When student Katherine Bilic applied for a short course in railway engineering at Monash University, she didn’t know much about rail.

“I saw there were some spots available and I thought ‘I’ve got nothing on next week, I might as well go,’” she said.

“But I ended up finding it fascinating and wanting to learn more.”

Unable to specialise in railway engineering within her broader engineering degree, she decided to take matters into her own hands.

“They don’t teach it beyond the odd elective, so I spoke with some people from the Monash Institute of Railway Technology to figure out what we could do to get more students involved.”

This initial spark led to Monash’s first ever student rail team competing in the annual Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) Railway Challenge in the United Kingdom, a competition that involves designing and building a locomotive that is one-fifth the size of a regular locomotive.

The team, led by Bilic and dubbed Monash Railway Express (MREx), competed in the Entry Level Challenge in 2025 and ended up coming in second place, just five points behind the top spot.

“We were a close second and we learned so much from the competition,” said Bilic.

“It was such a great experience, with everyone willing to help each other – like if we asked another team about their locomotive they would literally pull it apart to show us.”

Back in Melbourne, the team is energised and gearing up to take part in the competition again in 2026.

“We came back from the competition and revised our locomotive’s design a bit, based on what we learned,” she said.

“We’re really looking forward to going back and hopefully winning something this year!”

MREx’s design, known as Wallaby, is a battery-electric locomotive inspired by Melbourne’s iconic W-class trams.

“We’re dedicated to designing an innovative locomotive that champions sustainability, safety and efficiency,” Bilic said.

She added that some of the other locomotives at last year’s IMechE didn’t perform as well as hoped after sitting out in the sun for a few weeks – but she reckons the Australian team has an advantage.

“A few of the other locos suffered from reliability issues with their electronics, but we think if ours holds up after being tested in the heat here it should be OK over in England.”

Since Bilic first started recruiting for MREx a year ago, the number of students on the team has grown to 45 – and 38 per cent are women.

“I wanted there to be a positive, welcoming culture for everyone from the start, as we were building the team from the ground up,” she said.

“More women have gotten involved because their female friends on the team have recommended it to them, which is amazing.”

She thinks projects like this are a great way to get more young people interested in joining the rail industry, which is suffering from a skills shortage and a retirement cliff.

“We had over 220 applications for the team – the interest in rail is definitely out there,” she said.

“We want to start a similar competition to IMechE here in Australia, to build on that interest and potentially encourage more engineers to go into rail in the future.”

She’s very proud of what the team has achieved so far and excited about what the future holds.

“The team has put so much effort into this project, and it’s great to see the tangible results from our work,” she said.

“Seeing it all come together, piece by piece, is what keeps us coming back.”