The creation of a PhD program in Neuroengineering, the renewal of the management contract with the Ministry of Education (MEC) and other strategic steps by the Santos Dumont Institute (ISD) for the next 10 years were perspectives highlighted this week in an audience at MEC in Brasilia and, by videoconference, at the last meeting of the ISD Board of Directors in 2020.

The Council is the Institute's highest decision-making body and brings together representatives from the MEC and also from other government ministries and entities from areas such as science, education, health and industry.

The current and planned actions and projects for strengthening and expanding the institution were discussed with the agency this Wednesday (2nd) and presented the day before to the new Program director of the Ministry of Education, João Carlos Barreto, to the area manager and director substitute Jaqueline Ribeiro Silva and Project coordinators Naimar Moretti and Vinícius de Aquino.  

The presentation was held at the Ministry's headquarters in Brasília in the context of negotiation of the 10th amendment to the ISD management contract, through which the government finances and monitors the Institute's activities since 2014. The amendment provides for the transfer of federal resources to the 2020 actions and the extension of the term of the management contract – which expires this year, - until December 31, 2021. In parallel, the Institute and the Ministry are also discussing the renewal of the contract for at least another 10 years.

The general director of ISD, Reginaldo Freitas Júnior, the administrative director, Jovan Gadioli dos Santos, and the manager of the Health Education and Research Center Anita Garibaldi, from the Institute, Lilian Lira Lisboa, participated in the audience.

A balance of the year and what is to come were also on the agenda of the ISD Board of Directors this Wednesday, at the last meeting of the year.

Future

“The year 2020 put several of our skills to the test, including resilience and resignification, resistance, but I think that for ISD it was also a year of a lot of learning and a lot of strengthening. The Institute ends the year strengthened, looking to the future, full of hope, projects, new ideas and believing more and more in the social mission it has embraced”, said the director general to the councilors, also highlighting the prospects for expansion of the Institute's activities beyond the borders of Rio Grande do Norte.

PhD in Neuroengineering

Neuroscientist Miguel Nicolelis, president of the Council, highlighted that “the new project of the 10-year management contract with the MEC can consolidate and perpetuate the mission of the ISD”. The neuroscientist also stated that “there is an urgent need to consolidate the educational mission of the ISD with the creation of a doctorate in neuroengineering, which would be the first in Latin America”. The Institute already has a master's degree in the area. It is the only one in Brazil approved by the Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (Capes).

“So the possibility of creating a doctorate with the support of Capes and MEC is essential for the new level (which the Institute hopes to reach), so that we can really train young people and spread them around Brazil and outside Brazil as well because I have sure that when this is announced we will have students from Latin America and other countries wanting to study at the Institute”, said Nicolelis.

According to the administrative director of the Institute, Jovan Gadioli dos Santos, “the bases for submitting the proposal for implementing the doctorate to Capes are already under way and include the hiring of new researchers next year”.

Sérgio Henrique Santos, director of Health Education Development at MEC and new representative of the Ministry on the Board of Directors of ISD, emphasized at the meeting that multiplying the initiatives that the Institute develops and integrating them with other current ones brings gains to the potential of ISD and also to Brazil.

“As MEC in the Board of Development in Education and Health, we focus not only on strengthening undergraduate courses but also postgraduate courses, and this is our perception of the Santos Dumont Institute, in terms of its performance in the permanent education of health professionals, inserted in the SUS, and also by the reference centers, whether in the maternal-infant part, as well as for their great vocation in assisting people with disabilities”.

About the Board of Directors of ISD

O ISD Board of Directors carries out non-remunerated activities and has as its members Miguel Ângelo Laporta Nicolelis (president), Alessandro Glauco dos Anjos de Vasconcelos (Ministry of Health), Amaro Sales de Araújo (National Confederation of Industry – CNI), Fábio Donato Soares Larotonda (Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovations), Francisco Humberto Vignoli (Getúlio Vargas Foundation), Hélio Toledo de Campos Mello Junior (members' representative), José Luiz Egydio Setúbal (José Luiz Egydio Setúbal Foundation – Sabará Hospital), Nildo Alves Batista (Ministry of Education), Sérgio Henrique da Silva Santos (Ministry of Education), George Dantas de Azevedo, director of the Multicampi School of Medical Sciences at UFRN, appointed to the Board among professionals of notorious ability, as well as consultant Theodoro Paraschiva and economist Luiz Gonzaga by Mello Belluzzo.