The case of Latin America and the Caribbean

Population education programs in Latin America and the Caribbean are traced from their first inception around 1970 and express the diversity of strategies that would be appropriate to the variety of cultures, development styles, climates, and geography. In the early 1970s, this region had the highest growth rates in the world. The thinking embodied the notion that large populations were a sign of progress and geopolitical power; size was relevant only to the physical space available. The connections between population and economic development were not being made explicitly in policy or sectoral planning. There was some contention surrounding urban growth and the ability to meet the needs and the imbalance in the age structure. Initially, educational sectors did not take population into accounting; international agencies were responsible for promoting attention to demographics. It was the medical profession that mobilized the education sector to start sex and family education, due to the increasing number of abortions and their consequences. By 1974, education departments were engaged in curricula that included sex and family life issues, in teacher education, and training staff to implement these programs. The demographic situation has changed over the past 20 years, and not includes reduced mortality and the beginning of fertility decline. Growth rates are now 1.9% annually compared with 2.8% in 1970, and population increases by 9 million/year. Population education is described in terms of styles, motivations, human resources, administrative awareness, teacher training, training strategies and research needs, and future management. Population education has advanced, but the need is still there to reduce fertility among large numbers of people who "leave procreation to chance and fate." Education serves the purpose of changing values, attitudes, and knowledge that entails a different view of the value of children, the relations between the sexes, and the adoption and practice of effective birth control. Education has already been shown to be effective in reducing infant mortality. The challenge ahead is to educate the poorer social and economic classes and Indian groups that lack knowledge of preventive hygiene and believe fatalistically that deaths are natural and unavoidable. Development models must accommodate population issues.     

Illiteracy and literacy training in Latin America and the Caribbean

Educationist and linguist. Professional activity in Nicaragua (1980–86) and Ecuador, particularly in the adult education sector. Has been engaged in educational research sine 1980 and has acted as education adviser in a number of countries. Was Director of Education for the Monseñor Léonidas Proaño National Literacy Compaign carried out in Ecuador in 1989. Is currently adviser to the National El Ecuador Estudia Programme. Author of many publications on adult education, including: Nicaragua, revolución popular, educación popular (Mexico City, 1985); Educación popular: un encuentro con Paulo Freire (Quito, 1986); Alfabetización popular: diálogo entre 10 experiencias de Centro-américa y el Caribe (Quito, 1987); Discurso y práctica en educación popular (Quito, 1988; Ijuí, 1988); Entre la acción y la praxis: crónica de un proceso de formación de educadores populares (Quito, 1989); El nombre de Ramona Cuji. Reportajes de la Campaña Nacional de Alfabetización Monseñor Léonidas Proaño' (Quito, 1990).     

Higher Education in Latin America

This article presents an analysis of, and proposals for, international co-operation in higher education. It focuses on Latin American higher education, its current situation, and the expected transformation of the goals of higher education in the context of international co-operation. Education in the Twenty-First Century must be part of the world economic order. As such, it must attend to human necessities. One of the most important goals of the Twenty-First Century should be the building of a new kind of solidarity among human beings, one in which higher education systems will play an important role. The author describes the challenges that globalization poses to Latin American higher education.     

拉丁美洲教育改革与发展展望

1999年4月,在智利首都圣地亚哥召开了第二届美洲国家最高首脑会议。会议在讨论“民主主义、正义、人权保护与强化”、“经济一体化与自由贸易”、“消除贫困差距”等涉及全美洲共同存在的问题的同时,各国还着重就21世纪拉丁美洲地区教育的发     

Education,democracy and development in Latin America

The education first brought to America by Europeans was hardly more than ornamental culture, literacy was generally unimportant, and African slaves were not educated at all. Only in this century did industrialization cause some governments to provide economic and technological support through training and education. In the last decade, the debt crisis curtailed spending, while numbers of students and teachers continued to rise. A comparison between Latin America and South Korea illustrates the former's relative decline in investment. The advent of populist and corporatist democracies did not alleviate the situation, although there is now some evidence of concern for basic education for poorer children. With economic adjustment programmes, little else has been done for those who have suffered the heaviest burdens, and no obvious solutions to poverty and technological obsolescence are in prospect. A major reform of State institutions is called for, including a commitment to education, a change in the economic model, and a recognition of global interdependence.

