Petnica Research Center, Serbia

Friends of Science

As a traveler, participant, teacher, sponsor or just a friend of science you will always be welcome to feel Petnica way of life. Build on the infrastructure of an old school, close to the church, Petnica Research Center was created by people mad about science that were considered to be too demanding for the normal education system. This is not a trip or a visit, it is an experience about life, dedication, passion and hard work and the most important about wishes come true to child


By IOANA EMINA DUMITRASCU
from Bucharest, ROMANIA


If you have never been to Petnica you will know that you are on the right way when you hear good folk music, meet friendly people and smell some rakija, because that means you arrived to Serbia. This Research Center is about 40 minutes away from Valjevo, a small town in western part of the country. Petnica is the ground of science, friendship and hospitality. If you have been here at least once then coming back again is really easy. You should just follow your scientist friends, the sound of guitar music, your heart and your craziness for research.

As a traveler, participant, teacher, sponsor or just a friend of science you will always be welcome to feel Petnica way of life. Build on the infrastructure of an old school, close to the church, Petnica Research Center was created by people mad about science that were considered to be too demanding for the normal education system. Since that moment this Center was growing and every year it was improved with the new laboratories, equipments and modern technology needed for an appropriate research. Petnica is developing every year programs for Serbian high school pupils in research fields as chemistry, bio-chemistry, electronics, physics, astronomy, psychology and anthropology.

Before you even see all this, just after crossing the Petnica gate, you will enter the magic world and the first thing you will see will be the people. Any hour of day or night you will see youngsters dressed in white uniforms carrying strange substances or funny animals walking and talking passionately about their work and projects. Then you will meet young teachers in charge for all these students. But you will never meet Mr X, you will meet Aca, Srdjan, Luka, Nikola, Vlada..., great teachers with the most important value to be friend one with each other and with the students. That is the way education should look like in schools, science should be friendly for every kid and the teachers should be known for their professional value and not for their intangibility.

Lots of high school pupils from Serbia come here every year, four times a year. They design their own research and they carry it all year long and handle the problems that occurs in their research as real scientists and sometimes even better than real scientists. They work with passion all day long to finish their projects. If you look at the pictures in the Center you can see some of the junior associates at this time few years ago when they where only students in this place. Petnica has it's own story and everyone that came at least once has his on story about this special place.

If you take a look ahead you can see a bunch of kids, not more than 10 or 12 years old, speaking English in front of the Center. They are the International Students. Each year, Petnica International Program takes place for two weeks during the summer holiday. This event gathers high gifted pupils and even students all over the world and tries to offer them a travel to the world of science. The program had this year the third edition and each year everybody tries to improve it for next year students. In 2005 participants had projects to run during the two weeks of participation. In 2006 the organizers considered that the last year schedule was too tight so they quit the projects and every student had a presentation to do. At the end of the program students demanded for more, they said they were expecting to be busier than that so, in 2007 the new international team goes back to the projects method.

If you hurry you can still reach those guys before their departure and you can ask them about the time they had in Petnica. And if you can't reach them don't worry they will apply for next year Petnica International for sure and you can ask them then. This is not a trip or a visit, it is an experience about life, dedication, passion and hard work and the most important about wishes come true.