Translator: Camila Carvalho Reviewer: Claudia Sander
Good evening.
Plateia: Good evening.
Duilia Mello: You’re tired, right?
Plateia: No.
DM: No? Ready there for the last and last.
Well, it was with great pleasure that I accepted the invitation to speak to you.
To end this wonderful day
in which people are reflecting
about the future of our beloved UFRJ.
You see, I said my love.
This will happen during the talk.
I’ll try to motivate you
to love our university more.
So the future
it is not written in the stars.
If the future had been written in the stars,
they would probably have invited an astrologer to speak here.
But I’m an astronomer.
I did astronomy
at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.
The message I have for you is super simple.
It’s a message of optimism.
It’s a transformative message.
I believe that everything we do in life is a product of our efforts.
It is the product of our struggle.
But it is also a product of courage
that sometimes we have to have to change.
I believe that UFRJ is going through
for this moment of courage.
If UFRJ does not pass
for this moment of courage to change,
she will not transform
in the university of our dreams,
in the university that we want to leave to the next generation.
Well, I’m a daughter of UFRJ, I’ve already told you that I studied here.
Just as I am the daughter of UFRJ,
thousands of people have already passed through UFRJ,
since its foundation.
We entered UFRJ soon after adolescence.
Many are still teenagers when they come in here.
And we are transformed into UFRJ.
We get out of adolescence, become an adult,
turn up professional within the UFRJ.
It’s those four, five years
sometimes six, sometimes even seven.
Years of dedication here at UFRJ.
They are transforming years in our lives.
So, UFRJ has this transforming role in our lives.
But UFRJ will be transformed by you.
For the generation that is here today.
By the students of UFRJ today, from now on.
I brought you some slides that I show you
my life, my history,
to tell everything in a context for you.
And also because TEDx asks us to do this.
So let me show you a photo.
of a teacher with several students.
This photo was taken in 1970
in a school not far from here,
in Bom Sucesso.
It was the college where I was literate.
Guess who’s in this photo? I.
Look, it’s very easy to find Duilia when there’s a teacher in the picture.
Duilia is always on the teacher’s side.
I’ve always been very attached to my teachers,
I loved teacher.
I still love teaching.
I’m a teacher.
Here I am on the side of Dona Lucília,
the teacher.
Who has not seen me yet, I’m that little girl
on the side of Dona Lucília.
This one.
Why do I like teachers?
Because I’m attached to the teacher,
And why am I saying this to you?
I say this because I think this is one of the pillars of UFRJ’s transformation.
We need to get more attached to teachers.
And teachers need to become more attached to students.
I would like to remind you that teachers
are teaching a generation that is different from their generation.
And teachers need to modernize
and speak the language of the student.
We have to remember that most of you are from the millennium generation.
It is the generation of Google, Wikipedia, Whatsapp, is the TED generation.
This is the generation of immediate response
to the question that is not even in your head.
The student e-mails us …
E-mail not, that nowadays email is old thing.
But he ends up talking to the teacher with the old method, which is e-mail.
He asks a question at 2 am on a Sunday, wanting the answer;
because it is connected 100% of the time, 24 hours a day.
And the teacher is not.
The teacher is not using the student’s communication method.
So these methods of communication
are very important to modernize UFRJ.
I think this is one of the pillars of UFRJ’s change:
a more modern communication between teacher and student.
I brought this photo there for you,
many of you must have seen this movie, those who did not see it, see.
It’s a picture from the movie “Society of Dead Poets”.
It’s a great movie,
with the late Robin Williams,
And he gives a show in this movie.
with the interpretation of a teacher.
This teacher that Robin Williams plays
is a teacher captain.
He is a leading teacher,
he is an exemplary teacher.
These teachers exist here at UFRJ,
they were my teachers too.
And many, there is already a new generation of these teachers.
I would like to ask you, the students of UFRJ,
identify these teachers;
to admire these teachers;
that were in the rooms of these teachers
and talk to them.
Try to find out what the life of these teachers is like.
I’d like to ask you to stick with these teachers.
This is important because it makes everyone grow together.
The teacher captain is a mentor teacher.
