Análise do entendimento da Educação Ambiental a partir das diretrizes curriculares nacionais, Resolução 02/2012 CNE/CP, e sua aplicação nos cursos de graduação em Química da Universidade Federal de Uberlândia

Abstract

This work comprehend a study about how the Resolution 02/2012 - CNE/CP, that establish national curriculum guidelines for Environmental Education, is being contemplated in Chemistry Courses in the Universidade Federal de Uberlândia (UFU). The methodological analysis was qualitative, and the instruments to collect data were interviews and questionnaires applied to undergraduate chemistry courses coordinators, professors and laboratory technicians. The principal research goals investigated whether the course coordinators, professors and laboratory technicians know about the Resolution 02/2012, and what actions they did to attend what this document establish. Moreover, it was asked if the waste production during the laboratory chemistry classes was used as a way to address the environmental education theme with students. Additionally, it was investigated how the research participants understand the relationship of these residues with the quality of the local environment. In this sense, the investigations began interviewing chemistry courses’ coordinators from Industrial Chemistry and Bachelor of Chemistry of the UFU, on the two campuses. After analyzed the answers of coordinators’ interviews, the questionnaires was applied to professors who taught chemistry undergraduate courses in 2013 and 2014. The courses were General Chemistry, General and Inorganic Chemistry, General and Inorganic Chemistry Experimental, Introduction to Chemistry 1, Fundamental Chemistry 1, Experimental Chemistry 1, General and Analytical Chemistry, Solution Chemistry, General Chemistry and Analytical Chemistry and Basic. Finally, the results obtained by analysis of the professors’ responses; it was prepared another questionnaire that was answered by technicians responsible for teaching laboratories. The results from the coordinators’ interviews as well as the questionnaires’ responses from professors and technicians indicated that, although most coordinators, professors and technicians of teaching laboratories know the Resolution 02/2012 - CNE/CP, the environmental education issue is also addressed in simplistic way form, and does not include approaches by the Resolution. Professors, technicians and coordinators recognize that the waste from the practical classes can contaminate water and soil. Nevertheless, students are not encouraged to separate, treat and properly dispose of hazardous waste. Thus, everyone loses the opportunity to experience, reflect and discuss the related aspects of this real, interdisciplinary, and appropriate issue for undergraduates of chemistry courses.