Next generation innovators

Children’s Technopark trains personnel for enterprises

Talented Belarusian schoolchildren co-operate with dozens of enterprises in the real sector of the economy under the auspices of the National Children’s Technopark. Many of the projects they have created  are already being used in production.

Public defence of projects at National Children’s Technopark                 Kristina Fanchenko

Effective defence

The organisation of educational shifts for schoolchildren is one of the features of the National Children’s Technopark. Students of grades 9-11, having passed the preliminary selection, receive free training for several weeks in one of 15 educational areas — from architecture and design, engineering technology and green chemistry to robotics, nanoindustry and aerospace technologies. Accommodation is provided at the premises of the technopark, training and leisure — under the guidance of competent mentors.
It is important to point out that a child from any corner of Belarus can come here. The first 150 graduates of the technopark in the spring of 2025 presented 96 projects for public defence. This format was chosen so that representatives of the real sector of the economy would have the opportunity to get to know the guys and their work.
Sergei Arkhipov, Head of the Experimental Project Support Sector at the National Children’s Technopark, invites to the lobby, where the students have prepared their presentations, “Roadmaps of co-operation have been concluded with seven ministries. Their enterprises and organisations offer relevant project topics. Over two years, about 70 enterprises have started working with the technopark. Especially close co-operation has been established with energy companies, while the Minsk Automobile Plant (MAZ), BELAZ, Mogilevliftmash and some others are already using the developments of the students in their activities.”
Notably, it was the Ministry of Energy that proposed the theme, which was implemented in their project by Gleb Supranenok and Darya Chmurova, the participants of the March educational shift. “Our development is composite fuel based on peat and biomass, where reed and rapeseed straw were used as biomass,” the guys shared. “The objectives of the project are to save natural resources and at the same time reduce the negative effect of peat burning. The resulting fuel is indeed more environmentally friendly.” 
Every year, the National Children’s Technopark receives 70-80 different topics from enterprises.
Kirill Kutovoy and Viktor Starodubov — within the framework of the Natural Resources direction — calculated the industrial reserves of one of the Belarusian sand deposits using digital and alternative methods, “Firstly, the undeniable advantages of the digital method have been identified — it is more accurate in calculating volume and area, and does not require much time. Secondly, the calculation of loss rates and completeness of mineral extraction using special formulas has shown that further development of the deposit is very profitable.” 
The list of advanced topics is impressive. The high school students, in particular, were engaged in the development of a device for collecting and filtering tyre particles, the creation of a robotic sorting system based on a manipulator with soft grips, the study of materials for the accumulation of thermal energy, the design of a laser engraving machine for wood, and more.

Tatiana Kudan and Yelizaveta Balyuk, students of Yanka Kupala gymnasium           Daria Titova

In search of creative ideas

The National Children’s Technopark is certainly not a competitor to the National Academy of Sciences or design bureaux. Nevertheless, they co-operate on mutually beneficial terms: professionals highly value fresh ideas and young minds. Thus, Andrei Savchits, Chief Designer — Head of Chief Designer for Automated Systems, Telematics, and Mechatronics Department at the Minsk Automobile Plant, is following the work of talented young people with interest, “In the 1990s, when the Soviet Union collapsed, the prestige of engineering specialities fell dramatically. But in fact, engineers are people who create all the new things that exist in our lives. Therefore, future engineers need to be supported. Children are more flexible in the perception of information than adults, they learn faster. We hope that some of the graduates of the children’s technopark will come to our car factory in the future.”
A number of projects have already been implemented at MAZ together with the technopark. In particular, students studying in the field of Virtual and Augmented Reality (VR/AR) have created an electronic operator’s manual for electric vehicles. A new medium-tonnage electric vehicle has appeared in the production line of the plant, as clarified by Andrei Savchits. The students were provided with three-dimensional materials on its design, and they created a product that helps — with the aid of a virtual reality helmet and a joystick — to carry out technical manipulations for maintenance of equipment. Now, they can conduct practical exercises at MAZ while training specialists of service stations even when there is no electric vehicle nearby.
For the Mogilevliftmash plant, young researchers have developed a filler formulation using the waste available in the country to include it in elevator counterweights.

Testing developments at National Children’s Technopark          Daria Titova

Trajectory of development

Every year, the National Children’s Technopark receives 70-80 different topics from enterprises, of which more than a third are implemented in practice by the end of the year. This is a good result, experts say. The ultimate goal is to ensure that talented young people get an incentive to move on along their chosen path. By the way, the most promising students of the technopark are now granted the opportunity to continue working on projects remotely according to an individual programme after the end of their shift. Enterprises, in turn, continue to supervise their protégés, including in the framework of further targeted training at universities.
According to Sergei Sachko, Director of the National Children’s Technopark, today Belarusian schoolchildren have enormous opportunities to maximise their educational trajectory, “Such a trajectory may include training in specialised engineering classes, a system of additional education, engineering and technical centres and the National Children’s Technopark.”
Moreover, if the 11th grader is given a recommendation from the technopark, they get the opportunity to continue their studies at the university in any of the 150 specialities defined by the Ministry of Education without passing entrance tests — based on the interview results.

DOSSIER

The National Children’s Technopark welcomed its first cohort of schoolchildren in Minsk in 2021. The Russian educational centre Sirius in Sochi served as a kind of prototype for the creation of this institution of further education. They share similar goals: identifying and developing students’ abilities for creativity, scientific research, invention and innovation. In October 2024, the first Belarusian-Russian Start in Science project programme was launched in Minsk based at the National Children’s Technopark.

By Aleksandr Nesterov