STEMNNOVATION 2024 begins today

The 2024 edition of the STEMNNOVATION competition, which offers students the opportunity to explore and innovate with projects that find solutions to challenges of society and the country as a whole, will begin today.

The three-day event offers students from various second cycle institutions the opportunity to try their hands on practical skills and innovations, and to also learn how to work with other people in a team, among other skills.

Up to 285 second cycle institutions in the country are participating in the 2024 edition of the competition.

The number is a 24 per cent increase over the previous year which had 228 schools participating. This year, 57 additional schools are participating in the event.

The Deputy National Coordinator of the Free Senior High School Secretariat, Nana Afrah Sika Mensah, who disclosed this to the media in Accra last Friday, stated that the competition would climax with awards presentation on Wednesday.

She explained that participating senior high schools, senior high technical schools, as well as technical and vocational education and training institutes, had registered 570 projects for the 2024 competition as against 251 in the previous year, signifying a 127 percentage increase.

Ms Sika Mensah indicated that this year’s competition had seen an additional 319 projects registered as against the 251 registered under last year’s competition.

She attributed this to the rising interest in the project by the various stakeholders and the Ghanaian populace. 

Project categories

This year’s competition has projects in the areas of food sovereignty (89), sustainable energy (134), environmental sustainability (187) and digital technology (113).
Eastern Region registered the highest of 105 projects, followed by the Ashanti and Central regions with 81 and 70 projects respectively, while Bono East and Western North recorded the lowest with seven projects each.

Ms Sika Mensah said this year’s projects focused on the use of digitalisation projects to find lasting solutions to challenges confronting various societies across the country.

Background

The STEMNNOVATION competition, an initiative of the Free Senior High School Secretariat, started in 2022.

It has led to students being offered the opportunity to explore and innovate with projects.

Winners of last year’s event, Ahafoman Secondary/Technical School, and the First Runner-up school, Wesley Grammar, as part of their prizes, embarked on a one-week educational tour to Japan where they took part in this year’s international STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) conference.