The Big Day In ICT careers conference has kicked off for 2018, with a large turnout in Wagga Wagga.

Held at Charles Sturt University, the event hosted 590 high school students from across the Riverina and Albury Wodonga regions.

The students listened to presentations from industry professionals and learnt first-hand about different ICT career paths.

Now in its seventh year, the Big Day In is an initiative developed by the ACS Foundation aimed at providing an engaging conference for students who have shown an early interest in a career in technology.

In 2017, Big Day In had 170 speakers at its events across Australia and hosted over 7,800 students.

Students in Wagga Wagga heard from speakers from Adobe, Commonwealth Bank, Westpac, WiseTech and the Australian Government.

The students, who were mostly in years 9-12, were also able to hear from a fellow high schooler, with the Founder of EduKits International, Michael Nixon, speaking to the crowd.

Nixon, who is from Wagga Wagga, created his company in 2016 at the age of 13 when he was trying to teach himself how to code.

Being forced to use Tafe textbooks as his main resource, Nixon identified the need for educational and fun products that could be used to help young people learn to code.

Nixon developed the Amazing Annoyatron, a LEGO-style electronics kit that helps introduce young children to coding.

Alongside strong sales across Australia, New Zealand, Europe and the United States, the kit also helped Nixon to win last year’s national Australia Post Regional Pitchfest.

Nixon told the crowd about his journey so far.

He said it is now the responsibility of young people to break the stigma that they cannot create successful businesses.

The role of technology in agriculture was also discussed throughout the day.

Dan Winson, who developed Agrinet, the ‘farm-wide WiFi’, discussed how his large networks and remotely accessed cameras can help farms and stations.

Co-founder of supply chain management platform, FARMpay, Naomi Stuart also explained how she took her product from a prototype to scalable solution.

The next Big Day In will be held at UTS in Sydney on 20-21 March.