The role of Science Without Borders in Social Inclusion

Intersectional Analysis of the profile of program’s beneficiaries at Unicamp

Abstract

In recent years, there has been a democratization of access to public universities in the country, allowing the appearance of new student profiles in the university environment. Access to the university by members of the lower classes was an important step towards overcoming social inequalities. However, internal differences between students of upper and lower socioeconomic classes still persist, reflecting the inequalities in the broader society. This article focuses on the role of the Science Without Borders (SWB) program in the social inclusion of undergraduate students (former scholarship holders) from Unicamp, based on the application of a methodology that identified the intersectional profile of the program's beneficiaries. The results indicate that, although SWB offers mechanisms that allow social inclusion, the main beneficiaries had a very specific student profile - male, white, previous attendees of private high schools, not PAAIS entrants and without special needs. This is precisely the most frequent student profile  in the conventional international mobility programs maintained by Unicamp. Such results reinforce the idea that overcoming social inequalities and marginality for this new profile of students does not end with access to university, and that are other obstacles need to be removed.