Human Powered Vehicles

Mount Beauty Secondary College (MBSC) has three Human Powered Vehicle (HPV) teams, and will be looking to build upon that in the coming years. The program is offered to students at MBSC across all year levels.  The students train throughout the year, culminating in the Energy Breakthrough Human Powered Vehicle Race, held in November in Maryborough, Victoria. This is one of the biggest events held for students in Australia with hundreds of schools participating, from primary through to senior secondary school.

This program encourages young people to be actively involved in finding solutions for a world they will inherit, while giving them the opportunity to be involved in a fun program with real world challenges. It is an exciting program designed to provide opportunities for students, teachers, parents and local industry to work together to design and construct a vehicle, a machine or innovation in technology that will represent an energy breakthrough. School groups work throughout the year to design, build and test vehicles or machines within detailed specifications.  Students get to explore and address driving skills and passenger safety issues, during the construction of Human Powered Vehicles. It requires a team effort and an across-the-curriculum approach. These groups then bring their vehicles and machines to Maryborough in November, for a huge celebration in which they can demonstrate and trial them in action.

A major part of the program is to encourage students, parents and the school to foster positive attitudes towards alternative energy sources and the potential to recycle much of our waste materials. The Energy Breakthrough aims to ….

  • Provide an excellent technology project for students from Year 7 to Year 12
  • Encourage young people to explore solutions to environmental and transport issues
  • Provide an opportunity for women and girls to participate in what has traditionally been a ‘male’ dominated area of the curriculum
  • Be a fun program with real world challenges
  • Offer students opportunities to explore and address vehicle design, driving skills and vehicle and passenger safety issues.

For further information, or to find out how to become a sponsor, please speak to Mr Chris Greenhalgh, and or visit:  eb.org.au to learn more about the event.