When ideas bloom into future solutions

Ten-year-olds pitched disaster-response drones, Grade 5 students coaxed light sensors to life while seniors filled writeable walls with robotic arms. It was nothing short of an occasion when ideas of children bloomed into future solutions.
And the ideas turned limitless. Students displayed early projects that ranged from practical to ambitious and included light detection systems, auto sensing to identify which part of a machine needs repair, object detection models, a robotic arm, a bipedal robot and so on and so forth.
It was at the ‘Forum’ that got underway at the Indian School Al Ghubrah, which turned questions into working things on a morning that felt more like a festival than a school day and the space was described not as another tech lab, but as a place ‘where design, technology and human values converge to address real-world challenges.’
Launched by Dr Badr bin Hamoud al Kharousi, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Education for Education, the Center is an attempt to ignite the ideas of the children with a simple promise: no idea has to stay an idea.

Built around eight pods, from Reading and Research to Simulation and SparkTank, the space is designed to be loud, messy, collaborative, and joyful. As President Ahmed Rayees put it, the goal is to move students from consuming technology to creating it, one prototype at a time. For a school that started with one ‘what if’ nearly four years ago, the corridors now sound like the future arriving early.
Dr Badr’s message to the students was simple and direct: “Keep learning and asking questions. Keep dreaming bigger and bigger as that makes our learning journey joyful and beautiful.” He added that in line with Oman Vision 2040, the goal is to raise students who can “speak the language of the future” and use technology responsibly to improve quality of life.
Built around how ideas actually grow:
The idea for The Forum came from ISG President Ahmed Rayees nearly four years ago, with continued support from Founder Dr P Mohamed Ali, whose belief was articulated as ‘Innovation is a process, not a product.’ Principal Papri Ghosh said the team deliberately moved beyond the concept of just an AI or robotics lab.

“As learning moved beyond textbooks, we envisioned a space where students could question, research, collaborate, design, experiment and create,” Rayees explained, adding, “We began with one simple question: What if an idea did not have to remain just an idea? Today, The Forum gives that vision a physical form.”
That process runs through eight interconnected pods, such as: Presentation, Collaboration, Innovation, Simulation, Mentor, Media, Creativity, and Reading, Research & Reflection. An idea can start in Reading, grow through research and Collaboration, take shape in Design and prototyping, be tested in Simulation, get refined with a Mentor, and finally be shared through Presentation or Media.
Here, kids are currently adding innovations after innovations and their ideas don’t end just there. They are busy with innovative ideas like a ‘safety human detection drone for disaster management’, ‘an auto water dispenser, ‘systems for protecting buildings, a ‘crowd management tool’, a flight simulator’, and ‘a currency converter’, besides other possibilities on the table such as IoT, electronics, automation, 3D design and printing, renewable energy, digital media, product design, textiles, fashion, and combining traditional skills with emerging tech, to name a few.