The Salvador Regional Conference, held last September in the capital of Bahia, fully achieved the goal of Bett Educar’s new initiative: to bring together education leaders and experts to bring to other states an event similar to the one held annually in São Paulo, but focused on regional needs and contexts. To that end, in Salvador, Bett Educar presented experiences, case studies, innovations, and educational trends, and engaged in a multifaceted discussion of the key issues shaping education in Brazil and around the world.

At the event in Salvador, teaching and learning through active methodologies was the topic presented by professor and writer Lilian Bacich, founder of Tríade Educacional. She emphasized that schools are much more connected today and, therefore, their role should not be limited to merely transmitting knowledge; rather, it is essential to help students engage with that knowledge. For Lilian, what used to be the primary function of schools is no longer viable, and therefore the skills that need to be developed today are much more complex, since information is at our fingertips. Education must be personalized for people who are not all the same, and for this reason, teaching itself should not be delivered in the same way to everyone.

Another topic that sparked the participants’ interest was “The Teacher of 2030,” a lecture by Professor Angelo Battistini, who holds a Ph.D. in Engineering from Poli-USP. According to the educator, the challenge is that, since this teacher does not yet exist, we must prepare for this imminent need that is already knocking at our door, given that the 21st-century schoolteacher will have to adapt to the increasingly rapid changes occurring primarily outside the school environment.

Following the same line of reasoning, Professor Renato Casagrande, director of Alleanza Brasil Educação, addressed one of the aspects that most deserves the attention of 21st-century educators, broadening the discussion to include school administration. In his lecture, Casagrande highlighted the development of school administrators in eight fundamental roles within educational management and the dilemmas that education professionals face today, regardless of the sector in which they work. According to him, school administrators must be flexible enough to handle change, manage daily conflicts, and know how to lead other educational stakeholders within their schools.

Managing conflicts is also a challenge for teachers. On this topic, Fabiola Falh, the national education manager at Escola da Inteligência and pedagogical coordinator, addressed the issue of social-emotional skills for 21st-century teachers, emphasizing the pitfalls of the “mante” mindset, feelings of helplessness, lack of recognition, and fear of social disapproval and making mistakes—key issues that need to be rethought and addressed by and with educators.

Francila Novaes, a specialist in political psychology from USP, a teacher of social-emotional learning, and a developer of social-emotional learning curricula and teaching materials at Pleno, spoke about empathy as an essential skill to be developed in basic education by teachers and students, and its inclusion in the BNCC.

Technologies

Rethinking and relearning education through the integration of technology and innovation in schools was the topic of a lecture on computational thinking by Francisco Mendes, an educational consultant and researcher at Janvs/USP. Mendes emphasized that thinking about digital transformation is not simply a matter of investing in technology labs, since it is not enough to merely teach programming; rather, it is essential to contextualize the process of computational thinking.

The Salvador Regional Meeting also welcomed Matteus Martins, the planning and management advisor for the Bahia State Department of Education, who spoke about the department’s plans to bring technology to schools in Bahia, particularly the proposal to provide high-speed internet to all public schools in the state.

Research

The Salvador Regional Meeting brought together 235 participants, 77% of whom were from private institutions and 13% from public schools. Of the total, 42% hold coordinator or supervisor positions, 35% are school principals or school system administrators, and 7% are teachers.

An internal survey by Bett Educar found that 46% of the educators attending the event work in elementary school (grades 1–6), 35% in early childhood education, 16% in high school, and 3% in higher education. Most participants are from educational institutions with between 200 and more than 1,000 students.

The Salvador Regional Meeting was sponsored byEscola da Inteligência, a school recognized for promoting programs aimed at developing intelligence, emotional well-being, and building healthy relationships among children, youth, teachers, and parents, and bythe Pleno Program, which develops competencies and skills by integrating Active Methodologies, Entrepreneurship, Innovation, and Maker Culture—a program based on the BNCC and guided by the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

The meeting was supported by the National Union of Municipal Education Directors (Undime – BA chapter) and the Union of Educational Institutions of the State of Bahia (SINEPE – BA).