Innovating Minds 2009

The second year of the European high school “scientists and technicians” competition is just beginning
1st March 2009, Prague, The Czech Republic

Prizes for the high school students from all around Europe “Innovating Minds – Czech Awards for Young Europeans” will be awarded for the second time this year. These prizes are granted by the company Česká hlava together with the Senate President of the Czech Parliament Přemysl Sobotka. More than 60 teams and individuals from 12 European counties took part in the competition to which any European student can apply directly. The prize of EUR 5000 was awarded to students from Austria, Italy, Romania and The Czech Republic competing in four categories.

This year’s competition is held in cooperation with the European Union in terms of the European year of creativity and innovations. The competition is meant to be a Czech contribution to the European-wide effort to attract attention of young people to education in the technical and natural sciences field and motivate them to scientific carriers.

Europe is short of hundreds of thousands of scientific workers essential to maintain the necessary competitiveness of the continent towards developed as well as fast developing economies. The problem is even more severe in the Czech Republic than in the rest of Europe. The proportion of graduates from the technical and natural science specializations is low. It is only 6,5% of graduates in the Czech Republic compared to 13% average of the EU among young people 20 to 29 years old. If we know that there are 22.7% of people with university education in the EU, is is only 11.9% in the Czech Republic. In the USA there are 38.1% of university graduates in the population, in Japan 36.3% and in Finland 32.8%. It is very hard even to remove existing inequalities. According to the EU Survey of Income and Living Conditions only 9% of people under the age of 26 whose father was a manual worker hold a university degree. When it comes to university professionals’ families, the ratio is six times higher. This inequality is by far the worst result of the entire European Union. On top of that it is very hard to prevent young talented minds from leaving abroad. According to the European Commission information up to a half of the PhD. students studying in the US do not return back to Europe. In line with that, the ratio of the European students in the total number of PhD. students in the US is increasing. It grew by more than 10% between 2000 and 2005.

This year the competition has the following four categories:

Information and communication technologies, Vítkovice a.s. award
The prize is awarded for a project, invention or an enterprise, elaborated or executed in the field of information and communication technologies considering its practical applicability.
Health and the quality of life
The prize is awarded for a project, invention or an enterprise, elaborated or executed in any field if the result aims at improving health and the quality of human life.
Environment, Veolia Voda a.s. Endowment fund award
The prize is awarded to a scientific and technical project, invention or an enterprise which is aimed at the environment improvement and energy savings with respect to the quality of environment.
Products and technology innovations, Aero Vodochody a.s. award
The prize is awarded for product innovation and innovative approach, enterprise, professional activity or a project in the field of technologies with respect to the practical applicability.
High school students from all over Europe can apply with their works on before 15th October 2009. Their work will be judged by an international jury comprising the president and nine other members. This year the following prestigious names will sit in the jury:

Prof. Richard Hindls, president of the University of Economics, (Czech Republic), Chairman
Prof. Richard R. Ernst, Chemistry Nobel Prize (1991) (Switzerland)
Prof. Sigrid Peyerimhoff, Director of Institute for Physical and Theoretical Chemistry, University of Bonn (Germany)
Jiří Šneberger, Vice – Chairman of the Czech Republic Senate (Czech Republic)
Martin Jahn, Managing Director VW Group Russia (Czech Republic)
Prof. Dorte Salskov-Iversen, Vice-President Copenhagen Business School (Denmark)
Prof. Rudolf Hanka, University of Cambridge (UK)
Prof. Jan Z. Kubes, Director of MBA Consulting Projects, IMD Lausanne (Switzerland)
Prof. Jiří Drahoš, President of Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic (Czech Republic)
Prof. Kurt Wüthrich, Chemistry Nobel Prize (2002) (USA)
The best work in each category will be awarded a financial prize amounting to EUR 5000. The ceremonial prize awarding will be held on 10th december 2009 in the Knight’s Hall of the Czech Parliament Senate where many important local as well as foreign guest and Czech Republic Parliament representatives will be present.

Send the applications to the organizer – Česká hlava s.r.o. All the information to the project and the conditions for applying can be found on the website www.innovatingminds.eu

Please help us inform students about this competition. The hardest task for the organizer is to inform all European high school students about the possibility to take part in this competition.

PDF presentation is attached to this press release.

Contact:
Marta Štěpánková
GSM: +420 721 628 059
E-mail: registration@innovatingminds.eu
www.innovatingminds.eu
Česká hlava s.r.o.
Vinohradská 100
130 00 Praha 3