Minister honours research contest winners

Minister of Education and Higher Education H E Dr Mohammed Abdul Wahed Ali Al Hammadi honoured winners of National Scientific Research Week contests held for school students and teachers in Qatar as part of Education Conference, which concluded yesterday.

The Minister awarded the head of the jury as well as winning teachers, students and schools in the nine categories of the competitions which included computer and communication systems, biomedicine, Mathematics and physics, engineering, energy, chemistry and material science, earth and environmental sciences, animal and plant sciences, behavioral and social sciences, The Peninsula reported.

The event also witnessed announcement of six researches that are going to represent Qatar in the upcoming International Science and Engineering Fair (Intel ISEF). Fawzia Al Khater, Undersecretary for Educational Affairs at the Ministry, said that the event aimed to provide an appropriate atmosphere for exchanging national and international expertise. This year, she added, the conference dedicated a whole week for scientific research and attracted most of the scientific research entities such as Hamad Bin Khalifa University, Qatar Environment, Energy Research Institute (QEERI) and the British Council. In her speech read out by Dr Asma Al Mohannadi, Head of the Ministry's Scientific Research Team, Al Khater said the ministry has worked to encourage teachers and academics at government and private schools to implement advanced practices in education. There were 680 research entries this year compared to 300 in the previous edition, said QNRF Executive Director Dr Abdul Sattar Al Taie.

Al Taie praised the partnership the QNRF has established with the Ministry of Education to encourage scientific researches, re-designing the scientific research competition and transforming it into a national competition by adopting the standards of Intel ISEF so as to produce research and innovative projects that qualify them for competing at the event in Los Angeles in May.

Qatar University Vice-President for Research and Graduate Studies, Prof Mariam Al Ali Al Maadeed, who was the founder and director of the Center for Advanced Materials at QU, and founder of the master's program in material science and technology at QU, highlighted the theme of the conference and said that innovation is based on improving and developing society.

Director of the Public Relation at the Ministry, Hassan Al Mohammed said among the winning researches many need to be adopted and further developed. In order to achieve the strategy of creating knowledge based economy there is need to create research database through national cadres and adoption of the youth innovations and creativity, he added.