The Mayor of Bilbao, Juan Mari Aburto, and Leire Castro, have inaugurated BIZILABE-BILBAO, the first intelligent research and leisure centre for young people in the Basque Country. It is an initiative promoted by Elhuyar and the City of Bilbao with the aim of attracting young people between 12 and 17 to the world of research, science and technology from leisure.

With more than 200 m2, it has chosen its location in the Municipal Center of Deusto, integrating with the local Gaztegune, thus becoming an integral center of research and intelligent leisure.

As an action to launch the first center of the Bizibale network, since October a series of workshops are being held aimed and designed for young people, guided by researchers and experts, following the educational model STEM of Elhuyar, under the slogan "Scientific experiences and youth community", through adventures and experiments.

The aim of Bizilabe is to offer young people intelligent leisure, proposing actions outside the curriculum and school hours, and ultimately to voluntarily develop their creativity and stimulate their fondness for these professions. Also, one of the strategic objectives of the Network is the creation of a network of collaboration with local scientific and technical companies (community), a reference for young people. This collaboration will materialize in actions such as visiting companies and sharing experiences with their professionals. In Bilbao, for example, they have organized visits to companies such as Erabi and Material Connexion.

Bizilabe also has three other transversal objectives: to attract girls to science and technology; to promote the use of Basque; and to promote equal opportunities for students with fewer resources to overcome differences among young people of different socioeconomic levels.

This week, several schools in Bilbao have been invited to visit Bizilabe, to introduce the centre to young people, and their activities have been made known to students and their families.

As the last event of the week of presentation and inauguration of the Bizilabe initiative, today Friday, at 18:00 hours, a party will be held aimed at citizens and especially young people between 12 and 17 years, in which they will be able to see the facilities. The Board Room of the Municipal Center of the District of Deusto will have different stands such as the UPV/EHU or the companies Erabi and Material Connexio, other collaborators and young people who have participated in the Bizilabe workshops. In these stands will be exposed the experiments and prototypes made by themselves.

To set the party, outside the building there will be a DJ tent with music and the event will end with the scientific show Adrenalina.