Victoria MARTÍNEZ ANTIPA, Andres Bello University, Chile
In Chile, 62% of people declare that they are interested in science, an encouraging phrase that contradicts the fact that 76% of people feel little or no information about science issues (THE SECOND NATIONAL SURVEY ON PUBLIC PERCEPTION OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY IN CHILE, 2018)[1]. In my point of view, this is one of the main challenges we have as a society in terms of scientific communication, because it means that if the public has a real interest in science, what is happening so that scientific knowledge is not accessible? This leads us to a second question, for this to happen, who are the actors that must be involved? And in particular, what are universities and research centers doing to contribute to a science culture in Chile? To put it more clearly and in terms of the reality of our country, in this same survey the data shows that 80% of people do not know an institution that is dedicated to doing scientific and technological research in Chile. So, although these are not new questions, the challenge continues to be more present than ever, and this is how we saw it reflected in the 2020 pandemic, which put us in front of a world full of uncertainties and where science always had such an important role.
In this proposal I would like to analyze and reflect on the role and importance of universities in not only providing new knowledge to society, but also in contributing to new spaces of science culture and science communication, so necessary and urgent for the times we live in. For this, a context of the importance of scientific communication will be shown based on the experience of a program of activities carried out at the Center for the Science Communication at the Andrés Bello University. A work that takes more than 7 years and that has managed to bring science to a citizen conversation. From the training of researchers with new communication tools; talks open to the public on science and technology issues and a permanent citizen and cultural link. For example, 2020 was a challenging year, but where from an experience in scientific communication, with open talks, we were able to reach more than 8,000 people (virtual), much more than we achieved before in person, addressing the COVID pandemic -19 from different perspectives: environment, cities, health, culture, economy, education, and other important topics.
[1] https://www.conicyt.cl/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/31072019-Informe-Final-Conicyt.pdf
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