‘Café com Darwin’: uma experiência de extensão na divulgação científica em um programa de pós-graduação

Abstract

The Systematics and Evolution Forum – "Coffee with Darwin" – was created by the Graduate Program in Systematics and Evolution at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN) as its main outreach activity. The first "Coffee with Darwin" was held in 2016, and there were a total of six editions by 2023. The duration of the forums varied from one to five days, consisting mainly of lectures, round tables, mini-courses, and/or poster sessions related to biodiversity, systematics, ecology, evolution, and related topics. Given the importance of this extension activity for scientific dissemination, this review describes and evaluates the six years of experience with the event and suggests future actions. Over the six editions, the extension project gathered 1,017 participants from 22 undergraduate courses and nine postgraduate courses, distributed across 11 educational institutions. Among the participants, 87.4% were UFRN students, while 12.6% were from other institutions. Of this audience, less than 1% were elementary and high school students, highlighting the importance of expanding the event to younger target audiences and other levels of education, such as Youth and Adult Education (EJA) and Professional and Technological Education. We hope that this review can support and serve as a model for the execution of similar outreach events by other graduate programs in Brazil, as well as guide future editions aimed at a larger and more diverse audience.