I am a mentor … in fact, there are some of my pupils here in the audience.
I am mentoring many students who were not my students,
but who are looking for me on the internet.
If you did not look for me, you could look for me.
I do a mentoring program,
trying to show you what it is, for example, to be a scientist.
Search, talk to your teachers.
Find out why he is a professor at UFRJ.
And why is this important?
Because UFRJ is a treasure trove of people,
and you must discover this treasure.
But it’s a “two-way street”.
It is not only the teacher-student,
is also the student-teacher.
So the teacher has to be open to the student,
and the student has to be open to the teacher.
Good, and then I ask you
that wear the UFRJ shirt.
This is superimportant.
Be proud of UFRJ.
One of the first teachers to give a lecture today,
who paid the monkey here, cried, right?
(Laughs)
I said I was not going to cry.
He told us that the URFJ is a gift.
Actually, UFRJ is a gift.
I consider URFJ a gift in my life.
And that’s why I’m very proud to be here today talking to you.
Wear the UFRJ shirt.
Be proud of UFRJ.
And when you finish the URFJ,
return to UFRJ.
When you are successful people,
return to UFRJ.
Come here and help UFRJ to always grow.
Recall that the growth of the URFJ
It’s important for each one of you.
After all, you have UFRJ on your CVs.
Then, the growth of UFRJ,
make you grow as well.
Be proud of UFRJ,
Come back here whenever you can.
Keep wearing the UFRJ shirt.
Well, I told you that the generation today,
with which today’s teachers are dealing,
is a generation different from my generation.
So if I were a teacher here at UFRJ,
I’d teach your generation to you.
But what was it like when I was your age?
Well, I was a nerd girl,
which at the time we called “CDF”.
I was the “nerd” girl, and I loved science fiction.
Then there are the scientific fictions of the time, of the time.
It has “Star Trek”, “Star Wars”,
“Star Trek”, “Lost in Space”,
has the “Cosmos” with Carl Sagan, which is not fiction, but that is a great show on TV.
And I put here a little piece of an old notebook that I had,
which showed three of my passions of that time.
I should have been about 15 years old.
I wrote this in all my notebooks.
On the back cover of my notebooks.
They were three of my passions.
I do not know if it’s giving everyone a clear view of what’s written.
I wrote: “Flamengo, the best team in the world”.
(Applause)
That’s it people, remember that I was literate in 1970?
So I was six years old in 1970, so back then, I’m talking about the ’70s.
The 70’s was the time when Flamengo was three times three times champion.
Time of tri-tri.
So Flamengo was very important in my life.
Another thing that was very important in my life,
the greatest rocker of all time:
Peter Frampton.
(Laughs)
If you have never heard of Peter Frampton, please,
when they get home, homework,
Google and Youtube: Peter Frampton.
You’re going to fall in love, like I was when I was 15.
And I had another passion.
My other passion was a spaceship.
A space probe that NASA had been sending through the solar system,
which was called Pioneer 11.
Ever heard of a girl who had her favorite spaceship?
(Laughs)
It was not, it was just me.
(Laughs)
So this passion I had for space science, for astronomy,
it was something that had come from when I was a teenager.
So what did I do?
I told my mother I wanted to do astronomy.
Here are the discoveries of Pioneer that motivated me to take this attitude,
that I would do astronomy;
I wanted to one day participate in discoveries like these.
Well, I told my mother I wanted to do astronomy.
Then my mother said, “Astro what?”
(Laughs)
I’m from a simple middle-class family,
We lived in the suburbs of Rio.
Neither my father nor my mother went to college.
We were like this … money was short.
My three brothers had already entered college with much sacrifice.
I was the last to enter university.
And my mother was very worried about my future,
because she thought I was going to starve
making it she did not know what it meant.
Then she had a brilliant idea.
She took me to the Valongo observatory at UFRJ.
Well, we used to live in the Rio suburb of Brás de Pina.
Have you heard?
We lived in Brás de Pina.
Get out of Brás de Pina, Baíra street, my mother and I, I was 16 years old.
My mother and I went there in the center of town.
