UC Education stands out in Fondecyt Initiation 2026 with six awarded projects

The initiatives, led by academics from the Faculty, address key issues for the Chilean education system, from early childhood education and teacher training to arts high schools and scientific and environmental literacy. 

During the last week of 2025, the Fondecyt Initiation 2026 Competition announced its results, in which the UC Faculty of Education stands out with six awarded projects in the assessment groups for Early Childhood Education and Higher Education. It is Natalia Candido, Philip Porflitt, Paul Torres, Elisa Calcagni, Pilar Álamos y Gonzalo Guerrero. 

This achievement explains Paola Sevilla, Director of Education Research at UC, is “the result of collaborative work developed in the Faculty, through mentoring, peer review and support workshops for project formulation, and reflects the high academic quality of our regular staff.”

Learn about the titles and objectives of their awarded research projects here: 

“Inform or transform?: The role of museums and science centers in Scientific Literacy”, Natalia Cândido (Principal Investigator). 

Its overall objective is to characterize the contribution of museums and science centers in Chile in the development of different visions of Scientific Literacy, in order to propose guiding criteria for the design of exhibitions and educational interactions with a focus on Vision III of Scientific Literacy.

Artistic High Schools in Chile: Creation, sensibilities and pedagogical meanings, Felipe Porflitt (Responsible Researcher). 

The project's general objective is to critically analyze the organizational, curricular, and pedagogical characteristics of art schools in Chile, understanding their educational meanings, the configuration of subjectivities of girls, boys, and young people, and their contributions to a critical pedagogy situated in the national school context.

JUGAAR Project: Guided Play or Self-Regulated Learning. Feasibility study for the implementation of playful and active pedagogies in the transition level of early childhood education in Chile, Pablo Torres (Principal Investigator). 

Its overall objective is to study the feasibility of implementing guided play and self-regulated learning at the transition level of early childhood education in Chile through its educators. 

"Intermediate leadership for teacher professional development: policies, enactment and professional agency from Local Public Education Services", Elisa Calcagni.

The project's overall objective is to understand the interpretations, implementation, and learning opportunities that the SLEPs generate within the framework of their role in promoting teacher professional development.

“Socialization of emotions in early childhood education: educational practices in pre-kindergarten and kindergarten”, Pilar Álamos. 

The overall objective of the project is to analyze the emotion socialization practices used by educators in preschool and kindergarten classrooms, including emotion modeling; explicit teaching about emotions; and responding to children's emotions.

Critical scientific and environmental literacy in education for sustainability, Gonzalo Guerrero (Principal Investigator). 

The project proposes to critically analyze how education for sustainability is incorporated into the curriculum, school practices, and teacher training in Chile, with the aim of proposing innovative pedagogical and training guidelines that articulate critical scientific literacy and critical environmental literacy.