Keywords: employment, equality

Talents brings the technology park together with high school students, women and people with special needs through on-site visits that provide interaction with companies, employees, and university professors, awakening participants to the possibilities of work and future careers, with the ultimate goal of filling of job vacancies.

The Brazilian market is lacking around 50,000 ICT professionals every year, and short-term actions need to be implemented in order to solve this shortage. This is where the Talents Program comes in: awakens in young people the desire to study new technologies, in an environment where they will be able to develop them - in companies within the park, which offer jobs of high added value. The park also provides study and work possibilities, since Unisinos offers most of its courses in the evening. 4 hour visits are scheduled throughout the year, offering students the experience of being inside a tech park, and interacting with the companies and startups located there. This introduces the program""s participants to the universe of innovation and future careers.

The program""s innovation is in bringing schools closer to innovation and entrepreneurship, and reaching a diverse audience by consciously considering diversity and inclusion. It also brings awareness to people about opportunities for their professional future, and is an innovative way of acquiring both an immediate and future workforce for the companies in the park. The Talents Program also brings about a change of concepts and even paradigms in families when students share in their homes what they saw and felt in Tecnosinos - a typical example is that of the student who wants to enter the game development sector, which is a career often not supported by parents. When parents become aware of the success stories in the park, and the courses offered in this area, families begin to see this ambition in a positive way.

The program impacts society immediately by filling job vacancies in the park""s companies, but its medium-term impact is the most significant: after being at Tecnosinos, young students begin thinking about their professional future and participating in activities offered in the Park, such as challenges and training programs. The most enterprising students are inspired by successful cases and seek to develop their ideas through pre-incubation or even creating a startup. An equally important impact is the increase in University enrolment in STEM courses at Unisinos. Young women get inspired, and special needs people realize there are opportunities offered at Tecnosinos companies and in the University. To date, 5,230 students have already been impacted.