A FITNESS app created by Ennis students which aims to prevent injury among young female sports athletes, has scooped second prize in a prestigious competition.
Third year students Amy Hennessy and Juliette Purcell from Coláiste Muire turned judges’ heads at the BD STEM Stars competition with their app which focuses on preventing anterior cruciate ligament injuries in young women.
Their research also found that young women are given the same fitness coaching as their male peers despite having different body forms.
The competition is run by Becton, Dickinson and Company (BD), one of the world’s leading medical device companies.
First place was jointly claimed by two Kinsale Community College teams, which earned their school a cheque of €10,000 for STEM related facilities. 
The BD STEM Stars 2024 Award, which is supported by the Limerick and Clare Education and Training Board (LCETB), is the biggest such awards programme in Munster. 
The competition was launched five years ago by BD to promote and encourage participation in STEM subjects for second level students. The brief given to students was to devise solutions that positively impact on and advance the world of healthcare.
In addition to the competition element itself, the students also received a tour of the high-tech BD Research Centre Ireland facility before the announcement of the winners by the Senior Manager at BD RCI, Dr. John Carey and presentation to the winners by Site Lead for BD RCI Seán Wall.
“This is a special day for all of us at BD and one we look forward to with great excitement as we get to see the incredible pool of STEM talent that’s coming through in second level schools,2 said Mr Wall.
“We set out with this project five years ago to encourage awareness of the potential of STEM to improve the world of healthcare and to see where we have arrived at, with so many schools and incredible talent taking part, makes it a journey worthwhile.”
Donncha Ó Treasaigh, Director of Schools at Limerick and Clare ETB said, “The promotion of STEM among students is a very important objective of ours at the ETB and having one of the world’s leading med-tech companies weigh in with a competition like this is something that we are very privileged to have in the Munster area. There has been a huge response from the schools, and this is a competition we see going from strength to strength. I also want to complement the BD team on this as the scale and reach of the competition gets bigger and more exciting every year.”
BD RCI is a state-of-the-art facility adjacent to the University of Limerick campus that develops innovative technologies to improve biomedical discovery, clinical diagnosis of disease, and the delivery of care for patients and health care workers.
It currently employs 370 experts in software development, software testing, systems engineering, mechanical and electronic engineering, project management, quality and biosciences including immunology.