Students of Excel Public School in Mysuru.
| Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
While schools from Karnataka accounted for the highest number of selected projects among all States at the recent ATL (Atal Tinkering Lab) Marathon 2024, Mysuru’s Excel Public School emerged at the top with the highest number of finalists from a single school.
ATL Marathon is Atal Innovation Mission’s (AIM) flagship innovation challenge, where schools identify community problems of their choice and develop innovative solutions in the form of working prototypes.
Spearheaded by NITI Aayog in partnership with UNICEF and YuWaah, the ATL Marathon 2024 edition saw an overwhelming 19,700 project submissions out of which top 500 innovations were selected as finalists.
Karnataka saw the highest number of selected projects among all States with 84 projects. Out of the selected projects from Karnataka, Mysuru accounted for 13 and Excel Public School in Mysuru contributed to the majority of the tally with 11.
“The students of Excel Public School will now have the opportunity to participate in Student Innovator Programme, which includes entrepreneurship boot camps and internships with leading corporates and incubation centres in India”, said a statement issued on behalf of the school.
Excel Public School has been a regular at the Marathon submitting around 250 projects over the last six years and consistently emerging in the top 500. Last year, two of the school’s innovations went on to receive top honors with its ‘Millet Vending Machine’ being selected at Dell Shepreneur Program for boot camp training and ‘Anytime Education Device’ receiving grant and seed funding from the Ministry of Education, the statement said.
“With an aim to continue its winning streak, this year the school’s project spanned across a diverse range of themes, including agriculture, inclusivity, education and skill development, mobility, disaster management, health, and space. These projects tackle real-world problems with innovative solutions, such as a device for Traffic Rerouting during floods, DIY HAM Radio kits to enable community communication during natural disasters, a solar-powered medicine vending machine to bridge the gap in accessing basic medicine, a revolutionary satellite payload to monitor the environment through diverse sensors, automated agricultural assistance devices, gamified tools to help students build problem-solving skills,” the statement added.
