Over a pleasant and cordial breakfast at CEDENNA, a collaboration agreement was signed between our center and the Chilean Network of Chemistry Teachers (RPQ). RPQ representatives were enthusiastic and motivated by the activities and initiatives that will arise from this agreement, which was signed by the center’s executive director, Dr. Juan Escrig Murúa, and the executive director of the CEDENNA Foundation, Dr. Dora Altbir Drullinski.
Dr. Juan Escrig highlighted the importance of this agreement with the RPQ, which brings together more than 250 teachers in different regions of the country. “This agreement will make it possible to develop numerous activities for teachers, schools and students, mainly focused on teaching materials to teach nanotechnology to Chile’s future generations,” he said.
For her part, Dr. Dora Altbir commented on the importance of working with schools and teachers, who can take knowledge to a large number of students. “This agreement allows us to establish a collaborative working framework with teachers and reach, through them, many children who in the future could be great scientists or citizens interested in and motivated by science,” said the 2019 National Prize for Exact Sciences winner.
She recalled that CEDENNA has previously worked with the RPQ, collaborating in the selection of teachers from different regions to take part in the in-person ProNano workshop, whose mission is to provide training in nanoscience and nanotechnology to science teachers. In addition, students from classes taught by teachers in this network have visited the center’s laboratories.
On behalf of the RPQ, the agreement was signed by members of the coordinating team, teachers Mabel Camilo, Ximena Gonzalez, Joaquín Castillo, César Plaza and Pamela Mondaca. The latter commented that this agreement is very important to “bring academia closer to our classrooms”. She added that in this way “we will be able to reach every corner of the country through CEDENNA’s platforms, have special places for visits and other activities that will allow them to bring “this wonderful experience of nanoscience and nanotechnology to different corners of the country through chemistry classes”.
The Chemistry Teachers Network started in 2021 and currently has around 250 associated teachers in different regions of the country. It defines itself as “a Chilean network of professionals dedicated to science teaching, which promotes support initiatives that allow reflection and learning around the teaching of chemistry”.
