General Director of ISD discusses partnerships with RN’s Department of Culture

The general director of the Santos Dumont Institute (ISD), Reginaldo Freitas Júnior, met this Thursday morning (2) with the extraordinary secretary of Culture of Rio Grande do Norte, Maryland Brito, to propose the development of partnerships between institutions. The meeting took place at the Rampa Cultural Complex, in the Santos Reis neighborhood, east of Natal.

The meeting was marked by a productive and open dialogue, where potential projects and initiatives that could be carried out together were discussed, aiming to expand access to culture in Macaíba, the municipality in which ISD is located. The intention is to establish an agenda that promotes film shows, exhibitions, seminars and stimulates cultural production among people with disabilities, students from the Macaíba public school system and residents of local communities.

To this end, the general director of ISD made the physical structure of the Institute available to the state’s cultural agents. “We have a fully equipped auditorium accessible to people with disabilities that can be turned into a movie theater. We also have an exhibition space that can host numerous artistic projects. We have no shortage of ideas. What we want is to break out of inertia and make the Santos Dumont Institute a means of access to culture in Macaíba”, stated Reginaldo Freitas Júnior.

The ideas shared were well received by the extraordinary secretary of Culture. Maryland Brito explained the department’s mission to promote cultural and artistic diversity in the state and highlighted the relevance of strategic partnerships to achieve these objectives. She also emphasized the need to include people with disabilities in cultural incentive notices, as a way of promoting greater equity in access to resources to promote the sector.

“Our intention is to change the world through culture. There’s a quote from Einstein that says that the mind, once expanded, is like a parachute: it doesn’t return to the same place. And culture brings this, it brings this break. And for people with disabilities, I also know that through culture it is a way to break paradigms. When they are there in dance, they are in the cinema, they are in other things, the attention ends up going to something other than the disability”, he emphasized.

At the end of the meeting, both parties agreed to begin a process of detailed evaluation of the opportunities identified and the formation of working groups with the aim of establishing bases for future cooperation. Reginaldo Freitas Júnior and Maryland Brito highlighted their mutual commitment to boosting cultural and educational development in the state, with a focus on the inclusion of people with disabilities in cultural activities.

“What anchors people with disabilities down is the limitation of social participation. The majority do not participate in leisure and cultural activities, do not go to the cinema, the theater, or leave the house. In fact, he leaves home for the health service and from the health service for home. I think our partnership can leverage this. We can have a culture agenda in Rio Grande do Norte that is absolutely based on inclusion”, projected Reginaldo.

About ISD

The Santos Dumont Institute (ISD) is a Social Organization linked to the Ministry of Education (MEC) and encompasses the Edmond and Lily Safra International Institute of Neuroscience and the Anita Garibaldi Health Education and Research Center, both in Macaíba. ISD’s mission is to promote education for life, forming citizens through integrated teaching, research and extension actions, in addition to contributing to a fairer and more humane transformation of Brazilian social reality.