Window Institute for the World: project for a sustainable future!

It was the purpose of transforming the world through education and income generation, shortening the distance between dreams and opportunities and fostering a sustainable future, that the Janela para o Mundo Education Center was born. Today, the centers are located in three teaching sites present in communities far from major urban centers, as well as initiatives in a 100% remote model. All designed to foster a virtuous cycle that looks inward at its students and their needs, building opportunities outward.

Meet the Janela para o Mundo Institute

The first unit was founded in 2017, in Ilha Grande, Piauí, and has already positively impacted over 1,000 students with educational projects focused on income generation and entry into the job market. Thought out and designed valuing the specificities and needs of the region in a collaborative way, it was in this space that the first classes of English, New Information Technologies, and College Preparatory began.

Following the same line, in 2020, shortly before the country was impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic, the activities of the Maranhão Education Center in Paulino Neves began. The work has remained steady since then, having benefited around 600 students and being pioneering in projects, born from the curiosity of the students themselves, such as the Education Centers Chess Club.

In 2022, the Bahia Education Center was inaugurated in Gentio do Ouro. It, besides serving more than 100 students just this year, recorded a record number of enrollments in a variety of courses, such as Virando a Chave, focused on entrepreneurship and local businesses.

The mission of the Janela para o Mundo Institute

This 2022 also marks a new phase in the trajectory of the Janela para o Mundo Program, making it possible to further expand the positive impact with the founding of the Janela para o Mundo Institute. The project succeeded so well that it now moves into a new, much more challenging phase that can scale positive impact and value creation. It is now an Institute, but with the same energy to care for, educate, and value the true protagonists: people. The idea is to take actions in the present so that we become authors of new futures. “We are writing a new story and are very eager to see the next chapters,” says Lívia Mariz, Director of Sustainability and ESG at Serena.

All Education Centers were built as places of formal and informal learning, with infrastructure for the development of various courses, activities, and encouragement of social integration of the communities in which they are located, serving as spaces for coexistence and exchange of knowledge among students of all ages and academic and professional stages.

Education for a Sustainable Future

The Learning Support course, for example, offers students in Early Childhood Education and Elementary I and II, during after‑school hours, reinforcement in the learning process of Portuguese Language and/or Mathematics. To achieve this goal, students have access to appropriate pedagogical tools and best practices to overcome challenges in reading and writing, as well as to understand and interpret mathematical concepts.

In addition to the English course and Let’s Code, which provides training in systems development for people with a knack for technology, one of the areas delivering remarkable results is the College Preparatory course. Its classes aim to prepare students for selection processes such as the ENEM, and among the students of the latest cohorts, 49% achieved scores sufficient to enter higher education.

Among the stories built, Nicole, a student of the College Preparatory course and a LIBRAS educator for the Sem Barreiras project at the Piauí Education Center, is one of the students who has already felt a difference in her results after classes began. “Now I think I will really be able to get into college. The course is helping me a lot. I started not knowing much about writing, scored 400 on my first ENEM essay and today my score is 980. After I started studying at the Education Center, I began to have great expectations for my future,” the student says.

And the experience is not transformative only for the students of the Janela para o Mundo Institute. According to Raimundo, an educator of courses such as College Preparatory, Learning Support, and Math Games at the Maranhão Education Center, “I never thought about leaving Paulino Neves, because I want to contribute to my city’s education. The Education Center happened at the crucial moment for this to happen and I am very happy to be part of it. I see Janela para o Mundo as a great opportunity, both for me as a professional and for the young people here in the region who had no access.”

It is worth noting that the Institute leverages what technology has to offer to further scale education and support the learning of more students beyond those who have access to the centers. During the Covid-19 pandemic, faced with the need for population isolation, educators had to confront a challenge: engaging and teaching remotely. Despite the obstacles, this period made it possible to look beyond the windows of the Education Centers and see the opportunity to reach people far from the physical spaces. That is how the Tech Education Center was born, serving students who are not physically nearby through a remote teaching model.

Although many achievements have already been made, the Janela para o Mundo Institute aims to grow even more and become enduring, because it believes that sustainability and transformation only materialize when value is shared among as many people as possible.

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