Buy Smart Competition winners

Congratulations to the 2022 Buy Smart Competition prize winners who were announced at Parliament House on 27 October 2022.

Learn more about the entries by the winners of the 2022 competition:

Years 4 to 6

First place

Chloe Hosking and Keina Fox, Wellers Hill State School

Chloe and Keina created an anime short film, where their pencil-and-ink selves fell for a malicious pop-up offering a fake ‘starter pack’ for an online game. This pop-up was used to steal personal details and gained access to their mum’s bank account.

These savvy creators highlighted the 2 biggest lessons in this story—firstly to check with a parent before buying anything online and secondly to never give away personal details to untrusted sites.

Second place

Ziggy and Milla Henry, Queensland Department of Education’s Home Education Unit

Ziggy and Milla became interested in refund rights after buying a faulty toy. They adapted this incident into a news report to let people know what their rights are and where to go for help. They even came up with a catchy jingle for the Queensland Government phone number to contact the Office of Fair Trading!

Third place

Lilica Koseki, Wellers Hill State School

Lilica’s board game had a clever twist. Players move between squares not by rolling dice but by answering questions about potential scam scenarios, which keeps the learning objective at the front of players’ minds. The scenarios were well chosen and the questions focused on the core of each issue.

Highly commended

Rachel Irvine, Forest Lake State School

Rachel made a super-savings calendar, which sets out monthly challenges to work out the best value option between similar products with different sizes and inclusions. There’s also a monthly challenge where users are asked to go the whole week buying only ‘needs’, and not ‘wants’, to show how much money one can save by thinking before they spend.

Summer Bishop, Indi Augustus, Emerson Nganeko and Stella Nganeko, Kurwongbah State School

Summer, Indi, Emerson and Stella made a video about avoiding scams. It had elements of narrative storytelling, song and dance, and direct presentation to camera. There was a very strong focus on important tips and advice, such as talking to an adult, changing your passwords and paying attention to the details on a website.

Cyrus Maglis and Brody Mercer, Clover Hill State School

Cyrus and Brody’s short film tells the story of a boy’s excitement at winning a prize in a competition he’d never entered. Will his friend be able to save him in time?

Their focus on a specific online scam allowed their information and advice to be clear and straightforward, and therefore memorable.

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Years 7 to 9

First place

Mei Mei Bolland, Wavell State High School

Mei Mei created an instructional video about budgeting and saving. The judges were impressed with the hand-drawn, cut-and-paste aesthetic of Mei Mei’s creation, as well as her presentation of useful advice on balancing a budget and maintaining control of your spending habits.

Second place

Hsiang-Ting (Lucas) Ho, Mueller College

Lucas applied a lot of artistic flair to his video about buying a first car. The illustrations showed a quirky sense of humour, and the overall content demonstrated a high level of knowledge and understanding of consumer protections, such as statutory warranties, cooling-off periods and more.

Third place

Rosie Lamb and Finn Burns, Bell State School

Rosie and Finn impressed the judges with their creative thinking in developing their Information ROCKS rock garden. Each of the rocks had consumer information attached using colourful ribbons. The idea was to have the rocks scattered around the school to catch people’s eye and encourage them to read the advice. Because, of course… Information rocks!

Highly commended

Emma Byrne, Helensvale State High School

Emma’s interactive game focuses on the topic of phishing scams. When players ‘catch a fish’ in her game, they must be able to identify whether the corresponding email or message is safe or if it’s a phishing scam.

David Chiu, Jerry Yang and Jaden Lee, Sheldon College

David, Jerry and Jaden’s instructional video on safer online shopping examined potential drawbacks for consumers when shopping online, including identifying scams, considering secure payment options and seeking redress (a fix) if something goes wrong.

Cedar Roberts, Aria Diamond and Isabella Keenan, Marymount College

Cedar, Aria and Isabella made a short film combining storytelling with journalistic-style narration on the topic of online shopping scams.

Mia Geere, Clayfield College

Mia created the Scam Island board game, where players navigate around phone scams, romance scams, online shopping scams and general online security. Players answer questions and complete actions that support the learning objectives of the game.

Mariya Budd and Bethany Carter-Murphy, Helensvale State High School

Mariya and Bethany built an entire website to step consumers through every aspect of buying and using a mobile device, from saving up for that device to managing their data use.

Sophie Dalrymple and Claudia Mar Fan, Loreto College Coorparoo

Sophia and Claudia created a poster with information, hints and tips for online shopping. They also undertook market research on their topic to find out what their school peers know—or do not know—about online shopping safety. It provided some interesting stats, but also gave them a clear focus on which ideas and tips to include in their poster.

Lucy McDougall, Sunshine Coast Grammar School

Lucy thought carefully about her target audience of over 65s, and how she could most effectively present her scam-awareness message to an audience that prefers information in a printed format. The Scam Smart magazine would not look out of place on any coffee table or in a waiting room. It is full of articles, hints and advice, as well as the essential quizzes and activities at the back of the magazine.

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Years 10 to 12

First place

James Ehrat, Nambour State College

James created a thorough and informative slide presentation with voiceover on the topic of buying a mobile device. The judges were impressed by James’s depth of research and how his entry stressed the importance of weighing up the costs and benefits when considering the range of different devices, networks and retailers on the market.

Second place

Maddison MacGregor and Chloe Robins, Aspley State High School

Maddison and Chloe designed and developed a brochure. They included a balance of information and tips on the topic of budgeting and saving.

Third place

Tayla Gibbons and Alyssa Clifton, The Springfield Anglican College

Tayla and Alyssa developed a snap-style card game to reveal tips for online scam awareness. It was a great concept, and the snap format was a clever way to encourage players to really read the hints and tips on the cards to find that perfect match.

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Commissioner’s School Champion Prize

Forest Lake State School / Wadja Wadja High School (joint winners)

This discretionary prize recognises outstanding support of the Buy Smart Program and its objectives.

  • All Forest Lake State School students in Years 4 to 6 engaged in lessons about online shopping, budgeting, scam awareness and more in the Buy Smart school presentations. The school also ran a lunch-time club where students gave up their own time to participate in the Buy Smart Competition and developed some great entries.
  • Wadja Wadja High School has strongly contributed to consumer literacy in the Woorabinda Aboriginal Community. All Year 7 to 12 students participated in the Buy Smart Program and, through this, have developed a strong understanding of their consumer rights and how to navigate the specific issues that can arise in a remote community.