18/07/2018

Talents are hidden in Brazil's poverty.

Reproduction of Marcelo Viana's column in Folha de S. Paulo.

Since graduating high school in 2016, Rodrigo do Nascimento, 19, has already had four jobs. In his most recent one, he worked 12 hours a day in a small market, without a formal employment contract, with only one day off. During that time, he completed a technical course in administration and started another in computer science.

A resident of the rural town of Capela do Alto, in São Paulo, Rodrigo is a six-time champion of the Brazilian Mathematics Olympiad for Public Schools (OBMEP) and has a dream: to study mechanical engineering at the Federal University of São Carlos. Poverty stands in his way.

“I had to stop everything to work, but I want to be someone. My family doesn't have a college degree, my mother always worked cleaning houses, my father is a caretaker and earns very little. I want to move to a bigger city, with more opportunities,” says Rodrigo.

Geovana Sousa, 14, lives with her grandmother and two siblings in the small district of Jordão, in Sobral, Ceará. Her mother, Maria Telma, is a domestic worker and sleeps at her workplace. A gold and bronze medalist in the Brazilian Mathematical Olympiad (OBMEP) and a silver medalist in the Astronomy Olympiad, Geovana dreams of becoming an engineer, a field traditionally dominated by men.

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