The extension project “Exchange of Knowledge and Expertise for Building Resilience, Socio-environmental Justice and Adaptation to the Climate Emergency” was born in the University Extension discipline, in 2023, taught by professor Cilene Victor, leader of HumanizaCom , in the Journalism course, at the Methodist University of São Paulo. The community was chosen by the class, which at the time was in the fifth semester and had three students living in Morntanhão - a territory with around 100 thousand inhabitants and considered one of the most affected by socio-environmental inequalities in the municipality of São Bernardo do Campo.

After choosing Montanhão, we visited the community and began a dialogue and strengthening our relationship with Tia Rosa, a community leader and project partner. In the first two years, 2023 and 2024, the project had exclusively Journalism students and, in 2024, the intern teacher and master's student Lilian Moreira, from the Postgraduate Program in Communication (PósCom), and member of HumanizaCom .

With an emphasis on the role of journalism and risk communication in strengthening communities and building resilience and adaptation to disasters associated with climate extremes, the main activities from 2023 to 2024 were: production of the mini-documentary Montanhão: territory of struggle and resilience; public class taught on the Methodist University campus by Tia Rosa; workshop on Visagism and Cultural Identity, offered by Lilian Moreira; journalistic coverage of parties and activities organized by the community; meetings and technical visits in Montanhão; creation of a portal and digital profiles to disseminate the activities; presentation of partial results of the project at academic events, such as Intercom Sudeste 2023 and 2024, the Methodist Congress of Initiation and Scientific Production and the Extension Exhibition of the Methodist Congress, both in 2023 and 2024.

In this third year and fifth phase (fifth semester) , the project was expanded to other courses, achieving an interdisciplinary approach , with students from Communication and Marketing, Psychology, Law and Veterinary Medicine. In this edition, more names from HumanizaCom were involved, who chose the project to carry out their teaching internship: Lilian Moreira, Renata Juliotti and Louis Edoa, in addition to the collaboration of Journalism professor, Filomena Salemme. With this, the project further strengthens the commitment to unite extension, teaching and research.

Montanhão-UMESP continues with its proposal to strengthen the community's role in tackling climate change and its consequences, such as environmental racism, thus contributing to building resilience and climate adaptation. The project also targets the well-being and physical and mental health of the local population, one of the most underestimated issues in the context of the climate emergency.

Montanhão-UMESP establishes itself as a space for critical experimentation and collective construction of knowledge and wisdom, where risk communication permeates all actions and contributes to the understanding of care as resistance and social transformation. With each new cycle, the project renews its commitment to active listening, ethical engagement and the promotion of climate justice based on the voices and knowledge of urban peripheries.