The rector of Unicamp, Antonio José de Almeida Meirelles, received, on the afternoon of this Tuesday (14), the Professor Darcy Ribeiro Educational Merit Diploma, offered by the Campinas City Council. The honor — which arose from a nomination by councilor Paulo Haddad (Citizenship) and was unanimously approved by the plenary of the House — is awarded to people or institutions that have contributed in a relevant way to the cause of education in the community of Campinas.
The delivery ceremony was held in the Unicamp University Council (Consu) hall, and was attended by the mayor of Campinas, Dario Saadi, and other authorities. Also present at the ceremony were Deans Rachel Meneghelo (Postgraduate), João Romano (Research), Ivan Toro (Undergraduate), Fernando Coelho (Extension and Culture) and Fernando Sarti (University Development); the head of the Rector's Office, Paulo César Montagner; and unit directors, teachers and employees at Unicamp.
“The honoree is Professor Antonio Meirelles, but the recipients are me and the entire Campinas Chamber”, said councilor Paulo Haddad. “This is a highly meritorious honor, due to his trajectory in the field of education and his contribution to the strengthening of Unicamp, a public university considered today one of the most important in the country”, added the parliamentarian.
Moved by the presence of his wife Eloise and sister Maria Angela, Antonio Meirelles said he looked for reasons to be honored with the title named after Darcy Ribeiro, in his opinion, one of the most important thinkers in education in Brazil. "Being honored with a diploma named after Darcy Ribeiro makes me think about what I might have done to deserve it. The issue here is not a curriculum, it is not the merits of an academic production, nor false modesty. This is about the need I have to look for connections with the history of this man who was, without a doubt, one of the great intellectuals of this country”, said the rector in his acceptance speech.
“Darcy Ribeiro was not just a thinker, but someone who actually sought to transform our country and who left marks on important moments in our recent history”, added Meirelles, remembering that Darcy Ribeiro was one of the founders of UnB (University of Brasília) and its first rector. He also recalled that Darcy Ribeiro participated in the creation of the Xingu Indigenous Park and was the creator of the Integrated Public Education Centers, a full-time school with recreational and cultural activities created in the second half of the 80s.
“I tried to list elements of my life that, in some way, could connect me with the battles for public and universal education that brought together intellectuals such as Darcy Ribeiro, Anísio Teixeira and Paulo Freire. Understand, the connection is not with them as thinkers who saw education as one of the essential elements for our development as a country and who were able to formulate concrete proposals to follow this path. It is above all the fact that I am a son of this public school that they defended so much,” he explained.
“The person who taught me literacy was my mother, a primary school teacher who taught at a rural school on the outskirts of Franca, classes in a single room, given simultaneously to students from the first to the fourth year, I was then a first year student. In the second year, already in Campinas, I studied at Castorina Cavalheiro, the gymnasium at Culto à Ciência, the first two years of school at the School of Chemistry (currently Etecap) and the last year at Aníbal de Freitas”, he revealed.
In the end, the rector recalled that despite the difficulties, the quality of public higher education was preserved. “Throughout this entire period of our recent history and with all the difficulties we have had to preserve quality public education, we have managed to build and maintain public higher education of excellent quality, capable of not only training people of high standards, but also to generate science, technology and knowledge of a high standard".
“We just have to thank the rector for the enormous effort he has made to bring the University closer to the city and its population”, said the mayor of Campinas, Dario Saadi. “The honor is fair when the representation is immense, and this is the case”, concluded the mayor.
