In the year 2000, the Ministry of the Environment through the Secretariat of Policies for Sustainable Development and the Federal University of São Carlos, signed a technical cooperation statement in which we may highlight: “project drafting of the Center of Researches to Sustainable Development, with the intent of attracting diverse technical and academic capabilities for the development of studies and research, additionally for specialized academic education, at levels of undergraduate and postgraduate programs”. Therefore, studies have been performed, focusing on the definition of a location to install this center of researches. At the end of these studies, Sorocaba was the chosen destination, having as its motivating factors, its region: displaying remaining Atlantic Forest and transitioning cerrado (Savannah), being a region of the São Paulo state with one of the highest rates of preservation of native vegetation, having the lowest numbers of HDI (Human Development Index) of São Paulo and having profound lack of public and quality academic education. After deciding the establishment of the UFSCar’s Sorocaba campus, five courses were initially deployed in 2006: Bachelor of Biological Sciences, [1] Licentiate of Biological Sciences, Tourism, Production and Forest Engineering. The sustainable emphasis is consistently and directly applied to all these courses. In such areas, there are several multi and inter disciplinary problems, including environmental, social and economic components of the sustainability topic. Multidisciplinary, given the fact of being considered by every field concerning development of knowledge of economic and political activities. Interdisciplinary, when considering that the solution of questions concerning sustainability demands synchronous contribution of several knowledge fields.

Therefore, the Computer Science course was proposed in the Sorocaba campus, whose installation initiated in 2008. The main motivation is given the transversal aspect of the computing into various fields of knowledge, rendering the introduction of this course strategic to the Sorocaba campus. On a recently created campus, the computer course contributes alongside additional fields and is aligned with the sustainable development objective, in this regard of collaboration with other fields, as well as in its focus of information technology development, aiming to contribute with sustainability.

The Bachelor program of Computer Science of the Sorocaba campus was created with the intent of educating professionals with distinctive profile, capable of act on applied research and the development of systems employing concepts concerning sustainability.

[1] Students who wish to qualify as secondary school teachers must complete a separate licentiate degree course, which, like a bachelor course, also has a normal length of 4 years, but has a stronger emphasis on teaching methods and pedagogy.