As part of its 2026 Awards Week, the Princess of Asturias Foundation has convened the eleventh edition of the “Taking the Floor” cultural programme for schools aimed at primary, secondary, baccalaureate and vocational training students. In addition to including schools in the Principality of Asturias, the programme has been extended to invited schools nationwide. The working proposal for this year’s programme consists of seven activities aimed at different ages and is inspired by the work of the Laureates in the following categories: Literature, Concord, the Arts, Technical and Scientific Research, International Cooperation, Communication and Humanities, and Sports.
The goal of this initiative is to bring the work and careers of the recipients of Princess of Asturias Awards into the classrooms. Since its launch in 2015, this programme has boasted 64 960 participations by pupils from 287 schools in Asturias and other regions of Spain.
In 2017, Her Majesty Queen Leticia held meetings at the El Quirinal state primary school (Avilés) and the Jerónimo González state secondary school (Sama de Langreo) with a delegation of teachers and pupils from the 74 schools that participated in the programme in 2016. The “Taking the Floor” programme was suspended in 2020 due to the public health situation resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2024, the Foundation convened an extraordinary edition to mark the tenth anniversary of Her Royal Highness The Princess of Asturias as the institution’s Honorary President and of the launching of this project. Extended on said occasion to invited school nationwide, it included proposals linked to the work of Mary Beard (2016 Princess of Asturias Laureate for Social Sciences) and the research of Sandra Myrna Díaz (2019 Princess of Asturias Laureate for Technical and Scientific Research), both of whom returned to Asturias in 2025 to participate in the programme’s closing events. This extraordinary edition registered 920 participations by pupils from 49 schools from the Principality of Asturias and other regions of Spain.
Taking the Floor 2026
“The Vertices of Memory”
A proposal dedicated to Princess of Asturias Laureate for Literature Julian Barnes in which pupils are invited to write a short story inspired by his novel Talking It Over. The plot should address the same everyday event from different perspectives including three main characters who speak directly to the reader. Via this exercise, participants will be able to explore empathy and reflect on the reliability of memories, one of the recurring themes in the work of the award-winning author.
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Aimed at 3rd- and 4th-year secondary and baccalaureate students.
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Deadline for receipt of applications and projects: 1st October 2026 (inclusive).
“Crew.action”
An activity focusing on the career of Princess of Asturias Laureate for Concord Christina Koch, in which students are asked to work in teams of four members –like the four astronauts of NASA's Artemis II mission– and prepare a logbook. After learning about the mission goals, participants will identify their own strengths and weaknesses in order to assume different roles within the crew and face a survival exercise together aimed at putting the value of cooperation into practice.
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Aimed at secondary school, baccalaureate and vocational training students.
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Deadline for receipt of applications and projects: 1st October 2026 (inclusive).
“Living in Art”
In this proposal dedicated to Princess of Asturias Laureate for the Arts Patti Smith, the Foundation invites pupils to analyse the Laureate’s creative and cultural universe through her photographs and words. Emulating Patti Smith in The Book of Days, participants are to share a reflection on an aspect of their daily life, accompanied by an image that serves as inspiration.
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Aimed at secondary school, baccalaureate and vocational training students.
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Deadline for receipt of applications and projects: 30th September 2026 (inclusive).
“Reading the ‘Book of Life”
The youngest pupils take centre stage in this activity focussing on the work of David Klenerman, Shankar Balasubramanian and Pascal Mayer, jointly distinguished with the 2026 Princess of Asturias Award for Technical and Scientific Research. Through drawings, pupils will express some of the main contributions and applications of the discoveries of these scientists, responsible for the development of the most widely used DNA sequencing technologies at the present time.
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Aimed at primary school pupils.
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Deadline for receipt of applications and projects: 22nd September 2026 (inclusive).
“Agri.cultures”
This proposal is structured around three different activities aimed at different ages, taking as a reference the work of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, Princess of Asturias Award for International Cooperation.
Aimed at 5th- and 6th-year primary school pupils.
Some of the varieties preserved in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault come from Asturian market gardens and the region’s countryside, such as wheat from Somiedo, lettuces from Gozón, onions from Villaviciosa and beans from Cabrales.
Pupils are asked to choose one of the Asturian varieties in Svalbard, plant it in a container and prepare a field notebook about the experience.
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Deadline for receipt of applications and projects: 1st October 2026 (inclusive).
Aimed at 1st- and 2nd-year secondary school pupils.
Pupils are invited to select one of the Asturian seeds preserved in the Vault and gather information about it to create a poster or model that explains its characteristics and highlights its cultural heritage.
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Deadline for receipt of applications and projects: 29th September 2026 (inclusive).
Aimed at 3rd- and 4th-year secondary, baccalaureate and vocational training students.
Students will need to analyse the Vault’s international cooperation dimension through questions such as what types of seeds it houses, what its basic operating principles are as established by the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, its relationship with seed banks around the world, and why protecting biodiversity is essential for future food security. The results of their research will be presented in the form of an infographic.
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Deadline for receipt of applications and projects: 30th September 2026 (inclusive).
“Ghibli: A Breath of Fresh Air”
A proposal based on the track record of Studio Ghibli, distinguished with the Princess of Asturias Award for Communication and Humanities, which invites students to discover a body of work characterized by the beauty of small moments. Inspired by the Japanese studio’s philosophy and universe, students will create their own artistic work. Baccalaureate students following Visual Arts, Image and Design courses are to design a flipbook –or other traditional animation devices, such as a 2D or 3D zoetrope, a phenakistoscope or a mutoscope– to give movement to a sequence of hand-drawn images. On the same topic, vocational training students following Image and Sound courses are to produce an animated video from hand-drawn illustrations.
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Aimed at baccalaureate Arts students (Visual Arts, Image and Design) and Image and Sound vocational training students.
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Deadline for receipt of applications and projects for baccalaureate Arts students: 1sth October 2026 (inclusive).
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Deadline for receipt of applications and projects for Image and Sound vocational training students: 2nd October 2026 (inclusive).
“The Number 10 Game”
Dedicated to Princess of Asturias Laureate for Sports Leo Messi, this activity invites students to imagine a new way of playing football at their school, inspired by some of the statements made by the Laureate. The aim is to promote the practice of inclusive football where all pupils are welcome, prioritizing coexistence and fun over competition. To achieve this, they are to develop a set of rules consisting of ten fundamental principles, agreed upon by the whole class, on the basis of which they will establish the rules and regulations of the game, which they will put into practice for ten days. Depending on the result, they will be able to modify the regulations and assess whether to maintain them for the rest of the course.
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Aimed at 5th- and 6th-year primary school, secondary school, baccalaureate and vocational training students.
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Deadline for receipt of applications and projects: 2nd October 2026 (inclusive).