Sean Morley Memorial Prize
Earlier this month, the final of the Sean Morley Award 2016 was held at the Palace of Westminster. The award, an initiative of the road safety charity AIRSO (The Association of Industrial Road Safety Officers), is open to undergraduates of UK universities and rewards exceptional projects and dissertations which have a road safety theme.
Sean Morley, a 20 year old History and Politics undergraduate at Aberystwyth University was killed on September 2nd 2012 when he was hit by a car as he made his way home on foot after a night out with friends.
The Memorial Prize aims to promote research into road safety by attracting talented graduates to the field. In addition, it is hoped that the prize will provide a mechanism through which those just beginning their careers can bring their ideas to the wider road safety community. Most importantly, however, the Sean Morley Memorial Prize celebrates the life of a remarkable young man, whose needless loss reminds us why continued efforts to make our roads safer are so important.
The shortlisted students accompanied Sean's family on a tour of the palace, hosted by Craig Tracey MP, before heading to the Attlee Suite to present their work. The audience included a panel of judges drawn from the Airso membership, with representatives of other road safety organisations, Airso council members, and academics also in attendance.
In total seven students presented their work, with Nottingham Trent University securing an impressive double, taking both the best dissertation prize for Aaron's Howard's work on training car drivers to spot motorcyclists at junctions, and the best product prize for Lara Alvarez's designs for reflective knitwear. Aaron's dissertation was judged to be the overall winner, & his name has been added to the cup, under that of last year's winner Dominic Russell. Aaron's department will be displaying the cup for the next 12 months.
Chair of Road Safety Wales, Susan Storch said, “Since the award’s inception last year, the number of entries has more than doubled.
“As judges we were genuinely impressed at the quality of the work we saw, and the potential it offers to practitioners and policy-makers.”
Dr Lucy Rackliff of AIRSO (The Association of Industrial Road Safety Officers) and Aston University added: “As an academic, I saw so much exciting and innovative road safety work being produced by students but there was no way to show it to the practitioners and policy-makers who could use it. I hope that as the award develops and grows it will become a key route for new ideas and new talent to enter the profession.”