“Meninas com Ciência” lives and resists for Brazil’s National Museum / Federal University of Rio de Janeiro

Abstract

The extension course Meninas com Ciência is a project created and performed by women who work in the Geology and Paleontology Department of the National Museum (UFRJ). It is aimed for girls in public and private middle schools, from 6th to 9th grades. It happens every semester since 2017, with practical and ludic Geoscience activities. Here we will present the history of our course, the updates made to our methodology, the evaluations on access, the permanence of students and our perspective on the future. The goal of this work is to inspire new initiatives and increase the access to science communication in our country. Since its creation, our project has faced many challenges, among them is the loss of its entire physical structure to the fire in the National Museum, but our team has endured and now we have had six editions, with 455 places offered and 2333 inscriptions. Furthermore, there is a growing interest from other institutions in reproducing our model. Up to this moment, the Meninas com Ciência has managed to inspire seven similar projects in the states of São Paulo, Pará and the Federal District, which confirms the importance of initiatives that deal with gender issues and our society’s receptivity. This project shows that it is possible to make quality science communication free of charge, even under adverse conditions and a low budget. Moreover, it also addresses the challenge of making the course accessible to girls who live in different social and economic conditions. In 2020, the activities predicted for both editions have been suspended due to the new corona virus outbreak. However, when faced with that setback, the Meninas com Ciência has grown and became an extension project. It has a permanent and larger structure, which contains: a) the on site activities, which will be resumed as soon as possible; b) a direct channel with the society, aiming to propose activities, answer questions on the Geosciences, pass along the experiences of female scientists, etc. and c) the creation of extension research lines.