Conclusions and Recommendations

Of the International Consultations on the

Future Development of the Chemistry Olympiads

Riga, Latvia, 9-10 January, 2004

1. IChO plays an important role in enhancing co-operation between countries making it possible for students to meet and make friends from different countries, discover and exchange their cultural diversities.

2. The Working Group was informed on the IChO history and present problems. With great satisfaction, it noted the further increase in the number of IChO participants indicating the growing importance given to this event. In the future, UNESCO and IUPAC will increase their involvement to help to host countries to organise the IChO.

3. Linkages between the International Chemistry Olympiad, International Physics Olympiad and International Mathematics Olympiad should be established. The Working Group recommends the IChO Steering Committee take initiatives to establish such contacts.

4. Baltic Chemistry Olympiad, Mendeleev’s Chemistry Olympiad are good examples of sub-regional and inter-regional co-operation between countries to ensure better preparation of national teams for IChO. They are also an excellent way of attracting young students to study chemistry. The Working Group suggests strengthening this kind of co-operation and establishing new contacts in other regions.

5. The Working Group outlined the role of teachers and schools, as well as universities professors, in the preparation of students for the IChO competition. The level of problems proposed by the IChO is much higher  than school curricula. Problems that require the creativity, ideas and critical thinking should be given priority over problems requiring specific knowledge.

6. The availability of information on  IChO problems is satisfactory. However, all problems and solutions of previous IChOs together with the preparatory problems should be available on the Internet. The International Information Centre of IChO in Bratislava proposes to collect materials of the IChO in electronic version.

7. The Working Group recommends that participating countries provide the  IChO Centre of Information with materials from national competitions and indicate links to relevant national web pages, preferably in English. This information will help students to better prepare for the IChO.

8. The experience of past participants in IChO is very valuable for better preparation of IChO teams. The Working Group recommends asking university students – former participants of IChO - to help in the preparation of national teams.

9. Finally, the Working Group requests UNESCO Secretariat: in close co-operation with the international centre of IChO and Lithuanian Ministry of Education and Science and in consultation with the senior authorities of IUPAC:

a) To provide the financial support for a 2-day working meeting, 26-27 March, 2004, Vilnius, Lithuania of Editorial Board of the future publication  “Selected problems of the IChO: Analysis and solutions”.

b) To support the first draft preparation of the electronic version of above publication

c)  The contract for the activities a) and b) should be prepared with the IChO International Centre;

The final version of the publication should be disseminated all over the world as an example of high standard learning and teaching materials.