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A team of students from Lincoln School was crowned world champion at the World Robot Olympiad (WRO) 2025, the world's most prestigious educational robotics competition. The tournament, held in Singapore, brought together the world's leading technological powers, making the Costa Rican students' victory even more remarkable.

Over three days, nearly 500 teams from some 100 countries demonstrated their talent for solving global challenges through robotics, engineering, and applied sciences. In this highly competitive environment, the team made up of Alanna Music, Emma Music, and Joel Chen, students at Lincoln School, took first place in the Future Innovators (Senior) category thanks to their robot Sprout. They also won the prestigious Innovation Award, presented by Aramco, a recognition reserved only for proposals that break new ground and make a decisive contribution to global technological advancement.

Three young people imagined a space nursery, and the world said yes.

The winning project was not an exercise in science fiction, but a solution designed for a real problem: how to produce fresh food on long-duration space missions. The young people developed a system capable of growing crops outside the Earth's atmosphere using a combination of advanced robotics, artificial intelligence, and agricultural biotechnology.

“The design includes a smart space greenhouse where the system regulates light, humidity, and other parameters to ensure optimal crop growth. The proposal even incorporates a mechanism to simulate gravity by rotating the plants and using centrifugal force, which is essential for the roots to grow downward, a condition that is impossible in zero gravity,” explained Emma Music, who was very proud to position Costa Rica at such a high level when competing with major technological powers.

“We have been working on Sprout for about a year, and to create it, we took Costa Rica's biodiversity and the needs of space missions as our reference points. We researched with all the resources we had at hand to move forward and creatively combined advanced technologies to develop our robot. One of the things we take away from the Robotics World Cup is that being in a global competition showcase and winning the championship showed us that it is possible to aim high,” said Joel Chen.

Alanna added,“It was really exhausting explaining our project to many judges from around the world non-stop, but each conversation filled us with energy. They praised the project, and as the judging rounds intensified at our booth, we knew it was a good sign. When judges come back again and again and take a selfie with your project, it's because they are discarding projects and checking the attributes of the finalists. Experiencing that firsthand was incredible.”

A small country with enormous ambition

“Participating in the World Robotics Championship was a real privilege. To get there, we first had to compete and win at the national level, and then in Singapore we faced the world's major powers in robotics: China, Japan, the United States, Russia, and Malaysia, among others. Knowing that we competed against the best teams on the planet and still managed such a solid performance confirms that young Costa Ricans have exceptional talent and the ability to excel in any setting,” said Christopher Music, team coach and father of two participants.

“This achievement was made possible thanks to the support of private companies. Fidélitas University played a decisive role by providing robotics equipment and technology essential for the development of Sprout. In addition, DHL supported all the logistics, taking on the task of transporting the bulky and expensive robot boxes. Added to this was the unconditional support of companies such as Lincoln School, Grupo Garnier, Shift Porter Novelli, and God Branding, whose collaboration was essential in making this feat a reality.” For this achievement to be repeated in the future, private companies and the government need to support student groups and provide them with the resources to compete internationally. I estimate that Sprout required an investment of more than 20 million colones, Music estimated.

“Costa Rica not only participated in the World Robot Olympiad, but is now the world champion. This victory shows what we can achieve when we invest in education, science, and technology,” said Alejandra Sánchez, organizer of the National Robotics Olympiad since 2009 and Latin American representative to the WRO Advisory Council.

What happened in Singapore is not just a technical victory. It is proof that talent flourishes when it is cultivated with opportunity, support, and ambition. And that even a small country can write a memorable page in the history of global innovation.

The post Costa Rica Was Crowned World Robotics Champion in Singapore with A Smart Space Nursery appeared first on The Costa Rica News.

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