LUMA Centre Finland is looking for StarT partner countries!

The internationally awarded StarT competition is organized annually by LUMA Centre Finland, a network of Finnish science and technology universities. Everyone from around the world is welcome to participate in StarT (register here for StarT 2019-20) to get support for carrying out interdisciplinary project-based learning and to share their science, technology and mathematics related best educational practices and students’ projects. However, in a few countries StarT is organized on a national level. These countries are our partner countries and they have a national StarT office that supports the participants locally in their country. In our partner countries the participants register and report their work directly to their national StarT office that organizes the selection of the national best projects and best practices for the international competition.

In StarT 2019-20 our confirmed partner countries are:

• China
• Jordan
• Turkey

Would you like to organize StarT in your country? 

So far we have had participants in StarT from over 40 countries. We are always on the lookout for new partners from countries where there is no national StarT office yet, so if you would be interested in organizing StarT activities in your country, do not hesitate to get in touch with us at info@start.luma.fi!

In our partner countries the local StarT office does the practical arrangements and dissemination of StarT. As a result, the participants can have local support in their native language and local StarT events, such as StarT Festivals. We will provide you with the materials that you can translate, and the framework and schedule for the process.

What does a national StarT office do? 

Everyone wanting to participate in StarT from our partner countries reports their work and registers to their national StarT office, and a national StarT jury established by the national StarT office decides the best national project teams and best educational practices that will participate in the international StarT competition. Last year the LUMA Centre Finland awarded the winners of the main prizes of the international competition with a trip to Finland to receive their awards at the annual StarT gala.

As a national StarT office you can also organize a national StarT Festival in your country, where teachers and students get to present their projects and best practices with each other. In 2018-19, Estonia, China, Jordan and Turkey organized their own national StarT Festivals. In Finland the local LUMA Centres organized 10 regional StarT festivals in 2018-19. You can read below the comment of the representative of StarT Turkey, Nilgün Erentay, about the Turkish StarT Festival: 

“There were many… many students and teachers coming from very far distances by buses with huge parcels, thousands of materials in the early morning of the 27th April, Saturday. There were also parents and public from İstanbul visiting the stands all day long. There were even middle school students coming on their own from far towns in order to set up their stands and make their presentations.

During the certificate ceremony in the afternoon, the hall was so crowded with students and teachers that many people had to stand. We realised 30 workshops, educational presentations and science shows in the classrooms during the festival. There were also many science shows at the stands in the garden. There were 65 project exhibition stands from several schools across Turkey.

We received the thanking letters from teachers afterwards. They point out the fact that the students need such opportunities to expose their efforts.”

About StarT

• Read more about StarT in general here
• Read more about our partner countries
• More about StarT as a competition
• What we offer for teachers and other educators

If you got interested, contact us at info@start.luma.fi for more information!