{"id":22946,"date":"2026-06-03T10:11:32","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T08:11:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/mint-challenge-2026\/"},"modified":"2026-06-03T10:20:53","modified_gmt":"2026-06-03T08:20:53","slug":"mint-challenge-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/mint-challenge-2026\/","title":{"rendered":"Featuring the Future: Young Talents Showcase Their Ideas"},"content":{"rendered":"<p data-start=\"527\" data-end=\"1055\">For Innovation Salzburg, the MINT Challenge holds special significance. Since 2024, the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mint-salzburg.at\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">MINT Salzburg<\/a> coordination office has been part of our organization. Our goal is to inspire children and young people to engage with science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) from an early age, nurture their natural curiosity and research mindset, and introduce them to future educational and career opportunities. After all, the skilled professionals, researchers and innovators of tomorrow are sitting in today\u2019s classrooms.<\/p>\n<h2>Creativity, Research and Big Ideas<\/h2>\n<p data-start=\"1096\" data-end=\"1508\">The wide variety of projects demonstrated just how creatively young people approach scientific questions. From climate protection and DNA to physics experiments and self-designed confectionery laboratories, the range of topics was impressive. Over a period of twelve weeks, around 150 projects were developed. Students researched, experimented and refined their ideas independently, achieving remarkable results.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"1510\" data-end=\"1704\">Adding to the excitement of the final event was a spectacular science show, where two chemists captivated the audience with engaging experiments and demonstrated how entertaining science can be.<\/p>\n<h2 data-section-id=\"mzcbx\" data-start=\"1706\" data-end=\"1747\">The Winners of the MINT Challenge 2026<\/h2>\n<p data-start=\"1749\" data-end=\"1859\">The jury faced a difficult decision. Two teams impressed the judges equally and ultimately shared first place.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li data-start=\"1861\" data-end=\"2069\">1st Place: \u201cClimate Crew \u2013 David2 \u2013 Beat the Heat\u201d (MS Strobl)<\/li>\n<li data-start=\"1861\" data-end=\"2069\">1st Place: \u201cPhysics Battle \u2013 Compressed Air vs. Gravity\u201d (MS Schwarzach)<\/li>\n<li data-start=\"1861\" data-end=\"2069\">3rd Place: \u201cDNA \u2013 The Blueprint of Life\u201d (MS Mittersill)<\/li>\n<li data-start=\"1861\" data-end=\"2069\">The Audience Award also went to the team \u201cClimate Crew \u2013 David2 \u2013 Beat the Heat\u201d from MS Strobl.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2 data-section-id=\"nba7wh\" data-start=\"2169\" data-end=\"2229\">Supporting the Skilled Professionals of Tomorrow Together<\/h2>\n<p data-start=\"2231\" data-end=\"2502\">Behind the MINT Challenge stands a strong network of partners from education, science, business and the public sector. Together, they share the goal of giving young people early insights into research and innovation while fostering long-term enthusiasm for STEM subjects.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"2504\" data-end=\"2888\">As the coordination office for MINT Salzburg, Innovation Salzburg brings these partners together and supports initiatives that open up new opportunities for children and young people. Those who discover a passion for exploring, researching and inventing at an early age are more likely to pursue education and careers in the future-oriented fields that drive our innovation ecosystem.<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"button\" href=\"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/presse-artikel\/mint-challenge-2026\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read the full press release for more information (in German only)<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What does the future look like? Perhaps exactly as it was presented at the MINT Challenge 2026. In line with our motto \u201cFeaturing the Future\u201d, 317 students from nine MINT secondary schools across Salzburg developed their own research projects over the past few weeks. At the grand finale on June 2 at the BAUAkademie Salzburg, the best teams presented their ideas to an audience and an expert jury.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":22924,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[78],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ausbildung-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22946"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22946\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22949,"href":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22946\/revisions\/22949"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.innovation-salzburg.at\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}