Paola Dama, a special testimonial for S.T.E.M. month at the Tito Lucrezio Caro School in Naples
10.04.2016 23:15
On March 30th Paola Dama, a Neapolitan researcher working at the Ohio State University (Columbus, U.S.A.), came to our School. She was a testimonial for the S.T.E.M. (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) month.
The Italian Education Ministry wanted to celebrate the S.T.E.M. month in order to make all Primary, 1st and 2nd Secondary Grade students aware of the fact that the study of scientific school subjects is very important.
Another very important detail in such cases is the elimination of gender gaps: girls are are often considered to be less inclined towards S.T.E.M.. That’s why only 38% of them study this kind of subjects.
Ms Dama came to our school to tell us about her experience as a researcher, about her passion for scientific research. “I’ve always had this passion, but it has been put aside in a drawer for a long time. However, I realized my dream just when it seemed that my future should be completely different”, she said.
After such consideration, we must say that our meeting with Ms Dama was a beautiful morning. Her sympathy and her professionalism let both boys and girls become interested in scientific research and curious to know it better.
The meeting was opened by a video about women, realized by one of our students, Sara Angela Palmieri. It described some old and contemporary scientists, including Ms Dama.
She told us about many things: her experience at University, her engagement in Telethon project for three years, her science plans for the protection of animals. But she talked especially about her love for Science, that she even popularized among young people in the discos!
Then she told us about her envolvement in Pandora Task Force, concerning the problem of the Italian Triangle of Death. Now Ms Dama is going to leave again Italy, because she’s going to start a new adventure in scientific research in Chicago.
We saw that our students’ faces showed feelings of amazement and admiration. They felt such feelings for this beautiful girl and simple-looking girl, a feather in the cap of Italian scientific research. We were very proud of this, because we wanted to make teenagers reflect and be aware of gender equality topics. After listening Ms Dama, we can say we have achieved our aim.
At the end of the morning, Ms Dama gave our students a present, a video entitled I have a dream. This video showed the most important moments of all the time she spent in research labs. It ends with a strong message of hope, Fight Cancer.
Dear Paola, we wish you to fight cancer with all our hearts!”
On Facebook Paola Dama said: "I started studying science because I have an innate curiosity to learn and know new things. I was not very ambitious; I had other expectations, reason why I did not follow a straight path. Today I am in a place doing a job that was my secret dream.
Young people need to feel the joy of growing up, of bettering themselves, using their own ways to reach their goals, not necessarily the ones pushed upon them by society and the media.
A researcher does not have a nine-to-five job, you do not go home and forget. A responsible researcher is the one that never forgets the project, not for ambition but for the project itself.My mother often tells me that I used to say “I would be a researcher even if I have to work for free”, and for a long time I did.
So, I feel very proud and delighted to be a testimonial to convey a passion for this field."
Thank you Paola!
