- The CEIP San Jorge de Huelva and its project T.H.O.R (Technical Help on the Road), was awarded first prize by the Endesa Foundation. The second prize went to the IES Tías de Lanzarote and its Eco-refill initiative; while the third was for the Highlands School in Seville and its ROV vision proposal.
- In this eighth edition of the Endesa Foundation's great educational and technological challenge, 17 prizes were awarded, three at national level, the Endesa Foundation Awards, and 14 at local level, the Teacher Awards. 210 schools in Madrid, Andalusia, Aragón, Catalonia, Extremadura, the Balearic Islands and the Canary Islands participated.
The RetoTech project was the starting point for festivals at its VIII Edition with the announcement of the three Endesa Foundation Awards, awarded nationwide. They were awarded to CEIP San Jorge (Huelva), the Highlands School (Seville) and IES Tías (Lanzarote) as they presented the proposals that best met the criteria of originality, creativity, applicability to a real need and technical competence.
The announcement was made in Málaga, where, in addition to the national awards, the Teacher Awards were also been confirmed, for which two were awarded for each autonomous community. In the case of Andalusia, these corresponded to the province of Jerez with the Alohomora project by CEIP Blas Infante and the La Mano de Elena project by IES Elena García Armada. The next ones will be awarded at the festivals in Catalonia (Barcelona, 1 June), Balearic Islands (Palma de Mallorca, 5 June), Aragon (Zaragoza, 8 June), Extremadura (Cáceres, 13 June), Community of Madrid (Madrid, 15 June) and Canary Islands (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 20 June).
Winning projects for the national awards
The CEIP San Jorge in Palos de la Frontera, Huelva, received the first national prize for its T.H.O.R (Technical Help on the Road) project, a system to make drivers more visible on the road, given the high number of accidents and fatalities they have in their town, Palos de la Frontera. This involved creating a helmet and a jacket that carry multi-sensors, with the aim of improving the safety users of both motorcycles and scooters.
The second national prize was awarded the students of the IES Tías in Lanzarote with ROV vision, an initiative consisting of an underwater vehicle operated remotely from the surface, which is used to explore the coastal waters around Lanzarote and to contribute to the safety of divers.
The third national prize went to the Highlands School in Seville with its Eco-refill proposal. It is a machine found in supermarkets that dispenses cleaning products and it can be refilled as many times as necessary. Under the slogan "Refill your containers, renew your future", it aims to ensure that companies use less packaging and that households learn to recycle and re-use.
Seven regions, 210 centres and 17 awards
This year 210 schools from Madrid, Aragón, Andalusia, Extremadura, Catalonia, the Balearic Islands and the Canary Islands participated in this technological challenge. The Endesa Foundation awarded a total of 17 prizes which will be awarded during the seven festivals held in each of the participating autonomous communities. There are three "Endesa Foundation Awards" at national level and chosen by a jury, and there are 14 "Teacher Awards" that are awarded locally and chosen by the teachers attending each festival, two prizes for each Autonomous Community.
For María Teresa Gimeno, Project Manager at the Endesa Foundation, "with RetoTech we would like to acknowledge and reward the young people here for their dedication, passion and skills in the field of robotics. Every year they are surpassed themselves and the technological initiatives they create are truly impressive. We will continue to be committed to promoting STEM vocations, because they are undoubtedly the next generation of innovators and leaders and, ultimately, the minds of the future."
RetoTech takes place throughout the school year in three stages. In the first stage, to help them start work on their projects as soon as possible, for each edition at the beginning of the school year the participating schools receive kits with technological material and the teachers receive partly in-person training, focussing on each of the three blocks within the programme: Robotics, programming for mobile apps and 3D design and printing. The second consists of work in the classroom on the challenges posed directly with the students and this is when the project takes shape. In the third stage they prepare the final project.
About the Endesa Foundation
The Endesa Foundation is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. A quarter of a century of social work that enables us to look to the future with the challenge of continuing to progress, with a broad and conscious outlook on human beings and the rest of the species that surround us to build a world in which there is room for everyone.
With this in mind, the Endesa Foundation contributes to social development and the conservation of biodiversity through education, training for employment, culture, volunteering and urban biodiversity projects so that there is a future in which we can all live together and in balance with each other.