A Tauranga student has been awarded a $10,000 scholarship to further his quest to become New Zealand's first drone engineer.
Otumoetai College student Callum Riddington was one of 15 recipients at the AMP National Scholarships Awards evening last night.
Callum had been researching and developing an unmanned aerial system (drone) for his college for aerial filming at school events, search and rescue following natural disasters in the Pacific and agricultural and environmental monitoring.
He was ready to take his knowledge to a wider audience and the AMP Study Start Scholarship would enable him to study engineering, with a major in software engineering.
His secondary study course would be in computer science so he could gain more knowledge and build innovative solutions.
Callum was awarded his NCEA with merit last year, topping electronics and programming with straight excellence results.
Callum said developing and innovating drones would help put New Zealand on the map and he looked forward to helping support the country's growing drone innovations.
"Drones have so many applications and can be used in many fields such as search and rescue, agriculture and environmental monitoring."
AMP chief customer officer Jeff Ruscoe said AMP loved innovation, "and to be able to provide a committed student such as Callum a helping hand towards furthering his career is rewarding and we look forward to his research and efforts being of significance to our country in years to come".
AMP managing director Jack Regan was delighted to award $200,000 in scholarships to the 15 passionate and determined New Zealanders striving to 'do their thing'.
Recipients were determined by a judging panel led by Dame Rosanne Meo, Pro Vice-Chancellor and Dean of the College of Business at Massey University Professor Ted Zorn, 42 Below co-founder Justine Troy, former-MD of Saatchi & Saatchi Mike Hutcheson, AMP chief operating officer Kevin Bouchier and Mr Ruscoe.