She did not come here in the university town because she knew,
I do not know how I did not have Google,
that astronomy was there in the center of the city,
in the Valongo observatory.
Then we took the bus to Brás de Pina.
In 1h45min we arrived in the center of the city.
It is the old center of Rio de Janeiro.
If you have never been to the Valongo observatory, I recommend it.
It is a magnificent place, a beautiful place,
which is in the middle of the favela, in the center of Rio de Janeiro,
in the hill of Providência, neighborhood of Health.
Well, it was hot,
we climbed that famous slope of Valongo, the slope of Pedro Antônio,
and more or less in the middle of the slope my mother began to regret
of that wonderful idea that she had to take me on the hill of Valongo.
Then we got up there.
When we got up there,
had some students and some teachers.
We talked to some of them,
and the students took us to know the atomic clock.
The atomic clock was transformative in my life.
When I saw the atomic clock, I was 16, I kept my mouth open,
because it sounded like science fiction.
Nowadays if you see, you would die of laughing,
because it’s just a box with little pines, there’s nothing more.
But that was absolutely fantastic for me.
It was the most accurate time in Brazil.
There was cesium in there, a radioactive chemical element.
Have you thought?
So I thought that was great.
Well, we’re gone.
Down the hill, my mother,
who was with his foot on the ground, and I in the clouds,
turned to me and said, “My daughter, is this really what you want to do?”
I said, “Yeah, was not it wonderful?”
She said, “You’re crazy!”
(Laughs)
I said, “I’m not crazy, I love it!”
She said, “But where are you going to get a job later?”
The answer I gave my mother is a revealing answer.
I told my mother the following:
“Ué, UFRJ professors are not astronomers
and are not employed?
Why can not I be a teacher at UFRJ? “
Then the card fell.
Then my mother let me do an astronomy exam.
I did, and here in this photo, it’s a 1981 photo taken at CCMN,
where we were all hairy.
(Laughs)
There are two people here.
which are present in the auditorium.
Here it is in the CCMN, here it is in Physics, in block A.
There are also some people here who are not present,
but are still linked to UFRJ.
It is of the Physics course, because those who do Astronomy have to do physics;
have to do physics, do math, do all the subjects here in Fundão,
then do astronomy there in Valongo.
Well, what I said to you,
that I told my mother
that the teacher is a scientist,
is a superimportant thing, that I think we teachers are guilty
of not revealing this more to society.
We need to talk about this more.
You guys please say this to everyone.
Because today there is a prejudice against the teacher.
When you say, “Do you want to be a scientist?
You will then work at the university and be a teacher. “
It’s like you’ve thrown a cold water bath
in that child, in that young man.
“Professor, no way, I do not want this at all.
I want to be a scientist, but I do not want to be a teacher. “
The teacher is a scientist,
and the scientist is a teacher.
This is something that we need to clarify more to society.
The teacher is a specialist.
The teacher is an intellectual.
The teacher is a thinker.
The teacher is the soul of society.
A society that forgets this
it is a society that does not deserve to grow.
I wish you would think about it.
and I would like to ask all of you
that helped in this campaign of appreciation of the teacher.
(Applause)
Then I traveled in the mayonnaise.
Time is passing fast.
But I’m the last, so I do not give a damn if time goes by a lot.
(Laughs)
My future university is this.
It is the UFRJ of the future.
It’s a university connected to the media.
It is a university connected to the industry.
It is an internationalized university.
It is an university concerned about the environment.
The environment is very important, we live inside the Maré Complex.
We need to remember that.
We have to change the university.
I would like to remember the university with the smell of sea air and not sewage.
How can we train future biologists next to this smelly bay?
How can we train future engineers in buildings that are falling?
How can we have a hospital next to an abandoned building?
We must have attachment to UFRJ.
Without attachment, it will not change, it will not change.
We need to have attachment to the neighbors, this is a photo taken in Networks of the Tide.
We have to go there.
We need to have the courage to go there, right there at Maré.
To be transformed is necessary to have courage, it is necessary to take the risk.
Let’s all go to Maré, let’s all bring the children from Maré to UFRJ.
And we have to go there.
And just so we will write the name of URFJ in the stars.
