(ANS – San José) – On 12 June  the Government of Costa Rica rewarded the young people who represented the country at the International Science and Technology Fair. Of the eleven young people taking part, seven were from the Don Bosco Technical Institute.

The ceremony took place in the Hall of the Presidential Palace, in the presence of the President of the Republic, the Hon. Laura Chinchilla, the  Minister of Science and Technology, the Hon. Alejandro Cruz, and the Director General of Intel, Dr. Mike Forrest. Taking part in the event were also the parents and teachers of the young people and the Principals of the various schools involved in the Fair, as well as  a large number of journalists from the press and from national television stations.

“Many thanks not only for your important personal achievement but also for having contributed to the development of Costa Rica. This country has the one thing that every country needs to have if it wants to dream about future progress, that is the intelligence of its people” the President said in her address.

A special award was presented to the student José Miguel González for having achieved second place in the section sponsored by the Loghi and Marchi Society of the United States, in the Special Award Ceremony for the ISEF 2012. This young man  who has just graduated from the Don Bosco Technical Institute, is studying Electronic Engineering at the Technological Institute of Costa Rica.

“I adapted a traditional printer so that it could print in braille on re-cycleable paper  so as to help people who cannot see, read more easily and at very low cost,” José Miguel explained regarding his project that won the award.

Melina Jiménez, Angie Marin and Maylin Valverde, also recent Graduates of CEDES Don Bosco, developed a system to help paramedics transmit vital information about patients in real time from an ambulance to the hospital before the patient is admitted, gaining precious seconds that could make the difference between life and death.

Giancarlo Marín, Andrey Jiménez and Pablo Marín Arrieta  took  part in the ISEF presenting a classification system for medicinal plants according to a scheme similar to the periodic table. The table enables the plants to be grouped according to their curative properties and shows the information on a web application so that people can use them more easily. At present they are in the tenth year at the Salesian Technical Institute.

These young people competed with over 1500 students from all over the world. The ISEF is considered the biggest Science and Engineering Fair in the world. The projects from Costa Rica which arrived at the ISEF Fair had already won competitions at the National Science and Technology Fair and at the National Engineering Expo.

Published 15/06/2012