Since that shout of "eureka!", before and even after, humanity lives in the perennial yearning for celebration or triumph in the face of the many unanswered questions about life and the universe. We have committed ourselves to knowledge, with the certainty that "somewhere something incredible is waiting to be discovered."

This passion for learning nestles in the boys and girls of the Luis Urquiza Jorge Vocational Pre-university Institute of Exact Sciences (IPVCE in Spanish), who make up the national pre-selection teams and the Cuba team of the various subjects in the respective Olympiads.

Héctor Manuel Domínguez

"For me, competing is a pleasure and tremendously productive," says Héctor Manuel Domínguez, an eleventh-grade student who will represent the Greater of the Antilles in the Central American Chemistry meeting in El Salvador, in early September of this year. Like him, Lianet Tamarit Tejas, who will be the national exponent in the Pan American Women's Mathematics Competition, is proud of her work and has found a path free of gender biases: "Generally, boys are the ones who predominate in these competitions and I think it is very good for girls to participate and achieve development", she told 26.

Beauty, goodness, and truth are inherent to science; this is the path of knowledge that is built from cooperation to make people's lives better. This is how the enthusiasm of the Physics students is perceived, the largest and best-performing group in the country, marked by the imprint of Professor Alberto Mawad Santos, who for decades was the trainer of this subject and trained his continuators in this work.

Adrián Arcenio Garcés Jiménez is a beneficiary of this pedagogical method, he has been competing since elementary school and has not stopped in high school. "I recently participated in the Mesoamerican Physics Competition and I am now preparing for the Iberoamerican", he explains very close to his partner José Alejandro Romero Gil, another of those passionate about science.

Anisbeth Vidal Orasma and Elizet Quesada Hernández talk about how they have left "everything" in the competition and training, also about how much they have grown as people and the effort that encourages them to have "extraordinary performances" now and in the future.

Mario Zaragoza Ricardo

And if it is a question of tracing futures, Mario Zaragoza Ricardo, who was a member of the first group of ninth-grade students prepared in the IPVCE of Las Tunas to compete in these contests of knowledge, and was part of the national pre-selection for two years thanks to his excellent results in the subject of Biology.

"Now my perspective is to do my year of Active Military Service here as a biology teacher and trainer," he says.

PROVINCIAL TRAINING CENTER, LOCAL PODIUM FOR CUBAN AND INTERNATIONAL OLYMPISM

The fact that the IPVCE continues to be the flagship of pre-university education in Las Tunas is, largely, thanks to the talent and the spirit of educators like Orestes Landrove Ramírez. Cubans like him, with their daily work, make knowledge the great engine of a nation in which material wealth is not abundant, but intelligence is, of course!

"We have three groups at the Provincial Training Center and we are looking for students who want to study, who want additional preparation, and who have admirable behavior and social conduct. For our results in national competitions, in the last 15 years, we have been in first places; in 2023, with 12 gold medals, 23 silver, and an equal number of bronze, we occupy the third place at the country level," explains the coordinator of this institution and head coach of the Chemistry subject.

With 24 students in the national pre-selection, the "Luis Urquiza" today harvests the sowing of decades; disciplined and enthusiastic alumni are "the most committed coaches we have," Landrove said, who is on the hunt for students with high academic performance, but with the sign of a good heart.

In a country in need of a collective action of the youth, of science as the engine of development and of conscience in every act, having students and teachers motivated to learn, teach and excel is the glory.

Consequently, it is also the guarantee of sustaining the dream reality that the productions of science will not fall prey to the market. The names of so many teachers who have cultivated good seeds in their disciples remain anonymous; each medal is the culmination and beginning of a long chain of events that always impels them to be champions of knowledge.