Thank you.
(Applause)
Good evening.
Plateia: Good evening.
Duilia Mello: You’re tired, right?
Plateia: No.
DM: No? Ready there for the last and last.
Well, it was with great pleasure that I accepted the invitation to speak to you.
To end this wonderful day
in which people are reflecting
about the future of our beloved UFRJ.
You see, I said my love.
This will happen during the talk.
I’ll try to motivate you
to love our university more.
So the future
it is not written in the stars.
If the future had been written in the stars,
they would probably have invited an astrologer to speak here.
But I’m an astronomer.
I did astronomy
at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.
The message I have for you is super simple.
It’s a message of optimism.
It’s a transformative message.
I believe that everything we do in life is a product of our efforts.
It is the product of our struggle.
But it is also a product of courage
that sometimes we have to have to change.
I believe that UFRJ is going through
for this moment of courage.
If UFRJ does not pass
for this moment of courage to change,
she will not transform
in the university of our dreams,
in the university that we want to leave to the next generation.
Well, I’m a daughter of UFRJ, I’ve already told you that I studied here.
Just as I am the daughter of UFRJ,
thousands of people have already passed through UFRJ,
since its foundation.
We entered UFRJ soon after adolescence.
Many are still teenagers when they come in here.
And we are transformed into UFRJ.
We get out of adolescence, become an adult,
turn up professional within the UFRJ.
It’s those four, five years
sometimes six, sometimes even seven.
Years of dedication here at UFRJ.
They are transforming years in our lives.
So, UFRJ has this transforming role in our lives.
But UFRJ will be transformed by you.
For the generation that is here today.
By the students of UFRJ today, from now on.
I brought you some slides that I show you
my life, my history,
to tell everything in a context for you.
And also because TEDx asks us to do this.
So let me show you a photo.
of a teacher with several students.
This photo was taken in 1970
in a school not far from here,
in Bom Sucesso.
It was the college where I was literate.
Guess who’s in this photo? I.
Look, it’s very easy to find Duilia when there’s a teacher in the picture.
Duilia is always on the teacher’s side.
I’ve always been very attached to my teachers,
I loved teacher.
I still love teaching.
I’m a teacher.
Here I am on the side of Dona Lucília,
the teacher.
Who has not seen me yet, I’m that little girl
on the side of Dona Lucília.
This one.
Why do I like teachers?
Because I’m attached to the teacher,
And why am I saying this to you?
I say this because I think this is one of the pillars of UFRJ’s transformation.
We need to get more attached to teachers.
And teachers need to become more attached to students.
I would like to remind you that teachers
are teaching a generation that is different from their generation.
And teachers need to modernize
and speak the language of the student.
We have to remember that most of you are from the millennium generation.
It is the generation of Google, Wikipedia, Whatsapp, is the TED generation.
This is the generation of immediate response
to the question that is not even in your head.
The student e-mails us …
E-mail not, that nowadays email is old thing.
But he ends up talking to the teacher with the old method, which is e-mail.
He asks a question at 2 am on a Sunday, wanting the answer;
because it is connected 100% of the time, 24 hours a day.
And the teacher is not.
The teacher is not using the student’s communication method.
So these methods of communication
are very important to modernize UFRJ.
I think this is one of the pillars of UFRJ’s change:
a more modern communication between teacher and student.
I brought this photo there for you,
many of you must have seen this movie, those who did not see it, see.
It’s a picture from the movie “Society of Dead Poets”.
It’s a great movie,
with the late Robin Williams,
And he gives a show in this movie.
with the interpretation of a teacher.
This teacher that Robin Williams plays
is a teacher captain.
He is a leading teacher,
he is an exemplary teacher.
These teachers exist here at UFRJ,
they were my teachers too.
And many, there is already a new generation of these teachers.
I would like to ask you, the students of UFRJ,
identify these teachers;
to admire these teachers;
that were in the rooms of these teachers
and talk to them.
Try to find out what the life of these teachers is like.
I’d like to ask you to stick with these teachers.
This is important because it makes everyone grow together.
The teacher captain is a mentor teacher.
I am a mentor … in fact, there are some of my pupils here in the audience.
