When a Dunedin secondary student with a jersey full of scientific achievement badges noticed one area was not covered, he designed one of his own.

King’s High School year 9 student Samuel Riley, 13, has been working to collect 31 science badges as part of a self-led learning programme by the Science Award Trust.

Students pick a topic that interests them, then work towards their desired badge by completing challenges. Once marked and finished, they receive a badge and a certificate.

When he received his 30th badge, he was eligible for the platinum award — only 40 other New Zealand students have achieved this since 2019.

‘‘There’s a badge for nearly every science topic you can think of,’’ Samuel said.

While working towards the badges, he noticed computer science was missing — so he designed a badge for the programme.

He said creating a new badge for computer science was ‘‘filling a gap that needed to be filled’’.

‘‘It’s quite funny to think about that other people across the nation could be working…