Draft:Latinamerican Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrounautics

The Latinamerican Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics (OLAA, es) is an important international annual contest on astronomy and astronautics to high school students. Its objetives are to promote the cultural and scientific exchange of students while giving students an opportuniny to get closer to science research and teaching, especially on astronomy.

History
OLAA was founded during the Regional Olympiad Delegates Meeting held at Montevideo, Uruguay in october 2008. In that meeting representatives from Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Paraguay, Uruguay and Mexico were present, along the assistance of an UNESCO's assesor. There, the participation guidelines were approved as well as the selection of Brazil as the first site for OLAA, which would be held in october 2009.

Concept
It was decided that OLAA would be held annualy by the Member Countries council, and participants will be high school students from those countries. The main objectives of OLAA are:


 * The promotion of the study of Astronomy, Astronautics and Sciences in the youth;


 * The promotion of activities exchanges, share of knowledge and the pacific behaviour between participants;


 * Help in the creation of activities between associations and alumni to increase friendness and knowledge sharing.


 * Support for the construction of Observatories, Science Museums, and the curricular inclusion of Astronomy in the countries. In this way, the OLAA was established to be a purely educational event.

The concept of the OLAA is "the promotion of honor, discipline, humility and cooperativism among participants, stimulating technical-scientific thinking." Within this context, it was thought that the tests should consist of a written part, an observational part and an experimental part, all based on a previously established relationship of contents..

Its first edition occurred in the International Year of Astronomy, 2009 in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

History
The first edition of "OLAA" was held from October 12 to 19, 2009 and had the participation of seven Latin American countries (Mexico, Colombia, Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Chile), totaling 33 participating students. The observational test was carried out at the National Astrophysics Laboratory in Itajubá, MG.

The eleventh edition of the "OLAA" was held between October 20 and 26, 2019 in Puebla, Mexico, and had the participation of eleven Latin American countries (Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay). The record number of 12 countries would have been reached if it had not been for the fact that Ecuador had to miss the event at the last minute as a result of the serious social situation that country has been going through in recent weeks.

The twelfth Olympiad was supposed to take place in Quito, Ecuador. However, due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, this was held virtually between November 16 and 30, 2020, organized by the same country.