Community

Few words have such a broad meaning as the word community. Derived from the Latin word “comunus”, where the suffix munus means “task, debt and gift of a group of individuals,” community can indicate a specific group of people or a physical space occupied by a social group. It can be a neighborhood, a school, a traditional community such as an indigenous or quilombola community, a city, a country or even an international community of people united with a common goal. 

Whatever it is, the community produces knowledge: knowledge of socialization, community management and dialogues between equipment such as schools, health centers, cultural spaces, universities and companies are some examples. There is also knowledge that originates from the territory’s collective, communal memory, such as traditional festivals, ways of producing a certain typical dish or handicraft, and language, along with others. 

In this context, STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) projects can be designed to benefit a community. Therefore, the definition of the target audience is one of the initial stages of Project Based Learning (PBL) as well as being one of the most important ones because it helps to establish which community will be affected by the project. A solution or prototype aims to support a specific group of people, whether they are located in the territory, frequenters of a facility (a school, a health center, a museum) or within a social spectrum.

The community represents a valuable resource in identifying a problem. Prototypes that are developed from interviews with people who are directly affected by the problem have a better chance of promoting an effective solution. The community reappears in the prototype tests phase, because it helps to validate the effectiveness of physical or representational solutions. During this step, an ethical conduct of the testing stage is required, ensuring transparency throughout the process. 

If they are well built, STEM projects can also be a tool for strengthening community ties. For example, students can invite neighborhood residents to meetings about a problem or to take part in the tests of prototypes, especially when they are tools aimed at the management of collective spaces, such as squares, or services that need the interest and involvement of civil society, such as recycling and selective trash collection. STEM projects can also give a boost to the school community itself. Teachers together with other professionals and students from different classes activate the school’s collective spaces in the ideation, creation and testing of prototypes.