It’s not rocket science

By Casey Neill
BELGRAVE’S Anne Brumfitt is the first woman to receive non posthumously an international space education award.
Ms Brumfitt is this year’s Frank J Malina Medal winner.
Since 1986, the International Astronautical Federation has presented the medal to an educator who best used their resources to promote astronautics study.
Ms Brumfitt will receive her prize at a gala dinner in Glasgow, Scotland, on 3 October.
“I’m overwhelmed, incredibly proud, and delighted,” she said.
Ms Brumfitt started out as a historian and museum curator. She then worked as a teacher for more than 20 years, including a stint at UK’s Royal Military Academy Sandhurst.
“Being a teacher means seeing children’s eyes light up when you’ve opened a new door they didn’t know existed and were capable of going through,” she said.
Today she runs a non-profit company called Space Qualified to help teachers make students excited about space.
Ms Brumfitt said the aerospace industry needed more participants, because too few people were going into technology.
She said educators needed to create activities for young people that matched their interests.
In 2007, Ms Brumfitt organised a project involving 4000 children from Russia, the Netherlands, UK and Australia to commemorate the Sputnik launch.The students created mission patches that were launched into space.
“It’s not just about standing in front of the classroom blackboard,” Ms Brumfitt said. “It’s about taking young people on a journey.”
In 2006, she coached the Australian Space Olympics team to claim the Cosmonauts Prize for Space Research – the first non-Russians to do so.
RMIT University aerospace engineering Associate Professor Lachlan Thompson and his colleague Professor Pavel Trivailo nominated Ms Brumfitt for the honour.
Native to the UK, Ms Brumfitt is now a permanent Australian resident.
More information on Space Qualified is available by calling Ms Brumfitt on 0400 036 240 or sending an email to anne.brumfit@spacequalified.org.