build and design a VLF antenna, assemble the electronic components on the PCB to build the preamplifier and then analyze the data that they received. They had to create graphs and identify peaks indicating solar flares. Their findings were compared to GOES satellite data for verification. They were also required to prepare and upload their progress and final technical reports to be evaluated by a panel of judges. As stated in Vision 2020, this competition will hopefully cultivate interest amongst future scientists in the country especially the younger generation. This project revealed that the students were able to conduct research with minimal guidance and that they enjoyed participating in the competition.