September 2016

LOOK BEYOND THE HORIZON: First Robotics Festival Took Place in Minsk

The organizers of the First Robotics Festival focused on such challenging objectives as create the basis for efficient knowledge economy through the involvement of children and youth into scientific and technical creativity, find new talents and show them the horizon of new opportunities in the sphere of robotic technologies and IT.

The Festival turned into a platform where the participants could talk to global experts in robotic technologies, innovation, and IT, as well as demonstrate their own experience and talents, get acquainted with the latest inventions of young Belarusian scientists and entrepreneurs. More than 3,000 people visited the Festival in three days.

Interactive exhibition occupied the entry hall of the palace while the visitors paid special attention to the open areas for technical creativity such as LEGOdrom, Robokitchen, etc. They had an opportunity to build their own robots and drones from paper and cardboard, fire a rocket into space, carry out scientific experiments, create 3D models and print them out. The interest that parents and grandparents demonstrated in those areas proves that scientific and technical creativity might be a family activity.

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Participants of the Festival attended popular science lectures and master classes dedicated to certain issues of robotic creativity, namely creating and programming different robotic constructions such as Scratch, Arduino, Scratchduino, Lego WeDo, as well as 3D modeling and 3D printing, etc.

Some master classes were conducted by teachers from Russia: Denis Koposov, Anna Samarina, Marina Livenets.

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The Festival had a competitive element as well. The competitions were organized in 6 areas namely Robotics, RoboRace, CodeWheels, Neuropilotage, UAS, Robot-sumo. More than 250 people from all over Belarus and two teams from Russia (St. Petersburg and Kazan) took part in those competitions.

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The Festival program also included two discussions. Representatives of the educational system, researchers and representatives of the IT sector discussed the future of the Festival, its tasks and prospects for development of educational robotics in the country at the round table “Educational Robotics in the Republic of Belarus: Problems and Perspectives of Development, Coordination”.

The second discussion “Robotics in Education: How, Why and Who Needs it?” was more practice-oriented. The leader of discussion Diana Gagarina, an associate professor at the Perm State National Research University, discussed the importance and peculiarities of integrating robotics into the general educational process with teachers, team trainers and all those interested.

The First Open Robotics Festival “ROBOFEST-BELARUS” was a great HOLIDAY for all the participants! We thank the organizers, speakers, teachers for their support, interest and inspiring experience they shared!

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