13th International Public Communication of Science and Technology Conference 5-8 May 2014, Salvador, Brazil Empowering children: crossing the science in society and the social inclusion agendas Matteo Merzagora TRACES matteo@merzagora.net Meriem Fresson TRACES meriem.fresson@groupe-traces.fr Vanessa Mignan TRACES vanessa.mignan@groupe-traces.fr Abstract The EU funded project ―SiS Catalyst – children as change agents for science in society‖ is analysing the interrelationships between science communication practices and social inclusion, focusing on the children perspective. If on one hand science is offering opportunities to overcome forms of oppression and exclusion, on the other hand the science education pathways can be implicitly at the origin of a discriminatory process. In fact, a structured form of knowledge such as science can be perceived differently by children with a higher socioeconomic level (for whom science can be an opportunity of success) and those coming from disadvantaged areas or local minorities (for whom science can be mainly an instrument of selection for progression into higher education, reinforcing the divide between a future perceived as ―for them‖, and a future ―for me‖). A way to break this correlation is through