The core idea of the project is to create a modern Silk Road to strengthen the bonds between our countries and promote peace, innovation and international collaboration. We will achieve this via a common educational project, which will run at the same time, at schools in China, Pakistan and Greece (12-17 year old kids).
The ultimate aim of RADIIO is to face and mitigate two major social problems that are growing globally within our current societies: a) the belief about superior and inferior races resulting to stereotyping, discrimination and racism that can then lead to violence (even war), and b) the growing gap between scientific knowledge and achievements, and the main perception of them by society (pseudo-sciences, conspiracy theories).
The understanding of the world that surrounds us is not a copyright of a specific culture. It has been achieved using the global language of science and through an eternal relay race and intercultural exchange between different civilisations: from the pre-Islamic Arabs, Babylonians, Chinese, Korean, followed by the Greeks and Romans, and then by the Arabs during the Islamic golden age, the Renaissance Europe and finally to the worldwide modern astrophysics.
As radio astronomy experts, astrophysicists, and educators, we will leverage our expertise and international collaboration to address global challenges and fundamental gaps in school education that can perpetuate societal issues.
RADIIO targets school pupils and their teachers and uses radio astronomy as a tool, opening up for them a new window of knowledge and technological applications. It involves a) online seminars on the basics of astronomy, emphasising in radio astronomy, b) introducing basic techniques and methods in obtaining and analysing data via simple codes (Jupyter notebook), c) participating in the online citizen science project Radio Galaxy Zoo EMU, d) providing information and instructions to the students and their teachers on how to build a simple radio telescope using cheap, reusable and sustainable material, and use the telescope to observe the 21cm neutral hydrogen emission line of the Milky Way, e) in-person visits by the tutors to the schools to operate the radio telescope and record the observations, f) a report and presentation by the students and teachers about the radio telescope operation and observations.
RADIIO will be held in the official languages of the countries involved. At the end of the project, participants will present at an international online workshop, in English. This intercultural exchange, will firstly tackle the first problem, a make-believe cultural superiority. We will play the role of the “silk” transporters of knowledge and expertise, creating scientists of the future, thus tackling the second problem, inspiring and enabling the next generation with tools/skills and working towards preventing school dropouts. Finally, we will translate the reports to Braille, to increase inclusion and reduce inequalities.
