The ICGEB partnered in the ‘VIVA MARGA’ competition for schools, focusing on the figure of astrophysicist and scientific disseminator Margherita Hack, ten years after her death.
On 28 May 2024, the award ceremony of the “VIVA MARGA” competition for schools was held at the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region in Trieste, with ICGEB as scientific partner.
Over 700 students and 40 teachers from 21 secondary schools in Florence, Trieste and cities abroad where Italian is taught (Graz, Koper, Bratislava, Sremski Karlovci, Belgrade, Banja Luka, Sarajevo, Còriza) took part in the competition, organised by the Trieste-based cultural volunteer organisation “Radici&Futuro”, in partnership with 12 scientific institutions from Trieste and Florence. More than 70 entries freely inspired by the life and work of Margherita Hack were produced by the students during the 2023-24 school year.
Dr. Iris Bertani from the ICGEB Bacteriology Lab evaluated the numerous entries and awarded the first prize for foreign schools in the Multimedia category to the students and teacher Jasmina Kovačević from the Sremski Karlovci Philological High School in Serbia for the entry ‘MARGHERITA’, containing video and original music.
By participating in this competition, the ICGEB wishes to contribute to honouring the figure of Margherita Hack, as an exceptional scientist and passionate science disseminator, the first woman to be awarded a university professorship to teach astrophysics, as well as a multifaceted person who loved sports, children and animals – as an inspiration to current and future generations of women in science.
