Science in the classroom

This is the project "Breakin' Science", the Public Engagement initiative conceived by UniSR in collaboration with IRCCS Ospedale San Raffaele, which offers the secondary schools in the Milan area several activities to experience firsthand the world of research: DNA extraction, electrophoresis, viewing of cells and tissues under the microscope.

Laboratory experiences and direct encounters with researchers are essential for understanding science, which before being a body of knowledge is also a way of thinking and looking at the world.

UniSR has always been convinced that communication, engagement, and education in life sciences aimed at an audience of "non-experts" represent a meaningful and constructive interaction that provides opportunities for mutual learning between scientists and members of the public. For this reason, UniSR students, alongside their academic career on campus, participate in a multitude of events aimed at promoting a culture of health and prevention within society and the territory.

For the 2024 edition of Breakin' Science, UniSR involved the brilliant students from the Bachelor’s Degree in Biotechnology Research in Medicine and the Master's Degree in Biotechnology and Medical Biology, who conducted the activities with expertise and passion.

Moments of dialogue and interaction with a "non-expert" audience, especially when so young, enrich researchers, helping them to collect new ideas and points of view, improve their communication skills, and making them relive the enthusiasm to approach science for the first time. A challenging experience, which our students welcomed with enthusiasm:

Breakin' Science was a unique opportunity to tell and show the new generations what we researchers love to do. This experience has put us researchers in front of a quite unusual challenge and for this very stimulating: to explain the complexity of what we do using simple words that could captivate our audience,

says Bianca Nesti, I year BMB.

Letizia Morelli, II year BMB, adds:

It was the first opportunity to make scientific popularization to an audience other than colleagues and professors, thus trying to adapt a "technical" language for an audience of non-experts: not a simple challenge! I especially appreciated the opportunity to have been able to bring science closer and make it more concrete, which very often at that age is studied only in books and seems such an abstract and distant matter. It is definitely an experience to repeat!

Edoardo Lissoni, II year BMB, concludes:

The opportunities like this that UniSR allows us students to experience are an excellent addition to our academic career, and fuel our passion for science.

Are you curious to learn more or interested in taking part in Breakin' Science? Send us an email at: divulgazione@hsr.it