19 October 2017
Assistant Director General at the Central Statistics Office, Maria Hurley, today (Thursday 19th October 2017) presented prizes to the winners of the 2017 John Hooper Medal, Apps4Gaps and BT Young Scientist – Best use of Open Data Competitions, in the National Concert Hall, Dublin.
The goal of the John Hooper competition is to improve students' abilities to describe, explore and investigate their environment using statistics. This national competition is open to teams of 2 to 3 students, up to 18 years old and is named in honour of John Hooper BA* (1878 - 1930). The competition was first launched seven years ago to mark the first World Statistics Day in 2010, which is now observed every 20 October. This year’s overall winners of the John Hooper Awards went on to win third place on the world stage in the coveted International Statistical Literacy Project (ISLP) and International Association of Statistical Education (IASE) International Statistics Competition. This prestigious competition attracted entries from 23 countries including Japan, Russia, Mexico, Australia, Finland, Hungary and Zambia. The winners also received their international award at this ceremony for their project “Don’t ditch your dairy”.
This is the fourth year of the national Apps4gaps Competition. The aim of the competition is to encourage teams to develop innovative apps, harnessing open data available on www.data.gov.ie, to generate new insights. In addition, this is the third year of the BT Young Scientist – Best use of Open Data competition. This competition aims to aims to encourage young people to use open data. This award is for the most innovative use, or potential use, of CSO data - be it in statistical analyses, statistical processes or statistical outputs, a piece of research, a visualisation or a data map, the development of a device, a software application or the use of CSO data in any other innovative way.
Speaking at the ceremony, Ms. Hurley said:
“There has been a consistently high standard of entries for both the John Hooper and App4Gaps competitions, and I am delighted with both the commitment shown and the quality of entries submitted.
Students have demonstrated ingenuity and original thinking by exploring a broad range of topics from racehorses to the effects on sleep. They have also shown creativity by developing innovative apps exploring a range of topics such as crime, bullying and education. In doing so, they have highlighted the relevance of statistics in that they can be used to educate and to provide insight and understanding in relation to a diverse range of subject matters.
Educating young people and promoting how statistics can be used in society underpins the CSO’s Educational Outreach programme which includes the John Hooper Medal, the Apps4Gaps competition, the CSO award at the BT Young Scientist exhibition for the best use of open data and the CensusAtSchool initiatives.”
For further information contact:
Elaine O’Mahoney - 087 1308799
First prize: Ella Brennan, Jessie Oyenuga
Teacher: Claire Treanor
Loreto Secondary School
Co. Kilkenny
Poster: Don’t ditch your dairy
Second prize: Bronagh Cassidy, Aoife Lowth, Rachel Campbell
Teacher: John White
St. Vincent’s Secondary School
Dundalk, Co. Louth
Third prize: Lynn Sweetnam, Eva Murphy
Teacher: Stephen McLaughlin
Bandon, Co Cork
1st place and Overall winner of the Alice Perry medal:
“Luas Real Time Information”
Creators: Eoghan Craven-Grace, Liam Finnegan and Ethan Hammond, Dublin
2nd Place Working App:
“Population Projections”
Creators: Cian Dunne and Mohammed Eraghubi
“LifeStats”
Creators: Akhil Voorakkara, Steven Harris and Jack Lane, Dublin
John Hooper BA* (1878 - 1930). He graduated in 1898 with a First Class Honours in Mathematics, and in 1923 at the foundation of State, was appointed the first Director of Statistics for Saorstát Éireann. As the first Director of Statistics, John Hooper shaped the development of official statistics for the new State until his death in December 1930. His work led to the development of new statistics (e.g. first Census of Population and Census of Industrial Production in 1926), and the 1926 Statistics Act.
Ken Kennedy (+353) 21 453 5036 or Olivia Lucey (+353) 21 453 5021
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