I am mentoring many students who were not my students,
but who are looking for me on the internet.
If you did not look for me, you could look for me.
I do a mentoring program,
trying to show you what it is, for example, to be a scientist.
Search, talk to your teachers.
Find out why he is a professor at UFRJ.
And why is this important?
Because UFRJ is a treasure trove of people,
and you must discover this treasure.
But it’s a “two-way street”.
It is not only the teacher-student,
is also the student-teacher.
So the teacher has to be open to the student,
and the student has to be open to the teacher.
Good, and then I ask you
that wear the UFRJ shirt.
This is superimportant.
Be proud of UFRJ.
One of the first teachers to give a lecture today,
who paid the monkey here, cried, right?
(Laughs)
I said I was not going to cry.
He told us that the URFJ is a gift.
Actually, UFRJ is a gift.
I consider URFJ a gift in my life.
And that’s why I’m very proud to be here today talking to you.
Wear the UFRJ shirt.
Be proud of UFRJ.
And when you finish the URFJ,
return to UFRJ.
When you are successful people,
return to UFRJ.
Come here and help UFRJ to always grow.
Recall that the growth of the URFJ
It’s important for each one of you.
After all, you have UFRJ on your CVs.
Then, the growth of UFRJ,
make you grow as well.
Be proud of UFRJ,
Come back here whenever you can.
Keep wearing the UFRJ shirt.
Well, I told you that the generation today,
with which today’s teachers are dealing,
is a generation different from my generation.
So if I were a teacher here at UFRJ,
I’d teach your generation to you.
But what was it like when I was your age?
Well, I was a nerd girl,
which at the time we called “CDF”.
I was the “nerd” girl, and I loved science fiction.
Then there are the scientific fictions of the time, of the time.
It has “Star Trek”, “Star Wars”,
“Star Trek”, “Lost in Space”,
has the “Cosmos” with Carl Sagan, which is not fiction, but that is a great show on TV.
And I put here a little piece of an old notebook that I had,
which showed three of my passions of that time.
I should have been about 15 years old.
I wrote this in all my notebooks.
On the back cover of my notebooks.
They were three of my passions.
I do not know if it’s giving everyone a clear view of what’s written.
I wrote: “Flamengo, the best team in the world”.
(Applause)
That’s it people, remember that I was literate in 1970?
So I was six years old in 1970, so back then, I’m talking about the ’70s.
The 70’s was the time when Flamengo was three times three times champion.
Time of tri-tri.
So Flamengo was very important in my life.
Another thing that was very important in my life,
the greatest rocker of all time:
Peter Frampton.
(Laughs)
If you have never heard of Peter Frampton, please,
when they get home, homework,
Google and Youtube: Peter Frampton.
You’re going to fall in love, like I was when I was 15.
And I had another passion.
My other passion was a spaceship.
A space probe that NASA had been sending through the solar system,
which was called Pioneer 11.
Ever heard of a girl who had her favorite spaceship?
(Laughs)
It was not, it was just me.
(Laughs)
So this passion I had for space science, for astronomy,
it was something that had come from when I was a teenager.
So what did I do?
I told my mother I wanted to do astronomy.
Here are the discoveries of Pioneer that motivated me to take this attitude,
that I would do astronomy;
I wanted to one day participate in discoveries like these.
Well, I told my mother I wanted to do astronomy.
Then my mother said, “Astro what?”
(Laughs)
I’m from a simple middle-class family,
We lived in the suburbs of Rio.
Neither my father nor my mother went to college.
We were like this … money was short.
My three brothers had already entered college with much sacrifice.
I was the last to enter university.
And my mother was very worried about my future,
because she thought I was going to starve
making it she did not know what it meant.
Then she had a brilliant idea.
She took me to the Valongo observatory at UFRJ.
Well, we used to live in the Rio suburb of Brás de Pina.
Have you heard?
We lived in Brás de Pina.
Get out of Brás de Pina, Baíra street, my mother and I, I was 16 years old.
My mother and I went there in the center of town.
She did not come here in the university town because she knew,
I do not know how I did not have Google,
that astronomy was there in the center of the city,
in the Valongo observatory.
