First activity of the Portuguese Hub in Portugal...
4th February, 2019 - Author: Michele S.Gomes da Rosa - Portuguese Hub Leader
In January this year, InnovaSpace had the opportunity to captivate a group of Portuguese schoolchildren, aged 12-14 years, with presentations about the career of space scientists. Students from the high school Rainha Dona Amélia in Lisbon gathered in an auditorium, together with Professor/Coordinator Berta Ferreira, to learn more about the role of Women in the Space Era. The bright-eyed youngsters sat listening attentively in the hall to a presentation of Project Valentina, which began with an enthusiastic presentation by Dr. Michele Rosa, who talked about her scientific pathway to becoming a researcher in the area of space, together with the work she carries out as the head of the InnovaSpace Portuguese Hub. InnovaSpace CEO Dr. Thais Russomano then provided the icing on the cake when she talked to the audience about the pioneering work of the first women in space, followed by a little about how she became a space doctor and some of the work she performs.
Whilst presented with an enthusiastic audience, the InnovaSpace team also took the opportunity to present to them one of our most recent projects, the InnovaSpace Box, developed by our Information Technology Specialist Mauricio Rosa. The easy-to-use InnovaSpaceBox has a simple interface and provides dynamic interaction with videos from the Kids2Mars Projects that took place in 2018 – questions and answers about journeys to Mars and astronaut life. Nearly two hours of constructive interaction and knowledge sharing took place, hopefully giving the young people present positive reinforcement about following a career path in the sciences in general, and space science in particular.
Our experience in Lisbon is just the beginning of our journey in space educational projects for schools in Portugal and Portuguese-speaking countries - do get in touch if you are interested in knowing more about what the InnovaSpace team can offer your school and your children - we look forward to hearing from you! Our thanks go to Prof. Berta Ferreira and the Rainha D. Amélia school for allowing us to spend time in your institution, to Fernando Mendes and Ana Dias who facilitated the connection, and to their daughter Matilde, whose question to an analogue astronaut on a mission in the Utah desert represented Portugal in our Kids2Mars Project.