As part of their commemoration of World Telecommunication and Information Society Day (WTISD) MultiChoice Africa and Eutelsat Communications have announced the return of the DStv Eutelsat Star Awards for 2013. The awards inspire innovative thinking among secondary and high school students in Africa, to create awareness on how science and technology can be applied to everyday life, and to showcase the many ways that satellites already impact on the development of the African continent.
The 2013 awards are aligned with the objective of WTISD, namely to raise awareness of the impact of information and communication technologies (ICTs), and in particular satellites, on society.
“The new edition of the Star Awards challenge high school student from over 42 African countries to propose how they would use the satellites in space to address three community, country or African continental priorities” says Nico Meyer, Chief Executive of MultiChoice Africa.
The annual awards, which grew from 800 entries in 2011 to over 1000 last year take the form of a competition open to 14-19 year-old students to write an essay or design a poster on the specified topic. Country winners, besides winning exciting country prizes, will go on to compete against each other for the overall continental awards. Like their 2011 and 2012 counterparts, this year’s overall essay and poster winners will win a once in a lifetime trip for two to the Eutelsat facilities in Paris, with the essay winner traveling onwards to witness a live rocket launch. Runners up will win a trip to South Africa as guests of MultiChoice Africa. Schools attended by the overall winners will also receive a DStv installation, including dish, television, state-of-the-art PVR decoder and free access to the DStv Education Bouquet.
The 2012 best essay winner, Oyom Anthony from Uganda, won a trip to Paris and French Guiana.
Students can enter the awards by collecting an entry form and other resources from their nearest MultiChoice office or download a copy at www.dstvstarawards.com. Entries for the awards close on 19 September 2013.
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