Then we took the bus to Brás de Pina.
In 1h45min we arrived in the center of the city.
It is the old center of Rio de Janeiro.
If you have never been to the Valongo observatory, I recommend it.
It is a magnificent place, a beautiful place,
which is in the middle of the favela, in the center of Rio de Janeiro,
in the hill of Providência, neighborhood of Health.
Well, it was hot,
we climbed that famous slope of Valongo, the slope of Pedro Antônio,
and more or less in the middle of the slope my mother began to regret
of that wonderful idea that she had to take me on the hill of Valongo.
Then we got up there.
When we got up there,
had some students and some teachers.
We talked to some of them,
and the students took us to know the atomic clock.
The atomic clock was transformative in my life.
When I saw the atomic clock, I was 16, I kept my mouth open,
because it sounded like science fiction.
Nowadays if you see, you would die of laughing,
because it’s just a box with little pines, there’s nothing more.
But that was absolutely fantastic for me.
It was the most accurate time in Brazil.
There was cesium in there, a radioactive chemical element.
Have you thought?
So I thought that was great.
Well, we’re gone.
Down the hill, my mother,
who was with his foot on the ground, and I in the clouds,
turned to me and said, “My daughter, is this really what you want to do?”
I said, “Yeah, was not it wonderful?”
She said, “You’re crazy!”
(Laughs)
I said, “I’m not crazy, I love it!”
She said, “But where are you going to get a job later?”
The answer I gave my mother is a revealing answer.
I told my mother the following:
“Ué, UFRJ professors are not astronomers
and are not employed?
Why can not I be a teacher at UFRJ? “
Then the card fell.
Then my mother let me do an astronomy exam.
I did, and here in this photo, it’s a 1981 photo taken at CCMN,
where we were all hairy.
(Laughs)
There are two people here.
which are present in the auditorium.
Here it is in the CCMN, here it is in Physics, in block A.
There are also some people here who are not present,
but are still linked to UFRJ.
It is of the Physics course, because those who do Astronomy have to do physics;
have to do physics, do math, do all the subjects here in Fundão,
then do astronomy there in Valongo.
Well, what I said to you,
that I told my mother
that the teacher is a scientist,
is a superimportant thing, that I think we teachers are guilty
of not revealing this more to society.
We need to talk about this more.
You guys please say this to everyone.
Because today there is a prejudice against the teacher.
When you say, “Do you want to be a scientist?
You will then work at the university and be a teacher. “
It’s like you’ve thrown a cold water bath
in that child, in that young man.
“Professor, no way, I do not want this at all.
I want to be a scientist, but I do not want to be a teacher. “
The teacher is a scientist,
and the scientist is a teacher.
This is something that we need to clarify more to society.
The teacher is a specialist.
The teacher is an intellectual.
The teacher is a thinker.
The teacher is the soul of society.
A society that forgets this
it is a society that does not deserve to grow.
I wish you would think about it.
and I would like to ask all of you
that helped in this campaign of appreciation of the teacher.
(Applause)
Then I traveled in the mayonnaise.
Time is passing fast.
But I’m the last, so I do not give a damn if time goes by a lot.
(Laughs)
My future university is this.
It is the UFRJ of the future.
It’s a university connected to the media.
It is a university connected to the industry.
It is an internationalized university.
It is an university concerned about the environment.
The environment is very important, we live inside the Maré Complex.
We need to remember that.
We have to change the university.
I would like to remember the university with the smell of sea air and not sewage.
How can we train future biologists next to this smelly bay?
How can we train future engineers in buildings that are falling?
How can we have a hospital next to an abandoned building?
We must have attachment to UFRJ.
Without attachment, it will not change, it will not change.
We need to have attachment to the neighbors, this is a photo taken in Networks of the Tide.
We have to go there.
We need to have the courage to go there, right there at Maré.
To be transformed is necessary to have courage, it is necessary to take the risk.
Let’s all go to Maré, let’s all bring the children from Maré to UFRJ.
And we have to go there.
And just so we will write the name of URFJ in the stars.
Thank you.
(Applause)
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