General News
9 April, 2025
Dedicated STEM teacher recognised nationally
The St Kieran’s teacher was one of only five recipients of a CSIRO bursary.
Karissa Smith says she was surprised to win a national teacher bursary given she was not entirely sure whether she even met the criteria when she first applied.
The St Kieran’s Catholic School teacher was the only Queensland educator and one of only five recipients nationwide in the CSIRO’s Adult Future Pathways program.
Under the banner of strengthening students’ “confidence, capability and connection,” with Science, Technology, Engineering or Maths (STEM), the program aims to provide teachers with additional skills and resources to help steer students in “underrepresented” areas such as remote and Indigenous communities.
Ms Smith said the CSIRO had awarded $3000 to allow her to travel to an education conference in Melbourne later this year as well as purchase materials that will aid in her future lesson planning.
Ms Smith also manages music and Japanese classes at St Kieran’s but said she had increasingly enjoyed the challenge of engaging students in the hands-on fields related to STEM this year.
“I was sent the information about the program and thought I would just put my name down and see what happens,” she explained.
“There were 150 applicants around Australia so to be chosen among the five that received the prize is really surprising.”
In her day to day teaching role, Ms Smith floats between the different age groups and works alongside each classroom teacher to deliver specialised STEM lessons.
Students have engaged in a wide range of practical exercises under her instruction, from creating stop motion camera animations to detail the life cycle of an animal, to learning basic programming skills to using Lego to work on unique engineering constructions.
“I can go down a lot of rabbit holes developing lessons for the kids – Google and I have a lot of dates together,” she laughs.
“I think that STEM is so important in a town like Mount Isa because we see it everyday across all the mine engineering.
“But STEM is also about teamwork – we try to engage the students in activities where they have to work with a partner or in a group to solve a problem, just as they would in real life.”