Afonso Mendonça Reis: “In education, at this moment, I left pedagogy and cut back on bureaucracy”
Created in 2010, the Mentes Empreendedoras project – which was supposed to be called Mentes Fazedoras, but Afonso Mendonça Reis, the founder, considered it sounded “weird†– aims to promote a generation of citizens those of impact, leaders capable of transforming themselves and their community. It is a private non-profit organization that operates in the area of education and social entrepreneurship, whose mission is to create a generation of proactive, resilient citizens and with work in the community.
And how do they do it? Through a non-formal education process and overcoming experiences through project methodology that challenge secondary students to implement their own ideas: “Without carrots, without being like the greyhounds that walk running around, but working on your intrinsic motivation. Visualizing yourself being able to do things.â€
The proposal involves, through Mentes Empreendedoras clubs created in schools, generating a virtuous cycle that activates the potential social impact of young people, making them inspiring references in their community. Since 2015, they have felt the desire and need to include in their commitment to society the appreciation of teachers by students and the community itself, through “Inspira o teu Professor” and welcoming the international initiative, known as the Nobel Prize for education, the “Global Teacher Prize Portugal”, which recognizes the best teacher in the country.
The Mentes Empreendedoras project also promotes “Leadership Fellows”, a program for young university students, professionals and young executives with the spirit of change agents, in which, after training, they leave for the field where they accompany an Entrepreneurial Minds Club, supporting secondary school students to implement their ideas and develop their projects. “Leaders gang” is another project that is on the ground with the motto that we can all go as far as we can dream. No one should be limited by circumstances or starting point, that is, by having a less favorable socioeconomic condition.
Nuno Fox
Afonso Mendonça Reis says that he had to introduce a new dynamic focused on empathy – which was not a concern at the beginning, but they found that in some cases despite there being no conflicts, the When young people went to recess, they watched their cell phones and did not interact with each other. “We had the privilege of growing up in a world without the internet. She appeared in our lives early enough for us to take advantage of her, but we managed to keep her at a distance.†This new generation is different, so this was one of the new challenges for Entrepreneurial Minds.
Perhaps because he worked at the Aga Khan Foundation, where he had contact with the area of early childhood education, he highlights that the PRR should invest more in this aspect, as there are studies that prove that two or three years of access to quality early childhood education makes a difference. “That’s why California makes a huge investment in Head Start [um programa federal dirigido a crianças provenientes de famÃlias com baixos rendimentos]. Portugal should invest in daycare centers, guarantee their quality and a sufficient educator-child ratio,” he says, saying that they created an honorable mention for early childhood educators in the Global Teacher Prize.
Still on the topic of education, the founder of Mentes Empreendedoras says that it is essential to retain teachers and stabilize the teaching career, but guarantees that what he feels when interacting with schools is the amount of procedures completely crazy, who eat up time in an undersized school management structure, which is why he says: “Currently, in education, I left pedagogy and cut back on bureaucracy!â€
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Mario Henriques
