NSU conducts first Histology Olympiad for foreign students

At the end of January, NSU hosted the first Histology Olympiad for foreign students, «Specialists in General and Private Histology: 2022». Five teams comprised of 15 third year students at the V. Zelman Institute of Medicine and Psychology (ZIMP) demonstrated their knowledge in three competitive rounds: a crossword puzzle, identifying histological microslide, and identifying morphological structures in photographs.

Elena Prokopyeva, PhD in Biology and Associate Professor at ZIMP, Tatiana Pozmogova, Assistant at the NSU Department of Natural Sciences and ZIMP, and Natalya Palyanova, Junior Researcher at the Federal Research Center for Fundamental and Translational Medicine were the Olympiad organizers and jury.

— We conducted the Olympiad for foreign students to introduce game elements and create a more informal atmosphere between students and teachers. In my opinion these students have had a particularly difficult time studying. They studied remotely for two years while our course was only one and a half years long, — described the objectives for the event Prokopyeva.

The results of the competition were:

The first place team was Sara Chavoshzadeh, Bahram Kamangari, and Abdolaziz Al-attieh. The second place was shared by two teams made up of Soheil Azizi Arani, Mahamad Joodaki and Atefeh Amian and Amirmasoud Asgari, Roshanak Nahavandi, and Alireza Ghadiri. Third place went to Farid Abbaspour, Kimia Shahamatazar, and Amin Dinavarnezhad. Raha Jafarvond, Mohammad Hossein Zarei, and Mahamad Reza Ghasemi also took part in the Olympiad. All participants received diplomas and certificates. The first and second place teams were awarded with special prizes, automatic «excellent» and «good» for the «Special Histology» subject.

Soheil Azizi commented on participating in the Olympiad,

— Teaching and studying subjects at the University rarely give us an opportunity to discuss with our classmates the knowledge that we have received from various sources such as reference books, YouTube videos, etc. At this Olympiad I had the opportunity to discuss questions and answers with two of my friends and classmates, it was amazing! I think if we had studied some sections a little more, and looked at more pictures on the University's Histology website, we would definitely have taken first place. In any case, I'm happy. I hope that this competition will continue and we have something like this every year because I believe every histologist should have this experience at least once, — commented on participating in the Olympiad Soheil Azizi.

Teaching and studying subjects at the University rarely give us an opportunity to discuss with our classmates the knowledge that we have received from various sources such as reference books, YouTube videos, etc. At this Olympiad I had the opportunity to discuss questions and answers with two of my friends and classmates, it was amazing! I think if we had studied some sections a little more, and looked at more pictures on the University's Histology website, we would definitely have taken first place. In any case, I'm happy. I hope that this competition will continue and we have something like this every year because I believe every histologist should have this experience at least once.

Prokopyeva said the organizers would make this an annual event so that foreign students have more opportunities to demonstrate their knowledge in a relaxed and friendly atmosphere.