Cork ‘do the double’ in the Engineers Ireland STEPS Young Engineers Award

Third-class children from Barryroe National School, Barryroe, County Cork, have won the 2025 Engineers Ireland STEPS Young Engineers Award for their invention, the Water Safety Wristband. The Barryroe team faced strong competition, with almost 4,000 primary school children from all over the country taking part and over 550 projects submitted to the STEPS Young Engineers Award which encourages children aged 8-11 to develop creative engineering projects to help or improve their local community.

The Water Safety Wristband is a wristband with a compressed air cannister that inflates a balloon when a lever is pulled, so the swimmer can rest on the pillow if they get into difficulty. It was developed by The Burger Bites, comprising teammates Rian O’Leary, Meg Adams, Saidhbh Deasy, Conor Griffin, Aoife Whelton and Zac Guerin, to help prevent drownings.

Hailing from the coastal town of Barryroe in west Cork, the team developed the Water Safety Wristband as they ‘want people to feel safe while swimming’. The competition was judged by engineers from ARUP, eFlow, Engineers Ireland, ESB, Intel and TII who noted how the Barryroe pupils developed several prototypes to improve their design, including a working prototype. STEPS volunteer engineer Nikhil Vengatesan, from Veoila, visited the class to discuss his experience as an engineer and listen to the children present their projects.

St Mary’s Primary School in Rosscarbery, Co. Cork, took the runner-up prize for their project, Renewable Energy Ecofriendly Lighting. Caherelly National School in Limerick, Dunboyne Senior Primary School in Meath, Nagle Rice National School in Kerry, and Holy Family Senior School in Laois were all highly commended for their innovative designs.

The winning and runner-up schools receive an engineering show for the school from Mark Langtry, scientist, broadcaster and Head of Science and Sport at Explorium, and all finalists receive a trophy, medals and framed certificates. All participants receive a certificate of achievement and an online show. All prizes for the STEPS Young Engineers Award 2024/2025 programme are supported by eFlow.

Praising this year’s entrants to the STEPS Young Engineers Award, Damien Owens, Director General of Engineers Ireland, said:

“Engineering is about the application of science to real-world problems, developing solutions that can assist people across the world. It is marvellous to see the students at Barryroe National School excel in this approach to problem solving with this creative design, and congratulations to all of our entrants this year for their innovation and hard work on their projects. The future of Irish engineering is indeed in good hands.”