In April 2023, we received an email from Gilson dos Santos Croscato, a Rotarian in the Rotary Club of Goioerê, District 4630, Brazil, who learned about our Microscopes in Schools project via an article in the March 2023 edition of Rotary Brasil.
In April 2023, we received an email from Gilson dos Santos Croscato, a Rotarian in the Rotary Club of Goioerê, District 4630, Brazil, who learned about our Microscopes in Schools project via an article in the March 2023 edition of Rotary Brasil.
As a Higher Education Professor in Textile Engineering in the state University, Gilson saw the great potential in the project, and asked if we could help with a class set of 30 microscopes for Grade 6 students there in Goioerê.
We readily agreed to donate a set, and investigated how best to get the microscopes to Brazil from Australia. The cost of shipping them was prohibitive, but a solution was eventually found, with a Rotarian from the USA, PP Elizabeth “Buff” Wright, visiting our club in early June after the Rotary Convention in Melbourne and willing to carry the microscopes to the USA, to be shipped from there. We provided Buff with funds to cover the cost of shipping. She sent the microscopes from the USA on June 23rd.
We received the good news that the microscopes had made it safely to the Rotarians in Brazil on 11th July 2023. Rotarian Gilson has been busy presenting about the project, including to other professors at the state university; his club members are very excited and have been testing out the microscopes.
An article “Rotary Club receives microscopes from Australia for project in Goioerê” was published (in Portuguese) on Goio News on 14th July 2023.
Interestingly, the city of Goioerê, from which the Rotary Club of Goioerê takes its name, means “Clear Waters” – very close to our own club name, Freshwater Bay. We look forward to continuing to work with this club and hearing how the microscopes are used by the local students.