Science Festival to introduce future innovations

The fourth edition of the Science Festival held by the Bursa Science and Technology Center (BTM) will take place at Merinos Atatürk Culture Center from May 8-10. With support from the metropolitan municipality, the provincial education directorate and the Bursa Eskişehir Development Agency (BEBKA), the festival will host 30 university clubs from 50 cities. Gathering interested students from around Turkey, the festival committee announced this year's theme as "The future of design and innovation."

Rıfat Bakan, the BTM's general coordinator, said the festival's jury committee will include businessmen, senior academics and policy makers. The science projects will compete in five categories and the top three in each category will be awarded a monetary prize.Among primary, secondary and vocational schools, TL 5,000 ($1,844) will be given to the projects that come in first. Second place will be awarded TL 3,000 and third place projects will be given TL 2,000. Among higher education schools, the best projects will be given TL 6,000 and TL 4,000 and TL 3,000 will be given to second and third place, respectively. The winner of the inventor category will be given TL 10,000, the second-best inventor will receive TL 7,000 and the third will win TL 5,000. In total, TL 65 million will be given to competition winners. Surveys will also be conducted to receive the public's opinion about the projects.Bakan said the previous editions of the festival were successful enough to attract attention from Europe. The Geneva Science Festival, Europe's biggest science festival, is now the international partner of the festival, he added. Around 150,000 visitors are expected to attend this year. Twenty young inventors will show their skills. During the event, the international festival team will organize five workshops and give trainings about science communication and other related subjects within the program Science Events Academy.