Diversity can reach the classroom in many ways. It can come from the accumulated experience of those who have spent decades outside of academia, from the knowledge built in traditional communities, from the trajectory of a young PhD who has just completed their training, or even from knowledge that crosses the boundaries between science, technology, art, and society. It is this multiplicity that the Visiting Specialist Professor in Undergraduate Studies Program (PPEVG) seeks to expand by bringing professionals, professors, masters, and researchers with different backgrounds and experiences to undergraduate courses.
Coordinated by the Pro-Rectorate for Undergraduate Studies (PRG), the program is in its 27th edition and selects 16 proposals submitted by the University's units each semester. The places are distributed among the four major areas of knowledge — Humanities and Arts, Biological and Health Sciences, and Exact and Technological Sciences — with four places reserved for each area. In the most recent edition, 25 proposals were received. In the previous edition, there were 30 applications.
“These are beautiful proposals that aim to address and envision what we lack in university curricula today,” says Professor Silvio Consonni, coordinator of the Teaching and Learning Support Space [ea]² and president of the committee responsible for selecting the program.
In the last two calls for applications, the program incorporated diversity data to promote equity policies. In the case of equally qualified proposals, the PRG (Regional Planning and Management Office) began to prioritize candidates who self-identify as Black, mixed-race, or Indigenous. “This is not a quota system: candidates compete within their respective fields, but may receive the bonus provided for in the selection criteria. There are also tie-breaking criteria related to gender, accessibility, and inclusion,” explains Consonni.
It is in this context that the participation of Professor Maíra Rodrigues da Silva, the first quilombola selected by the program, is situated. A biologist by training, she built her academic career in the area of geosciences and develops research related to environmental contamination, climate change, biodiversity, and the impacts of disasters on traditional communities and territories.
Silva's relationship with the University, however, began long before her academic training. As a child, she accompanied the activities developed by Unicamp in quilombola communities in the Ribeira Valley, in the south of the state. Later, she returned through extension programs and, subsequently, research, until she reached her master's and doctoral degrees. It was in this journey that she began to connect scientific knowledge with the knowledge built by traditional communities. "I usually say that Unicamp was already in my life. I come from two worlds," she says.
In her research career, she began investigating the relationship between the physical environment and the communities living in territories affected by contamination processes and environmental disasters. This work also led her to the topic of climate change and participation in projects focused on the formulation of public policies. This experience broadened her understanding of the very production of knowledge. "Ancestral knowledge is also sophisticated, just not within our scientific methodology," she states.
For her, bringing this knowledge closer together doesn't mean replacing science, but creating possibilities for dialogue between different ways of observing and understanding the territory. This is the perspective she now brings to undergraduate studies as a visiting specialist professor. Her proposal is linked to an interdisciplinary course connected to the Environmental Justice Commission, which brings together students from different areas to discuss environmental impacts, climate science, health, climate justice, and community resilience.
The course has already begun, and after an initial call for applications that attracted 29 students, it reached approximately 70 registered participants from various fields, including Engineering, Physics, and Geosciences. The aim is for each area to contribute to the discussion based on its own knowledge, in an exchange that also allows for consideration of practices developed in traditional territories.
Different entry points
According to Consonni, the diversity sought by the program is not limited to the origin or academic background of the candidates. The visiting specialist professor does not necessarily need to hold a doctoral degree: a professional of recognized expertise can also be selected, provided they meet the criteria established by the program.
This openness allows, for example, the reception of professionals working in industry, specialists linked to agribusiness, artists, and people who have built their careers in different fields. It can also represent an opportunity for researchers at moments of career transition, such as those who have recently completed a doctorate or a post-doctorate.
The proposal submitted by the units must necessarily be linked to an undergraduate course, which may be mandatory or elective. The visiting specialist professor must also offer at least one activity open to the community, which may extend beyond the limits of the University. The contract lasts up to five months and is temporary.
Professor Rosa Chaves represents another such entry point. At 62, she is entering the undergraduate program at Unicamp after a career that included early childhood education, pedagogical coordination in the São Paulo municipal school system, and academic research. Holding a doctorate in Education from the Federal University of São Paulo (Unifesp) and a master's degree from the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo (PUC-SP), Chaves works primarily on issues related to childhood, adolescence, gender, race relations, and violence.
Her connection with Unicamp began before her participation in the PPEVG. In 2024, she taught an extension course aimed at early childhood education teachers, at the invitation of professors from the Faculty of Education (FE). Now, for the first time, she is at the University as a professor of an undergraduate course.
“It’s even an opportunity for us to flirt with an academic career,” she says. For her, the experience represents a challenge and, at the same time, the possibility of putting into practice a teaching style that has been built up throughout her career.
“I retired as a pedagogical coordinator in 2017, but I remain active,” says the professor, who completed her doctorate in 2023. For her, participation in the program shows that university teaching can be a possibility even for those who reach this stage of their career through different paths. “It’s a very good opportunity for recent PhD graduates. It’s very interesting to have this opportunity to teach an elective course.”
The course Body, Gender and Sexuality, linked to the Faculty of Physical Education (FEF), brings together students from different courses and proposes an intersectional approach to discuss violence, power relations and different forms of oppression. In the second class, the group already had about 28 students, coming from areas such as Chemistry, Mathematics, Social Sciences, Pedagogy and Physical Education.
The diversity of the class also aligns with the professor's proposal. The objective is to discuss the Black body and subjectivities without restricting the approach to the racial issue, articulating it with other dimensions, such as gender, sexuality, and different power relations. To develop the discussions, Rosa relies on dialogue between academic texts, cinema, and other artistic languages.
The experience has also led Rosa to establish new connections at the University. During her participation in the program, she intends to engage in dialogue with other disciplines and professors, broadening the discussion to include topics such as ableism and inclusion. More than just occupying a classroom, Chaves sees the program as an opportunity to expand exchanges between the University and society and to bring together different educational experiences. The same perspective appears in her outreach proposal, which aims to reach not only Unicamp students, but also professionals and communities in municipalities in the region.
A perpetual calendar
The program's calendar remains in constant motion. While the specialists of one semester develop their activities, the committee is already beginning work on selecting the professors who will work in the following semester. The next call for applications should be launched in September, with an application period of approximately 30 to 40 days. The evaluation takes place until the end of October, so that the results can be released before the closing of the timetable for the first semester of 2027.
Cover photo:
