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LOCAL Thursday 2 June 2022

Secondary school pupils get to know Caribbean Research again

In mid-June, NWO is organising the sec- tainability, and how can you keep your
ond edition of the Week of Caribbean Re- carbon footprint as low as possible? The
search. Education and knowledge transfer pupils thus become involved in the pro-
are key focuses. In the weeks before the gramme that focuses on knowledge shar-
event, researchers from the Caribbean re- ing and networking.
gion or those who are doing research in Tammy-Sue Lejuez, pupil 4 HAVO - Colegio
this region will give workshops to second- Nigel Matthew, Aruba:
ary school pupils. ‘Make more responsible choices. Think
about what you eat, and how that in-
The workshops will be offered at several creases your footprint.’
schools in the Netherlands and at schools
in Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao, Saba, Sint Eu- Amber van Veghel, researcher Food and
statius and Sint Maarten. Climate Change, University of Aruba
‘I really enjoyed engaging with the chil-
This series of workshops at secondary dren about food. We talked about culture
schools raises awareness among young and eating habits. And I also learned a lot
people of the value of science in society. from the students. For example, one group
Why is research so important and what discovered that some coconut planta-
does a scientist actually do every day? tions have dug channels containing water
What kind of jobs are associated with re- so the coconuts make a “soft landing” in
search and how do you go about getting the water instead of on the hard ground.’
one?
Programme of the Dutch Caribbean Re-
The workshops cover a range of topics. search Week (13-17th of June 2022)
Young people are encouraged to ask the https://www.nwo.nl/en/meetings/dutch-
researchers many questions and carry out caribbean-research-week
short assignments on the spot. Some of the
questions that will be dealt with include: Since the Caribbean programme was
How does the economy of a ‘small island launched, NWO has organised three grant
state’ such as Curaçao or Saba work? rounds. These have given a considerable
What exactly is data collection (the stu- boost to scientific research on and in the
dents will be asked to do an exercise, in Dutch Caribbean. More information about
which they design their own survey)? What the activities and results can be found on
is the relationship between food and sus- the programme page.q