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Zusammenfassung Das erste Bildungssystem, das von den Europäern nach Amerika gebracht wurde, war kaum mehr als eine dekorative Kultur; die Alphabetisierung war im allgemeinen unwichtig und afrikanische Sklaven erhielten überhaupt keine Bildung. Erst in diesem Jahrhundert veranlaßte die Industrialisierung einige Regierungen, durch Aus- und Fortbildung wirtschaftliche und technologische Unterstützung zu geben. Im letzten Jahrzehnt beschränkte die Schuldenkrise diese Ausgaben, während die Zahl der Studenten und Lehrer weiter anstieg. Ein Vergleich zwischen Lateinamerika und Südkorea macht den relativen Investitionsverfall in Lateinamerika deutlich. Die Einführung populistischer und corporativer Demokratien hat die Situation nicht verbessert, obwohl es jetzt Anzeichen dafür gibt, daß man sich um Grundbildung für ärmere Kinder kümmert. Mit den wirtschaftlichen Anpassungsprogrammen wurde sonst wenig für diejenigen getan, die die schwerste Bürde getragen haben, und es besteht keine Aussicht auf klare Konzepte zur Überwindung von Armut und technologisch veralteter Systeme. Es wird eine größere Reform staatlicher Institutionen gefordert — einschließlich eines Engagements für die Bildung, einer Änderung des wirtschaftlichen Modells und der Anerkennung globaler Abhängigkeiten.

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Résumé L'éducation apportée autrefois à l'Amérique par les Européens n'était guère plus qu'une culture d'agrément, l'alphabétisation n'avait généralement pas d'importance et les esclaves africains ne recevaient aucune instruction du tout. Ce n'est qu'au cours de notre siècle que l'industrialisation a amené certains gouvernements à offrir un soutien économique et technologique par le biais de la formation et de l'éducation. Durant les dix dernières années, la crise de la dette financière a réduit les dépenses, alors que le nombre d'apprenants et d'enseignants n'a cessé de croître. Une comparaison entre l'Amérique latine et la Corée du Sud illustre le déclin relatif de l'investissement de la part de la première. L'avènement des démocraties populistes et corporatistes n'a pas amélioré la situation, bien qu'on note maintenant quelques signes d'intérêt à l'égard de l'éducation de base des enfants pauvres. Les programmes d'ajustement économique n'ont rien apporté de plus à ceux qui portent les fardeaux les plus lourds, et il n'y a apparemment aucune solution en vue pour le problème de la pauvreté et de l'obsolescence technologique. Une réforme majeure des institutions publiques s'impose, impliquant un engagement envers l'éducation, un changement du modèle économique et une reconnaissance de l'interdépendance globale.

     

Conceptualising Education for All in Latin America

In this paper we discuss issues in conceptualising the education of poor and marginalised adults in Latin America. Our starting point is the World Education Forum 'Dakar Framework for Action' affirmation that education is the key to sustainable development, peace and stability. We argue that a reconceptualisation of the education of adults, informed by an understandingof adults' everyday and work practices, may help us understand the ways in which education can contribute to these goals. Such an analysis requires both a socio-cognitive and a political dimension in order to take account of the cognitive abilities and agency as citizens of those whom Frantz Fanon memorably called 'the wretched of the earth'.     

Science Education Research Trends in Latin America

The purpose of this study was to survey and report on the empirical literature at the intersection of science education research in Latin American and previous studies addressing international research trends in this field. Reports on international trends in science education research indicate that authors from English-speaking countries are major contributors of publications. Despite the internationalization of the science education community, as represented by the publication of the work generated in non-English-speaking countries, research trends in science education in Latin America are uncommon in the literature. Therefore, it was deemed important to explore the scholarly productivity of science education researchers from Latin America to learn about the research orientations pursued by scholars from this region. Collective review findings are presented with respect to author’s nationality, publication volume generated in each country, research type and topic, collaborative research, and areas for future research. Of the ten countries represented in this study, Brazilian authors were the most research active scholars followed by their colleagues from Venezuela, Mexico, and Argentina. The History, Philosophy and the Nature of Science (HPNOS) was the topic that most attracted the interest of Latin American science education researchers, and the Empirical Qualitative studies was the most frequent research type combination in the analyzed publications. Findings in this study suggest a relationship between investment power in Research and Development (R&D) and the scholarly productivity not only in science education but also in the scientific field in the countries of the region.     

