Category Archives: Brazilian Education Winter

Brazilian Education – Week 9 – Class Notes

We had a very controversial and heated discussion in class today. The presentation was lead by Professor Grün:

“Professor Roberto Grün is the author of 4 books and 50 articles on immigration, economic and financial sociology. Professor Grün teaches Organizational Behavior and Sociology in the Federal University of São Carlos, Brazil, where he leads the “Center for Economic and Financial Sociology (NESEFI)”. He is currently the Joaquim Nabuco Chair in Brazilian Studies at Stanford’s Center for Latin American Studies.”

He believes that scandals, regardless of guilt, happen when stakeholders, the opposition, the media, and the public opinion are in synchronicity and start acting at a fast pace. Loosely quoting him: ‘We as scientists look at the mechanisms, not at guilt.’

Regardless of the phenomena, guilt should be evidenced and punished, regardless of the size of the scandal, in my opinion.

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Brazilian Education – Week 7 – Class Notes

David Planck

  • economist to politics
  • Anisio Teixeira – his hero
  • Published his book in 1992
  • education boils down to two unattainable goals: more and better

Bob Verhine 

  • 1995 started big changes
  • FUNDEF was a great move by the Ministry of Education
  • It was a move to redistribute the resources more fairly between State and Municipalities
  • FUNDEB now puts them on the same side
  • Teacher salaries are now part of the law with a minimum set

Q&A

  • Bolsa Familia made a big impact in education by tying school attendance to receiving this benefit
  • What happens outside of school is as important as to what happens within the school systems
  • Nowadays you have ‘concursos’ to hire teachers but now they are ‘punished’ each time who is in power changes

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Brazilian Education – Week 6 – Class Notes

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Today we talked about how education is financed in Brazil and the National Education Plan lead by Bob Verhine (Universidade Federal da Bahia).

Basically Brazil spends quite a bit in education in absolute terms but per-student spending is ridiculously low.

The plan has 20 goals which are for the most part unatainable, vague, and/or non-descriptive. The focus seems to be to please all sides, be neutral, and avoid controversy.

Many policies and laws established in our Constitution for example, have never been put into practice…

Here are some points about the challenges to increase expenditures in brazilian education.

Brazilian Education – Week 6 – Reading Notes

Carvalho, C., 2013, DILEMAS DO FINANCIAMENTO E A META 20 DO PLANO NACIONAL DE EDUCAÇÃO.

  • Artigo analisando as leis relacionadas ao financiamento público da educação – Projeto de Lei do Plano de Educação (PNE)
  • Altíssimo desequilíbrio entre recursos para ensino superior vs ensino básico e fundamental
  • Composição complicadíssima em termos de regras de repasses
  • Gastos com educação em geral são baixos com relação ao OCDE
  • Gastos por aluno são MUITO mais baixos com relação ao OCDE

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Menezes, N., 2014, O Plano Nacional de Educação Publicado, Valor Econômico

  • “PNE foi concebido pelos movimentos corporativistas para conseguir transferir mais recursos da sociedade para si próprios, sem que haja cobrança de mais eficiência na aplicação desses recursos.”
  • “Aumentar os gastos simplesmente aumenta a mobilização dos movimentos organizados da sociedade para capturar esses recursos.”
  • “Uma das únicas notícias boas do PNE foi a estratégia incluída pelo Senado federal, que estabelece políticas de estímulo às escolas que melhorarem o desempenho no Ideb, “de modo a valorizar o mérito dos professores, diretores e funcionários”. Ela foi incluída apesar da resistência dos movimentos corporativistas, que são contra a meritocracia.”

Menezes, N., 2012, Mais gastos com educação? Valor Econômico 

  • “Em primeiro lugar, deve ficar claro que o PNE é somente uma carta de intenções. Nada garante que as metas serão efetivamente atingidas.”
  • “Hoje em dia, o Ensino superior apropria 15% dos gastos públicos com Educação, mas tem apenas 3% do total de Alunos.”
  • “em nenhum país do mundo essa discrepância de gastos entre o Ensino básico e o superior é tão grande.”
  • “Por fim, vale a pena ressaltar que aumento de gastos não significam aumento da qualidade da Educação. Várias pesquisas, inclusive da OCDE, mostram esse fato de forma inequívoca. Sem melhorar a formação dos Professores, a seleção dos diretores e sem demitir os piores Professores ainda em estado probatório, nada vai mudar, mesmo que gastássemos os 10% do PIB com Educação. Haveria somente uma maior transferência de recursos da sociedade para os Professores, sem melhoria do aprendizado dos Alunos.”

Maílson Ferreira da Nóbrega, M. F., 2014 Escolha fatal: 10% do PIB para a educação. VEJA

  • “A educação não precisa de mais dinheiro, e sim de uma revolução na gestão e na forma de remunerar os professores, para melhorar sua qualidade. A lei pouco ou nada contribuirá para isso. Tende a ser uma escolha ruinosa.”

