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Unicamp signs Chair for Refugees and University Pact on Human Rights

Adhesions were made official today in a ceremony at Campinas City Hall

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Unicamp made official this Thursday morning its adhesion to the Sérgio Vieira de Mello Chair, with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and also with the National University Pact for the Promotion of Respect for Diversity and the Culture of Peace and Human Rights, a joint initiative of the Ministries of Education and Justice and Citizenship, in a ceremony held in the Red Hall of Campinas City Hall.

The Chair for Refugees was created by UNHCR in 2003, with the aim of supporting the population in refugee situations through actions involving education, research and academic extension. The University Pact, launched in November 2016, is an initiative open to the participation of higher education institutions (HEIs) and supporting entities (EA) such as companies, civil society organizations and public administration bodies.

Photo: Perri
Marcelo Knobel speaks during the ceremony: for the rector of Unicamp, “the role of the public university is to ensure diversity and collaborate with the training of people who are going through a difficult time as refugees”

“Unicamp is the 18th institution to join the Sérgio Vieira de Mello Chair, and this happens during a very important event, which is the launch of the University Pact, at Campinas City Hall, which once again promotes the integration of the municipality and universities places with the human rights agenda”, said Isabel Marquez, UNHCR representative in Brazil. “The University Pact emerged a year ago and today we have 322 colleges and universities throughout Brazil, 47 federal and 30 state, gaining a large body”, informed professor Daniel de Aquino Ximenes, MEC representative at the event.

“The role of the public university is to ensure diversity and collaborate with the training of people who are going through a difficult time as refugees. It is essential that there is an important welcoming place like our University for these people to think about the future and develop possibilities to progress in their lives”, highlighted the rector of Unicamp, professor Marcelo Knobel. “We have just sent a project to Capes proposing interdisciplinary initiatives with several units involved, around research focused on diversity, culture of peace and dialogue”, he added, regarding the University Pact.

“These are very important agreements for a city like Campinas, which has undergone an immense transformation in the last five decades, going from having around 200 thousand inhabitants to becoming one of the largest metropolises in Brazil. There are different thoughts, origins, ethnicities, religions, we cannot have intolerance”, noted Mayor Jonas Donizette. “For this reason, we rely on what is most precious in life, education, making a pact with universities – the environment in which we can propagate the ideas of peaceful coexistence, captivating young people, who have a great power of transformation” , he concluded.


The Chair’s proposal

Coordinated by professor Rosana Baeninger, the GT-Cátedra – an interunit and interdisciplinary working group created by rector Marcelo Knobel, linking him directly to his Cabinet – announces an extensive work plan, with actions and activities to be carried out between the second semester of 2017 and the first semester of 2019, starting by expanding scientific production and disciplines that address the topic of refugee immigration at undergraduate and postgraduate levels; promote interunit and interdisciplinary seminars; and implement the scholarship program for university professors in refugee situations.

Photo: Perri
Professor Rosana Baeninger, coordinator of the GT-Cátedra: research and project implementation

In partnership with UNHCR-Brazil, the Brazilian government and the City of Campinas, it is also proposed to develop dissemination programs, seminars and awareness raising on the topic of refugees, through training and organization of joint training events for agents involved in reception asylum seekers and refugees in Brazil; reinforce the role of advocacy for protection and integration of refugees at local, state and federal levels; support the refugee student; offer Portuguese teaching; facilitate the process of validating undergraduate and postgraduate degrees; and participate in the national and Latin American network of the Sérgio Vieira de Mello Chair.   

The GT-Cátedra, which has already established strong coordination with the municipal and metropolitan public administration, recalls that Unicamp has been concerned with the issue of refugee immigrants for 30 years, and that it currently has seven students in this condition: four Syrians, one from Serra Leone, another from the Democratic Republic of Congo and the seventh from Angola, as a special Medicine student. The document also recalls the University's active participation in the Pro-Haiti program, receiving the first Haitian students in Brazil after the 2010 earthquake. 

Between 2004 and 2017, 18 theses/dissertations were produced that dealt with the issue of refugees, in addition to studies on Haitian immigration (12 theses/dissertations and two books). Theses and dissertations on refuge, culture and language are being developed at IEL. “The number of asylum seekers in Brazil has been growing in recent years and research on immigrants not covered by the legal status of refugees will need to be examined in the regulation of the new Migration Law”, observe the members of the GT. “This is also a topic that has been the subject of research in the areas of law, sociology, political science, anthropology and demography at Unicamp.”

