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Ashley Post Cool Lifestyle Writer

I for one am delighted to see the Government take action to promote STEM in schools. We have much talent in the country which has been going to waste through lack of nurturing.

I am lucky to be in a school that recognises that different people have different talents and caters for most of those through sports, practical subjects, clubs and academic study.

Because of that support, last year was exciting for a team of aspiring scientists from Queen Elizabeth Girls High School in Harare. I am honoured to be a member. We participated in Seitt competitions and excelled at cluster, district and provincial level. The team which comprised Kudzai Chabara, Shiela Munganyi, Perculiar Mandota, Wine Rondel, (myself) Ashley Post, Audrey Vengesai and Abdul Rashida have made history for Queen Elizabeth School. Four of us were then high school juniors.

We went on to participate in national competitions where we faced off teams from universities and private companies. We thus earned the chance to represent Zimbabwe at a science expo in South Africa. Once again we showed what we are made out of when came second out of 394 exhibitors. That led us to a more challenging expo where countries from diverse corners such as Mexico, Brazil, Thailand, Swaziland, South Africa, Botswana, Lesotho and Namibia participated. In all there were over 500 projects.

Team Zimbabwe did it again when we seven Queen Elizabeth School girls ended with a high recommendation for our project. We qualified to represent Africa in Phoenix, US, in May 2016. We are determined to re-write the narrative of the African girl child by showing that we are intelligent and capable young women who will lead the world tomorrow.

The team which will be travelling to represent Africa comprises of 11 members which will include the seven young scientists, three teaching staff members and a representative from the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education. Each person will need $3 400 for flight fare, $1 120 for accommodation,$140 for food which adds to $4 660 per person. Please kindly contact our school head directly or the Cool Lifestyle Team to assist us put Zimbabwe on the world map.