Winners of All-Russian Engineering Competition to receive additional points for Unified State Exam when applying to Russian universities

This year, the event gathered around 650 participants from various regions of the country, as well as schoolchildren from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan.

"Everything starts from kindergarten and school. We support engineering education through 'Kvantoriums', 'IT Cubes', and universities in the region. And we see the results: more and more children are choosing technical professions," said Aleksey Teksler, Governor of Chelyabinsk Region, while welcoming the participants.

Over the course of two days, young engineers presented their projects to experts. This year, a popular theme was rescue robots: a team from Krasnoyarsk Krai designed a gas rescue robot for oil refineries, while children from the Tyumen Region created a firefighting robot for forest protection. Participants from Kyrgyzstan came up with a solution for connecting railway wheelsets of different widths, and schoolchildren from Tajikistan developed an automated line for farm work.

Special attention was drawn to the projects of the youngest participants: kindergarten pupils in the "Ikarenok" category constructed mini waste recycling plants. In the older categories, children created drones for weather monitoring and tree planting, RFID control systems (a method of tracking and accounting for objects using special tags) for production, and automated lines for greenhouses.

Ariadna Voronina from Perm Krai took third place in her category.

"The competition is large-scale and very interesting! It’s a great experience for the future. I am in the tenth grade, and now I’m sure I want to pursue a career in engineering," she said.

Vladislav Khalamov, President of the Association of Educational Robotics Workers, emphasised that the competition builds a strong connection between schools and real production.

"Children carry out tasks for actual enterprises, gaining experience that helps them consciously choose a profession. Many later stay to work in the regions where they created their first projects," he noted.

The engineering finals in Chelyabinsk were supported by 94 industrial partners. A notable moment was the handover of lists of graduates-winners to universities and colleges in the region; many of them have already decided to continue their education in engineering fields.

Photo:  RAOR / Dmitry Nosov / Igor Bakulev