Photo: Perri
Isabel Marquez, UNHCR representative in Brazil: “Unicamp is the 18th institution to join the Sérgio Vieira de Mello Chair, and this happens at a very important event”

With regard to research, back in 2005, the Center for Population Studies (Nepo) investigated – together with the Human Rights Secretariat of the Presidency of the Republic/UNHCR and Cáritas São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro – the “Living Conditions of Refugee Population in Brazil”. That year there were around 3 thousand refugees in the country, concentrated in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. The research included 220 families, totaling 1.520 people, and resulted in two monographs, two master's theses and a doctoral thesis. Recently, between 2014-2015, the same questionnaire was applied to Syrian families in São Paulo, along with 255 people, whose information is being analyzed for a doctoral thesis. In 2016-2017, questionnaires were administered to 72 refugees of different nationalities in São Paulo.

Within the scope of university extension, the University has been offering training programs for municipal managers since 2009, in partnership with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). The partnership with the City of Campinas is strengthened with the creation of the Support Network for Immigrants and Refugees (RAIR, from the Department of Citizenship), which has the participation of Unicamp through students, teachers and researchers. As its first activities, the GT-Cátedra held the seminar “Migration and Refuge” at the Immigration Museum in São Paulo, on World Refugee Day (20 June), as well as the photographic exhibition “Somos Todos Imigrantes” (from Missão Paz- Chico Max) at the Unicamp Central Library during the month of July and then in spaces at the City Hall. 


Committee for Diversity

In relation to National University Pact for the Promotion of Respect for Diversity and the Culture of Peace and Human Rights, whose main objective is to promote human rights education in higher education, Unicamp established in May this year a Management Committee that is made up of 13 members, including the rector Marcelo Knobel and representatives of professors, researchers, students and employees. Initially, the coordination of the work was carried out by Professor Rosana Baeninger, from the Department of Demography at the Institute of Philosophy and Human Sciences (IFCH).

Photo: Perri
The coordinator of the Pact Management Committee, professor Néri de Barros Almeida: “We intend to simultaneously encourage debates within the community and the development of research”

According to the current coordinator of the Management Committee, professor Néri de Barros Almeida, from the IFCH History Department, the Committee worked in recent months to define the guidelines of the Work Plan to be carried out by the University. “We intend to simultaneously encourage debates within the community and the development of research. In this sense, the involvement that the Committee had in responding to a notice from Capes [Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel, a body of the Ministry of Education] aimed at promoting, for two years, research and postgraduate courses was important. committed to the issues of interest to the Pact”, he reports.

The professor states that, although the schedule was tight, it was possible to identify that there is great interest on the part of courses offered by Unicamp in the issues addressed by the Pact. “We received proposals, among others, from courses in Economics, Education, Geosciences, Linguistics, Literary Theory and Demography. The proposal also arose to expand the training of Scientific Initiation, Master's, Doctorate and Post-Doctorate researchers through the offering of disciplines, the promotion of multidisciplinary scientific dialogue and the joint study of teaching techniques for content related to human rights and diversity ”, reveals professor Néri.

The Steering Committee also suggested the creation of the Permanent Observatory of Human Rights and Diversities at Unicamp. Its mission will be to gather and disseminate information. “The idea is to provide a panel of research carried out at the University, successful initiatives in the field of management and coexistence in different bodies and units, in addition to identifying teaching, research and extension demands. We believe that, starting next year, the Committee's proposals will begin to come to fruition. We are not in a hurry. The most important thing is to promote adherence, ensuring solid foundations for work that we hope will be important for the community”, analyzes the teacher. Some actions will be developed in conjunction with Campinas City Hall.

Photo: Perri
Table and audience in the Red Hall of Campinas City Hall

Currently, the University Pact for the Promotion of Respect for Diversity, the Culture of Peace and Human Rights already has 304 public and private higher education institutions joining, which demonstrates the interest in the initiative, according to professor Néri. To participate in the action, HEIs must sign a membership agreement, which is available on the Human Rights Education Portal: http://educacaoemdireitoshumanos.mec.gov.br/#adesao. Once participation is formalized, institutions will have 30 days to form a Management Committee and 90 days to present a work plan. Supporting entities must also sign a membership agreement, which is available at the same email address. They will have up to 90 days to present an action plan.

 

Listen to the CBN interview:

http://www.portalcbncampinas.com.br/2017/10/pacto-contra-a-intolerancia-a-refugiados-e-firmado-em-campinas-com-universidades/

See also:
Unicamp offers postgraduate courses on Human Rights
 

JU-online cover image
Sitting on the left Jonas Donizette wearing a navy blue jacket with a light blue shirt, in the center Daniel wearing a gray jacket with a striped shirt and gray tie, both looking at the rector Marcelo Knobel, on the right, signing a document, wearing a blue jacket with a white shirt and red tie , on the table red tablecloth, glasses with water and papers, on the white wall background.

2017 retrospective

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