Apples and oranges: Educational enrollment and attainment across countries in Latin America and the Caribbean

This paper uses household survey data to rank LAC countries’ performance in two areas: (i) getting children into school on time and keeping them there, and (ii) turning their contact with the educational system into years of schooling. It presents multiple rankings because most countries’ performance is not uniform across these dimensions. For instance, the Dominican Republic performs almost as well as the richest countries when it comes to keeping children in school, but as badly as the poorest few in terms of turning attendance into years of schooling. Further, the rankings, which are based on conventional and new measures of educational systems’ performance, are occasionally quite different from those obtained using more widely available administrative data.     

Spanish Bilateral Initiatives for Education in Latin America

The research presented in this article concerns la Agencia Española de Cooperación Internacional (Spanish Agency for International Cooperation—AECI) and its growing presence in Latin America since the late 1990s. The aim is to evaluate the transformative potential that bilateral funding can have on educational reform in the region. The article starts with a brief history of Spain’s past and present strategies for educational initiatives in Latin America, and then it focuses on three of AECI’s successful projects: basic and adult literacy; gender mainstreaming in development projects; and multicultural and bilingual education. The article explains the effectiveness of Spanish-sponsored projects in Latin America and compares their strategies with those of other bilateral and multilateral donors, such as PREAL. The article concludes by analysing multi-sectoral development efforts that are the foundation of educational strategies sponsored with Spanish funds, based on the grounds that elimination of poverty will not result from projects that focus exclusively on the individual or the family, but rather from those at the community level. AECI’s efforts are directed at cultivating internal capacities already present in the communities through training human resources and deploying financial resources.     

Inclusive education in Latin America and the Caribbean: Exploratory analysis of the national reports presented at the 2008 International Conference on Education

This exploratory analysis of inclusive education issues in Latin America and the Caribbean is based on a series of documents produced in the framework of the organization of the 48th session of the International Conference on Education, in particular the National Reports presented at the Conference as well as country reports presented at preparatory meetings. The content analysis of the materials focused on the following topics: (a) the legal and normative framework; (b) the current educational policies; (c) the proposed or adopted approach in terms of inclusive education; (d) the main target groups; (e) inclusive education and the curriculum; (f) the kind of indicators most frequently mentioned; and (g) problems and challenges for inclusive education. One of the main challenges for the countries in the region is the appreciable gap between the stated principles and vision on one side, and the actual practices of inclusive education, on the other. Thus, there is an urgent need to ensure that policies and strategies translate into concrete actions aimed at changing the institutional practices and pedagogical approaches in the school and the classroom.     

Internationalisation in higher education in Latin America: policies and practice in Colombia and Mexico

There is now an extensive literature about internationalisation in higher education. However, much of the research relates to North America and Europe. This paper is concerned with internationalisation in Latin America and seeks to consider perceptions and experiences in Colombia and Mexico, and to compare practice in the public and private sectors. Based on detailed analysis of interviews with senior managers in six universities, the paper shows a growing level of activity, with some increasing levels of planning and strategy. Important differences are identified in the response of public and private universities, reflecting funding differences and freedom to determine institutional priorities.     

An overview of educational policies in the countries of Latin America during the 1990s

In this paper we want to examine the construct of the Learning Society in its economic and social context in the UK. We will argue that the policy rhetoric which makes up the current discourse of the ‘learning’ society is both powerfully normative and unhelpfully reductionist and that it displaces and masks issues of inequality. The discourse of the Learning Society has conflated the achievement of increased levels of participation for 16‐ to 19‐year‐olds with the insertion of market mechanisms and relations and the assertion of self‐interest. This has meant that issues of exclusion, polarization and social justice have been systematically neglected. The Learning Society provides, we suggest, for a redrawing and relegitimation of patterns of exclusion. In particular, in a time of social crisis, middle‐class retrenchment (masked as familial duty) has re‐asserted itself, in part, through a specific, particular engagement with the Learning Society in order to ensure advantage and distinction. As Connell (1996: 5) puts it, this ‘is the point on which the politics of education markets mainly turns’. Thus, we believe it is critical to address the question, ‘Whose Learning Society'? We shall attempt this through a preliminary examination of data collected from a cohort of 16‐year‐olds who are in the process of transition from statutory schooling into a post‐16 education and training market (ETM), and deploy their ‘emergent narratives’ to problematize the normative simplicities of the Learning Society.