Bangladesh becomes the Champion out of 174 countries

 

Bangladesh places its top position in Olympics. You may surprise by this news. That may not be possible for Bangladesh to take top position in Olympic games, but Bangladesh has already achieved top position in the 'Olympics of Robotics' in 2020.

Bangladesh has become the champion among 174 countries in the 'First Global Challenge', the world's largest robotics competition for secondary and higher secondary students. The International ‘First Global Challenge’ is a competition in which school level students from all over the world participate. This year the fourth edition of the competition was held, and the teenagers of Bangladesh won the championship. Defeating 173 countries of the world and Bangladesh become the champion.

First Global Challenge, a US-based charity organization, has been organizing this robotics competition for school level contestants every year since 2017. The first edition of the competition was held in 2017 in the United States. The second event was held in Mexico in 2018 and the third event was held in Dubai in 2019. Competitors of Bangladesh have shown consistent success in each event. Last year, Bangladesh was the 7th among 190 countries, which was hosted in Dubai. And this time Bangladesh came up to number one in the 2020 First Global Challenge.

With an aim to make students keen in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, the competition is organised every year so that ninth to twelfth grade students can take part in an international robotics competition. The event is also widely known as the 'Olympics of Robotics', as almost all countries of the world take part in it. And the format is also a lot like the Olympics.

Due to the outbreak of coronavirus, the entire 'First Global Challenge' has been organized virtually (online) this year. The theme of this year's competition is 'Connecting Communities'. Due to Covid-19 pandemic, global physical communication is very restricted but online communication continues. And maybe that's why this year's theme is 'Connecting Communities'. The organisers said all should take the theme of 'Connecting Communities' to the next level by working together as a community. They also mentioned this year's main theme is 'Connecting Communities' but the sub theme is learn, motivate, make change, and connect – together.

First Global robotics challenge aims to inspire the youth of the world to pursue STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) education and facilitate learning. A little on STEM can be discussed in this opportunity. STEM is said to be the key to moving the world forward. STEM is now a growing movement for education not only in the United States but also all over the world. The BD-STEM Society has already started its journey in Bangladesh with the vow to take the country forward through STEM education.

As this year’s event was organised virtually so besides STEM, they have to participate in other topics like Social Media Challenge, Technical Challenge and of course the STEM Talks. During the tournament, every team constructs multiple robots to accomplish specific tasks. The last challenge was STEM talk interviews where the participating countries were given the opportunity to ask questions to pioneer in the fields of STEM and other fields such as career building professionals and distinguished engineers. The technical challenge part was to assess skills in robotics and engineering. Bangladesh got highest score in the technical challenge and outsmarted all other participants.

In the competition Bangladesh team consists of 10 students of different schools of Dhaka. They take part in this competition under the supervision of an organization called Tech Academy. The Tech Academy, a social enterprise that teaches children about robotics, electronics and programming to popularise science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education, mentored and supervised the Team Bangladesh.

This year the competition was held from 1st July to 25th September 2020. Team Bangladesh was at the top of the points table for the total 12-week long competition time except for one week, after going through various stages and challenges. The result of the competition was announced on the night of October 31. With 117 points, Bangladesh secured top position out of 174 countries followed by Chile with 115 points, while Algeria was named third with 112 points. Team India became fifth in the competition. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Bangladesh has congratulated the brilliant students of Bangladesh on this achievement. On November 2, pictures of the winning students were shared on the ministry's verified Facebook page. It mentioned, “Congratulations! A team of Bangladeshi students has won the International Robotics Competition organized by First Global Challenge, a non-profit organization based in the United States, beating 173 countries. Congratulations!”

Talking to the media Dhaka University Professor of Physics Dr. Kamrul Hasan said, "Our young students have become champions out of 174 countries, it is a great achievement for us. This achievement is an inspiration for young generation. Our youngsters are doing well in the Maths Olympiad, they are doing better in the Physics Olympiad, they have now become champions in the First Global Challenge.”

The 10 members of Team Bangladesh are: Sujoy Mahmud (17) from Mangrove School; Razeen Ali (18) from Sir John Wilson School; Mahi Zarif (16) from International Hope School; Shahrear Shemanto (16) from DPS STS; Abrar Jawad (15) and Aymaan Rahman (15) from Bangladesh International School and College; Bianca Hassan (19) from Dhanmondi Tutorial; Zahraa Chowdhury (14) from Sunbeams; Areebah Nawar (14) from South Breeze; and Fairooz Hafiz Farin (18) from Mastermind. Shams Zaber was the mentor of the Bangladesh team. In addition, Shoaib Mirza was the technical mentor and Fardin Ananta and Namrat Roy were the assistant mentors.

Shams Zaber, founder of Tech Academy and mentor of Team Bangladesh, said, "We have been participating in this competition from the very beginning of 2017. We noticed that Team USA, Team Canada and Team Australia were far ahead of us in terms of knowledge and experience. At that time, we did well in coding, but we had shortcomings in mechanical engineering part. From this experience, we focused on our shortcomings and worked hard and become successful.”

The pride of being the champion of the young students of the country at this time of coronavirus pandemic gives us hope and dreams of moving forward. The youngsters have proved that 'we can do too' when given the opportunity. Salute you for the glory you have brought to the country by losing 173 countries of the world. Let Bangladesh go ahead with your hands.


The writer is Doctoral Researcher of Massey University, New Zealand
Email: [email protected]