Articulação do setor produtivo local com a rede federal de educação : um relato de experiência com Pequenas e Médias Empresas do Rio Grande do Norte

Abstract

One of the main extension activities of the Federal Institute of Education, Science and Technology of Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil (IFRN) is to approach the local productive sector. This engages vocational education students with the labor world and introduces labor as an educational principle. Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) from Rio Grande do Norte are an important part of the productive sector and IFRN can both help local businesses with innovation management processes and provide their students with jobs and income. That said, this paper reports a service provision aimed at bringing together IFRN and SME, by building an expanded knowledge base with information on the SME innovation management profiles as part of the international project EULA-GTEC, promoted by the ERASMUS + program, of which IFRN is an associated partner. Based on an exploratory study, students and teachers of the Tourism Management Technology Program from Canguaretama Campus carried out field research through a data collection instrument offered to SME entrepreneurs, between November 2018 and March 2019. Collection had drawbacks, such as entrepreneurs' reluctance to provide data, bureaucracy etc. Once data were collected, they were sent to the campus extension coordination to guide the elaboration of new projects involving IFRN and SME and to the EULA-GTEC coordination for data analysis and SME's innovation and technology potential diagnosis.