When CoAstro was born (video summary here) in 2018 – an award-winning project that continues to make headlines – two major phases took shape: i) teachers joined research teams (researchers took the lead role and teachers were research partners); ii) the Porto Planetarium – Ciência Viva Center (PP-CCV) and the researchers carried out activities in schools (teachers took the lead role – integrating astronomy into their daily practices – and the PP-CCV/researchers, from the Institute of Astrophysics and Space Sciences – University of Porto, were educational partners).
In 2023, this last phase was baptised ‘Con(s)ciência – a scientific condo’. The main goal was to reach audiences who were far from science (not just astronomy but using it as a gateway science to other sciences), not by choice, but because they didn’t have the opportunity to contact with it and therefore didn’t really know it.
To this end, we began our work by carrying out an analysis, of several indicators, that allowed us to identify the Portuguese municipalities (pp. 99-103) with low spontaneous engagement with astronomy.
In November and December of 2024, we are ready for the next step: to take action in these municipalities.
In November and December 2024, we were able to intervene in the first two municipalities: Boticas and Ribeira de Pena. The result: extraordinary!