SALALAH: The Sultanate of Oman’s four girl students from Al Saada School for Basic Education for grades (11-12) girls – named The Dhofar Education Team – will participate in the First Global Challenge which began in Geneva, Switzerland on Thursday.

Maryam bint Saeed Baween, a scientific innovation specialist at the Center for Innovation and Scientific Robotics, said: “The First Global Challenge is an annual global challenge in which students from over 100 countries take part and aims to empower through education in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), promote concepts of sustainable development, encourage youth to employ technology to serve the environment and to spread awareness of the environment.”

Before leaving for Geneva Maryam told Oman News Agency: “The competition consists of two main parts: the robot challenge, which requires the team to install and program a robot in an engineering context with the tasks presented in the race, and the challenges of social media.”

The competition will take place by dividing the work into two teams: The task of the first team is to prepare the challenges of social media and the second team will design, program and prepare the robot for the competition and this requires the cooperation of the students and the integration of their work. “The roles will change according to the developments of the competition,” Maryam signed off.

The event will conclude on October 16.

First Global is a US-based nonprofit public charity organization established by the founder of FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), Dean Kamen. The mission of the body is to inspire leadership and innovation in youth from all nations by empowering them through education in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics — also known as STEM.