The third scientific colloquium of the Science in Motion cycle promoted by CILAC will address this Wednesday a new paradigm on education that science should assume at all levels of learning to be able to face the challenges that exist in the region
This Wednesday, October 14, the third open and free meeting of a total of eight that make up the “Science in Motion” series will be held, which the CILAC Organizing Committee has held on the second Wednesday of each month since last August, focused to cover science, technology, innovation and society issues in Latin America and the Caribbean. For October, the meeting will focus on addressing the challenges related to education and science, and all those innovative learning practices that Latin America and the Caribbean have the potential to exploit to consolidate their development.
These new spaces offer the opportunity to exchange in person, hand-to-hand and live with prominent figures from the regional and international science environment. It is aimed at ensuring that actors linked to the political agenda of science, technology and innovation (STI) throughout the region can benefit from a high-level exchange space. On this occasion, the panel will be made up of: Melina Furman, Eduardo Sáenz de Cabezón and José Escamilla, along with Darío Grenni, nominated among the 50 best teachers in the world.
Some of the challenges of society that science should assume as its own have to do, for example, with addressing population growth, with the urgency of ensuring sustainable development, the satisfaction of unsatisfied basic needs and the aspirations of those who There will be five billion poor people in the world in less than twenty years, in addition to the provision of jobs in the face of technological changes, among others. But in Latin America and the Caribbean, considered the most inequitable region in the world where strong scientific-technological development is required to help counteract growing misery, a reduced level of attention to science is reported, and the little that exists is estimated which is focused only on minority population groups, thus aggravating inequality.
Scientific education within the compulsory education cycle must ensure, then, quality learning for all its students. However, this does not happen. The scenario of the region clearly shows that, at the different levels of the educational system, the academic proposal does not reach this ideal and, furthermore, the way in which scientific knowledge is presented does not encourage young people to awaken their interest in learning about thematic, so scientific vocation is not promoted among young people.
This is why a profound transformation of scientific education is required: defining what should be taught, to whom, and how to do it. It is necessary to think about new curricular proposals, in a transformative training of science educators and recognize that scientific learning must expand its borders and build bridges between classrooms and non-formal settings. The problem exceeds school contexts; It is an educational, scientific, social, cultural and ethical issue that, due to its impact on the development possibilities of each country, should be placed on the political and strategic agenda to be considered with the priority that it requires.
During the third CILAC colloquium, then, the panelists are expected to address these issues, identifying the specific challenges they see for the promotion of science education, as well as offering recommendations for action for political decision-makers, educational ecosystems, teachers and educational centers. investigation.
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