With a funding of 775,000 EUR from the Botnar Foundation, Cluj Cultural Centre will establish a STEAM education resource centre in Cluj-Napoca. STEAM education is a learning approach that combines Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Mathematics to encourage critical thinking, curiosity and dialogue.
Learning Qub will host a STEAM club for students, interactive exhibitions, a physical and digital library with educational resources to improve the school curriculum, as well as innovative formats for teachers\’ professional development and student involvement.
The space is still in the design stage, and will be opened at the end of 2021 in a location in the center of Cluj.
The project coordinators, Cristina Rogoz, manager of the Art’n Play cultural education project, and Miruna Amza, manager of the Quantum science education program, stressed that there is currently a growing need for collaboration between schools, civil society, business and universities.
Learning Qub will develop this type of collaboration model by connecting the pre-university system with citizens, artists, researchers, institutions and companies and will propose and test innovative solutions to the challenges of the educational system.
In the first three years of the project over 100 teachers, facilitators and artists will provide hands-on activities using cutting-edge educational resources, while STEAM clubs will encourage children and their families to design and implement practical ideas to solve various contemporary challenges.
Cluj Cultural Centre already has experience in developing cultural and scientific educational programs, after having carried out in recent years the Art’n Play and Quantum programs in ten pilot schools in Cluj-Napoca. Around these ten schools, the Cluj Cultural Centre will establish, in partnership with the County School Inspectorate, the Cluj-Napoca City Hall and the C-EDU Education Cluster, the Cluj School Network (CSN) with 30 member schools that will develop their capacity to adopt educational practices from outside the current school system.
