News & Event

The National Olympiad for Scientific Innovations, Robotics and Artificial Intelligence for the academic year 2025/2026 has commenced at the Oman Convention and Exhibition Centre, organized by the Ministry of Education, represented by the Innovation and Scientific Olympiad Department, with support from OMIFCO, and with wide participation from students from various educational directorates, with the number of participants reaching more than (250) students and (108) teachers and specialists supervising the various fields of competition in this national event.

The National Olympiad for Scientific Innovations, Robotics and Artificial Intelligence is an annual scientific event concerned with discovering and refining students' scientific and technical skills. It also aims to enhance future skills, encourage critical thinking, teamwork, and innovation, in line with the directions of Oman Vision 2040 towards building a knowledge economy based on innovation.

The activities of the National Olympiad for Scientific Innovations, Robotics and Artificial Intelligence for the academic year 2025/2026 vary to include the Student Scientific Innovations Corner, which showcases (70) scientific projects built according to the scientific research methodology, covering four fields: engineering and energy sciences, information technology, biological and environmental sciences, and science and mathematics, during which students present innovative solutions to address real challenges that affect various areas of life. This year's event features 126 students participating in scientific innovation competitions, all of whom qualified through the directorate-level competitions in their respective governorates. In addition, there is a robotics competition where students compete in three events: sumo wrestling, cube challenges, and fire rescue. These competitions involve designing and programming robots to perform various tasks in a realistic simulation environment, using different programming languages. These competitions contribute to honing students' engineering thinking skills, technical problem-solving abilities, and teamwork skills. This year's competitions include 66 students who also qualified through the directorate-level competitions in their respective governorates.

This edition of the Olympiad also introduced an AI-enhanced applications competition, focusing on developing smart solutions to address real-world issues such as climate change. This is achieved through building algorithms based on AI models and data analysis, fostering students' creative thinking and problem-solving skills. Sixteen students, who passed the qualifying rounds at the governorate educational directorate level, are participating in this competition.

In the drone competition, students compete by piloting drones along precise routes that demand high concentration and quick reflexes, thus developing their technical driving skills, spatial awareness, and disciplined execution. Twenty-two students, who passed the qualifying rounds at the governorate level, are participating in this competition.

This edition of the Olympiad also introduced a cybersecurity competition, aiming to develop students' analytical thinking and technical problem-solving skills, and to raise awareness of the importance of information security in the digital age. It also seeks to discover promising talents in the field of cybersecurity and build a generation capable of confronting future cyber threats. These competitions provide an interactive learning environment that encourages students to learn by doing, work collaboratively, and innovate in finding practical solutions to security challenges, thus contributing to the development of qualified national talent that will enhance digital security and protect the community's technological infrastructure.