“Many teachers, tutors and non-teaching volunteers feel that their job is their vocation. They often do it in their free time, with excitement and enthusiasm, though their work is unappreciated by society”, says the supervisor of the Dionýz Ilkovič Award and the chairman of the jury, Doc. RNDr. Martin Plesch, PhD., who is also President of the International Young Physicists´ Tournament (IYPT) and a researcher at the Institute of Physics of the Slovak Academy of Sciences. “I believe that this Award will help to improve education of the natural sciences and that it will also inspire other teachers, colleagues specializing in other subjects,” said the winner of the first year of the Award, Jozef Smrek from the Pavol Horov secondary-grammar school in Michalovce.
According to last year´s results in PISA tests, Slovak 15-year-old students dropped below the average of OECD countries also in mathematics and natural sciences. However, according to M. Plesch, the quality of education in this area used to be excellent in the past. The failure is also evidenced by a decreasing number of gold and silver medals from international competitions. “It used to be a common trophy in the past; now it is rather an exception. In spite of that, there are volunteers here who shape future scientists in their extra-curricular activities.”
Award criteria and schedule
Individuals – teachers and non-teaching volunteers who actively participate in developing extra-curricular activities for students of primary and secondary schools in subjects such as mathematics, physics, chemistry and informatics – may be nominated. The jury will assess the nominated persons based on four criteria, which are the length and sustainability of the extra-curricular activities, results of the extra-curricular activities, extent of the extra-curricular activities and innovative approach. Members of the jury chaired by Martin Plesch include:
prof. Ing. Ivo Čáp, CSc., University of Žilina
doc. RNDr. František Kundracik, CSc., Comenius University in Bratislava
prof. RNDr. Tomáš Opatrný, DrSc., Palacký University, Olomouc
Mgr. Milena Partelová, Primary school with nursery school Sibírska, Bratislava
prof. Mgr. Radovan Šebesta, DrSc., Comenius University in Bratislava
Award schedule for 2018
| Award start is announced | 20 February 2018 |
| Deadline for sending nominations | 31 July 2018 |
| Assessment of nominations by the jury | August – September 2018 |
| Announcing the Award winner | 7 November 2018 |
Who is behind the Award?
Promoting talents and personalities in the area of natural sciences is a part of the mission of PosAm which has funded the Award. “The Award has been created to express gratitude, respect and encouragement to people who work at schools and specialize in natural sciences”, explains Marián Marek, the company´s CEO. “We believe that businesses active in the area of information technologies should also have a broader social dimension.” After a successful first year in which 43 teachers and non-teaching employees of schools from throughout Slovakia were nominated, the Award is now held under the auspices of the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of SR.
Who was Dionýz Ilkovič?
This legendary teacher and enthusiastic scientist, physicist and physical chemist was born in 1907. Professor Ilkovič had an exceptional gift when explaining complicated science also to young students. He established and managed the Institute of Physics of the Slovak Academy of Sciences in Bratislava. In 1934, as a member of Nobel Prize winner Jaroslav Heyrovský’s team, he derived a relation between polarographic diffusion current, solvent concentration and the characteristics of a dropping mercury electrode. This scientific discovery is now known as ´Ilkovič´s Equation´. More information about the life and message of Professor Dionýz Ilkovič may be found at www.cenadi.sk.
More information for media:
More news
DDD in source code
Due to anti-pandemic measures, we moved the regular meeting of our community to the online space. And everything indicates that we will stay in the virtual world for a while … We are IT people, so we can handle such a move with ease! And we did. The online panel debate was a great success. With panellists Richard Richter, a developer at Evolveum, and Vladimír Hlaváček, a technology architect at Accenture Advanced Technology Center, we discussed programming procedures that help use Domain-Driven Design at the source code level. The discussion […]
The Dionýz Ilkovič Award 2019 went to a physics and astronomy teacher from Trenčín
Their work does not end with the school bell Not only the CDI finalist, but all of the nominated teachers have one characteristic in common: for them, the classes definitely do not end with the school bell. They see their job as a mission and educate and prepare students for domestic and international competitions outside of regular classes. “All of these teachers deserve enormous appreciation. This year, we agreed on the three finalists quickly, but selecting only one of them was very difficult. Each of them could be the absolute […]
High-quality platform for talented pupils, students and their teachers
The prize will be in the hands of the Dionýz Ilkovič Foundation For the past two years the Dionýz Ilkovič Prize was a project of PosAm, a Slovak technological company. However, starting from 2019 the organization and development role will be assumed by the Dionýz Ilkovič Foundation. Its aim is to reward and motivate outstanding teachers but also to emphasize the need for high-quality preparation of students. Marián Marek, the CEO of PosAm and the promoter of the establishment of the Foundation, is inviting everybody who would like to help […]