This morning, María Martinón-Torres, Director of the Centro Nacional de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH), and José Luis Arlanzón Francés, President of the Association of Families of Deaf People in Burgos (ARANSBUR), have presented a collaboration agreement, initially for four years, but renewable, to carry out joint actions of communication, science outreach and educational cooperation to offer the hearing-impaired and their families access to the CENIEH's events and activities.

This agreement arises out of the commitment by the CENIEH's Scientific Culture and Innovation Unit (UCC+i) to contribute to the public understanding of science through a broad, diverse and inclusive outreach program. “Access to knowledge is a human right, and the CENIEH must engage actively to ensure that science reaches everybody, without any form of discrimination”, comments Martinón-Torres. “This agreement with ARANSBUR is the first major step on a journey we shall be taking together from today. I am confident that we will grow and evolve as a team”, she concludes with satisfaction.

The agreement with ARANSBUR will affect the entire outreach calendar of the CENIEH, which at the moment includes activities like European Researchers' Night, Science Week, Women and Science Week, Darwin Day and the CENIEH Distinguished Annual Lecture.

ARANSBUR will advise the UCC+i with both aligning this outreach calendar for the deaf people through sign-language interpretation and/or content subtitling, and when adapting other activities (visits, videos, conferences, etc.) aimed at publicizing the facilities of the CENIEH and the work of its scientists and technicians.

Moreover, thanks to the agreement, from this year, deaf children will be able to participate in the "Ratón Pérez" Tooth Collection Campaign, one of the UCC+i's flagship projects, and donate their dental pieces to help the research of the CENIEH Dental Anthropology Group.