Almeida, M. & Pessoa, M. L. S., 2015, Desequilíbrio econômico é estrutural e exige correções mais duras. Folha de S. Paulo

  • “Certamente, ocorreu um grave descontrole dos gastos públicos a partir de 2009. Para além dos problemas de curto prazo, porém, existe um desequilíbrio estrutural. Desde 1991, a despesa pública tem crescido a uma taxa maior do que a renda nacional.”
  • “Nesses 23 anos, o setor público apropriou-se de 45% do crescimento da renda nacional para financiar seus gastos, incluindo programas de transferência de renda e demais políticas públicas.”
  • “Como cada idoso custa aproximadamente o dobro do que uma criança na escola, o quadro torna-se mais dramático. Ponderada pelo custo de cada grupo, a dinâmica demográfica tem acarretado aumento do gasto público há mais de uma década.”
  • “O grave problema fiscal do Brasil reflete a concessão desenfreada de benefícios incompatíveis com a renda nacional. Prometemos mais do que temos, adiando o enfrentamento das restrições existentes. Deixamos para as próximas gerações as contas a serem pagas, porém o futuro tem o inconveniente hábito de se tornar presente.”

Congresso Nacional, Plano Nacional de Educação

  • Um plano com 10 metas fica difícil de se cumprir
  • Não há penalidades previstas para o não cumprimento das metas, nem prêmios
  • Promoção de 2 (sim – somente duas) conferencias nacionais de educação até 2020!!!

Brazilian Education – Week 4 – Class Notes

We had the honor to have one of the authors from – “Educational Performance of the Poor: Lessons from Rural Northeast Brazil” by Harbison and Hanushek (1992) and David Plank who wrote a review about the book. 

The book covers the socioeconomic context of the Northeast at the time (1981-1987), and the challenges faced in the implementation and evaluation of the EDURURAL Project. 

Very interesting discussion. Main take-aways:

  • They were unable to find a relation between student performance and the teacher’s educational level or years of experience – the conclusion is that, at least quantitatively, it is impossible to pinpoint what a good teacher is – it seems like it is an art.
  • Pouring money into education works if it is to build schools but no one really know how to spend this money once it comes down to improving the quality of education.
  • Brazil has come a long way in educational infrastructure but now it’s time to talk about quality.

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Brazilian Education – Week 3 – Class Notes

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Todays class was lead by Eduardo Zancul, POLI: Engineering Education in Brazil: current issues and initiatives” by  – USP

  • Internal talk about pedagogy and quality of learning that does not happen
  • Very low incentives for teachers to change their practice
  • Some teachers actually think that flunking half of their class is good teaching

Stanford – Electrical Engineering online course – one of the oldest running programs

Brazilian Education – Week 3 – Reading Notes

Brazilian Education

This week’s readings were about Engineering education in Brazil. Main take-aways:

  • Poor STEM education in high-schools
  • Curriculum is too theoretical and lacks ‘soft-skills’ training
  • Job market complains about the quality of graduating engineers
  • Need more interaction between academia and industry
  • Dropout rates and enrolment rates are terrible when comparing to BRICS and OECD countries

CNI, 2014, Recursos humanos para inovação: engenheiros e tecnólogos.

  • Few patents, expensive process
  • Engineering education is outdated
  • Barriers in collaboration between universities, research centers and the market
  • Low tradition in multi-disciplinary research
  • Research financing does not demand financial or concrete results
  • PhDs are all in academia 98.3% (40% in the US)
  • Academic stricto sensu limits interactions with real world
  • Teach more creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship
  • Great problem with evasion – only 50% finish degree
  • Historic deficit of engineers, only 1% of graduates are engineers
  • Current teachers have no market experience

ITA/MEI, 2014, Fortalecimento das Engenharias no Brasil

  • Low salaries for engineers comparing internationally
  • Ill prepared and not innovative
  • Fields of study are too narrow – should offer a broader curriculum
  • Collaborate with international institutions

Relatório EngenhariaData 2015

  • See above… much of the same information but in quantitative terms

Strengthening Engineering Education in Brazil

  • See above… much of the same information but in quantitative terms  – report based on CNI’s report.

Brazilian Education – Week 2 – Reading Notes

Pedrosa, R. H., Simões, T. P., Carneiro, A. M., Andrade, C. Y., Sampaio, H., & Knobel, M. (2014). Access to higher education in Brazil. Widening Participation and Lifelong Learning, 16(1), 5-33. Chicago

Article about access and equity in Higher Education in Brazil in the last 20 years.

