The success of the Open Schools for Open Societies initiative has been verified at the last project meeting of the OSOS consortium in the Pavilhao Do Conhecimento in Lisbon. Two days of intense inspection of all project indicators and achievements, inspiring discussions on planning for the future and how our OSOS findings can be translated into concrete educational policies in Europe, dominated the event in a celebratory atmosphere.
It has been a long, but extremely rewarding 3-year journey into the exciting and often unexplored world of school openness through a unique student-led responsible research and innovation (RRI) approach to science education and beyond. This is a type of educational innovation that is addressing real societal challenges and is cultivating stimulating synergies with museums, local governments, industries, parents, science centres, something that would have been unimaginable a few years ago.
The OSOS partners, the 1100+ schools, the 2100+ teachers, the 80.000+ students and everyone involved in this one-of-its-kind experiment consider these final steps in this endeavor not to be the end of the road, but merely the end of the beginning!
