Budding Young Scientists Compete in QNRF and SEC Science Challenge

Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF), a centre of Qatar Foundation Research and Development (QF R&D), and the Supreme Education Council (SEC) have awarded winning students in the Science Challenge organized at the Hamad bin Khalifa University Student Center.

Aligned with the educational curriculum for middle schools in Qatar, the Science Challenge pilot programme was set up to encourage young students to construct a bridge using the science principles taught in the classroom.

A panel made up of university faculty members, QNRF program managers, and science experts at SEC judged entries from the 10 competing middle schools recognising teams from Abdulrahman Bin Jassim Secondary School for Boys, Fatima Alzahra Preparatory Independent School for Girls and Al Bayan Secondary School for Girls for demonstrating the most ambition and skill in building their innovative science project.

The competition encouraged students to use strategies such as teamwork and creativity to positively affect the outcome of their experiments. In addition to receiving guidance, resources and training, the students were also driven to displaying their own careful planning in order to overcome any obstacles.

QNRF’s Executive Director Dr Abdul Sattar Al-Taie, said: “We believe this new educational competition will help us further promote science and research at an early age, by demonstrating to young people that performing creative science experiments can be interesting whilst being fun.

“We are extremely encouraged by the success of our Science Challenge pilot programme and we look forward to implementing this valuable event in the school calendar for years to come.”

Elaborating further on the new programme, Fatima Al Rashid, Head of the Science Department at the SEC Curriculum Standards Office, explained:  “It is a great opportunity for the SEC to work with QNRF in developing and organizing this event. We feel it is important for pupils to use the theoretical work they have learnt by applying it in a practical context.

“The Science Challenge will give students the experience of working under restricted conditions in order to complete a set task. We hope this pilot event will pave the way for more Science Challenges to take place for different grades in the future.”

After the Secondary School Research Experience Program, the Science Challenge is the second cooperative program that the SEC and QNRF have launched to engage students in research using a fun, interesting and educational approach.