  • Secondary education is the bottleneck in Brazil
    • “Research shows that affirmative action policies have had a positive impact on reducing inequalities in HE in Brazil, but secondary education is still the main bottleneck for further progress, both in terms of expanding higher education and of making access more equitable.”, Pedrosa, Simões, Carneiro, Andrade, Sampaio & Knobel, 2014, p.5
  • Private, for-profit higher education institutions are of poor quality
    • “Unfortunately, these private, for-profit higher education institutions (HEIs) are generally of quite poor quality by almost all measures. This phenomenon may be linked, preliminarily, to the findings of studies of fifteen countries’ HE expansions in Shavit, et. al. (2007), which show that, in most cases, the differentiation of a system helped to maintain inequalities since disadvantaged groups would, in various ways, end up enrolled in “second tier” HEIs.”, Pedrosa, Simões, Carneiro, Andrade, Sampaio & Knobel, 2014, p.6
  • Expansion of HEI may not have an effect in reducing inequality since second-tier institutions are created with lower entry barriers and thereby maintaining a differentiation amongst the privileged and the not.
    • “Arum et al (2007) argue that, at least in the case of economically developed countries, ‘… expansion has been accompanied by differentiation. Systems that had consisted almost exclusively of research universities developed second-tier and less selective colleges and much of the growth in enrollment was absorbed by these second-tier institutions. Thus, at the same time that members of the working class found new opportunities to enroll in higher education, the system was being hierarchically differentiated so that these new opportunities may have had diminished value.’”, Pedrosa, Simões, Carneiro, Andrade, Sampaio & Knobel, 2014, p.8
  • Half of Brazil has not finished high-school
    • “Given that only about 50% of the Brazilian adult population has finished high school, one has to wonder about the total absence of policies dedicated to that educational sector from all levels of government (secondary education is the responsibility of states).”, Pedrosa, Simões, Carneiro, Andrade, Sampaio & Knobel, 2014, p.11
  • To get into the ‘good’ HEI in Brazil one must have attended a ‘good’ private high-school
    • “Elites and the middle class send their children to private schools and often enroll them in costly test-preparation programs as well. This leads to higher acceptance rates for private-school students at the free, elite public universities.”, Pedrosa, Simões, Carneiro, Andrade, Sampaio & Knobel, 2014, p.14
  • Federal government is funding private, for-profit HEI – even though they are consistently of low quality
    • “Thus, it remains an important issue, regarding opportunity of access to HE, and a matter for concern, the low quality of education provided by the private system. In addition, it raises serious doubts if that is the best policy, to have government support for-profit HEIs, and by large amounts of funds, a point already made by McCowan (2007).”, Pedrosa, Simões, Carneiro, Andrade, Sampaio & Knobel, 2014, p.21
    • “With that in mind, we finish this review on access to HE in Brazil with the following question: should federal funds continue to be used to support the private system the way it has been done recently, when those funds could be used to help make the recent federal expansion work better, to support disadvantaged students admitted via affirmative action programs in the public HEIs, and also to help develop secondary education, a huge and urgent task for Brazilian policymakers?”, Pedrosa, Simões, Carneiro, Andrade, Sampaio & Knobel, 2014, p.29

 

Colby, A., Ehrlich, T., Sullivan, W. M., & Dolle, J. R. (2011). Rethinking undergraduate business education: Liberal learning for the profession (Vol. 20). John Wiley & Sons.

  • Students of liberal arts and sciences view a college degree as something they must get out of the way even though the work-force values a broader set of education
    • “A number of reports have pointed out that upper-level managers often endorse the value of a broad, liberal education (Hart Research Associates, 2010). They seem to appreciate that a larger perspective will be a valuable resource for business success as well as for life more generally”, Colby, Ehrlich, Sullivan, & Dolle, 2011, p.52
  • Yet – middle-level managers want specific skills due to a more short-term vision of the company’s needs
    • “But middle-level hiring officers tend to choose candidates for skills that will be of immediate use to the company”, Colby, Ehrlich, Sullivan, & Dolle, 2011, p.52
  • Higher education must prepare students for real life.
    • “In this chapter, we suggest that liberal education’s purpose is to enable students to make sense of the world and their place in it, preparing them to use knowledge and skills as means toward responsible engagement with the life of their times.”, Colby, Ehrlich, Sullivan, & Dolle, 2011, p.53
  • Liberal Learning
    • Analytical Thinking
    • Multiple Framing
    • Reflective Exploration of Meaning
    • Practical Reasoning

Brazilian Education – Week 1

Given the feedback from last quarter the teachers decided to discuss with the students how could we improve the the class, having more discussions and engagement with the content. Since each week we’ll have a different lecturer, it will be up to the lecturer to design this activity.

So the class today was a short overview of what content they want to cover and how might we do that.

Just occured to me that this is the hardest part about teaching well – is preparing a class activity that is engaging and participatory – instead of a mere lecture. Lectures are interesting but can be compared to watching TV… 5 minutes later you forget… unless you are deeply engaged with the subject matter and the stakes are high. When the stakes are low, you might want to establish a more interactive engagement.

Could a presentation software with some coaching do the trick?