Tshwane automotive school learners build electric vehicle
The school has been on a mission to provide skills to learners in the township to prepare them for their future careers.
Soshanguve Technical High School has been assisting its learners to gain skills that will be useful in their professional careers.
Recently, learners at the school built an electrical vehicle using the frame of an old car.
Last year, another group built a solar-powered train locomotive that had photovoltaic panels installed on the roof and could reach speeds of up to 30km/hour.
The school is one of the 39 specialisation schools in Gauteng and was launched as such in 2019 with an automotive focus.
Principal Tladi Mashiane said the school offers nine specialisations that learners in grades 10 to 12 can choose from.
“Our learners in Grade 8 have vocational orientation subjects. Instead of learning economics and management sciences (EMS), they learn electrical technology, and instead of creative arts, they have mechanical and civil technology orientation,” he said.
Mashiane said this helps learners select the appropriate specialisation they wish to study when they enter Grade 10.
He said learners sometimes have lessons after school hours so they can come up with ideas and innovations to help address some of the current problems in the country.
“In 2017, we collaborated with MerSETA on a project to teach 21 of our learners how to become artisans, and now those learners are qualified artisans,” he said.
Mashiane said the school is currently in partnership with vehicle manufacturer BMW to educate learners about entrepreneurship.
“We are also working with the Chinese Embassy to have some of our learners that side to exchange skills and innovation,” he said.
School teacher Kgomotso Moimane said the 15 learners involved in building the electrical vehicle using an old car frame had to use their skills to structure the frame in a way that would accommodate new car parts.
“They removed the car suspension, painted the frame, made a new battery housing, and removed the old car axle and fabricated a new one,” said Moimane.
He said learners conducted thorough research before any work was done so that they could find statistics that had real percentages.
“The statistics showed that cars in South Africa contribute a lot towards carbon emissions, so learners saw fit to come up with a solution that could address that problem.”
Moimane said the main reason there are often projects at the school is to make sure that learners are aware of the career paths they want to pursue.
“The projects help them develop character and discover many things, including a lot of other careers that they could venture into.”
He said the projects also assist students in improving their academic performance by teaching them the importance of time management.
He added that although project-based learning was not compulsory, students were encouraged to participate in as much as they could.
Grade 11 learner Rendani Mulaudzi said he has dreams of becoming an astronaut one day.
“I love everything about space, and it would be really amazing if I could go to the moon and stand on top of it just to know how it feels,” he said.
“I believe if you strive for anything you believe is possible, then it is possible,” he added.
Mulaudzi said he wants to study engineering at one of the universities in China after completing Grade 12.
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