Chamber approves new secondary education reform – 03/20/2024 – Education

The Chamber of Deputies approved in a symbolic vote this Wednesday (20) the project that changes the secondary education reform sanctioned in 2017 and establishes new rules for this school stage in the country. The Lula (PT) government gave in in the negotiations to avoid an even greater disfigurement of the text in relation to the one it sent to the Legislature last year.

Now, the proposal will be forwarded to the Senate

The main setback by the Planalto Palace’s allied base to reach a consensus with the majority of the Chamber concerns the relaxation of the mandatory workload of the common curriculum for students who choose to take professional courses.

Traditional subjects are included in the common curriculum, such as Portuguese, mathematics, history and physics.

The Executive’s proposal provided for 2,400 mandatory hours of the general curriculum for all training itineraries. The rapporteur, with the support of the majority of state education secretaries, stated that the mandatory level would make professional courses unfeasible.

Faced with the imminent defeat, the Minister of Education, Camilo Santana, reached an agreement and agreed to reduce the common curriculum for all students to 1,800 hours in cases where the student opts for professional courses. Thus, students will be able to take a technical nursing course, for example, of 1,200 hours — in total, there are 3,000 hours in high school.

Before approving the text, the rapporteur also gave in to the appeals of left-wing deputies to gain more support and set the common schedule for technical courses at 2,100 hours with the possibility of using 300 of these hours to complement professional classes.

In other training itineraries, which are the areas that students have to choose to deepen their secondary education, the requirement remains at 2,400 hours.

Another change in the text implemented by the rapporteur, deputy Mendonça Filho (União Brasil-PE), in relation to the government’s proposal is the removal of Spanish as a mandatory second language — the first is English.

The agreed text treats Spanish as preferential, in a reduction in the importance initially given by the MEC, with the possibility for states to establish mandatory language.

The ministry also accepted a change in the project regarding the possibility of implementing distance education in secondary education.

The approved text provides, contrary to the Executive’s initial proposal, training via “mediation by technology” in exceptional cases, which does not mean that it will necessarily be a recorded class, without a teacher on the other side of the video, but which opens up scope for distance learning. The MEC, however, must regulate this issue.

The approval of the text occurred after extensive negotiations mediated by the president of the Chamber, Arthur Lira (PP-AL), between minister Camilo Santana and rapporteur Mendonça Filho.

On Monday night (18), in an effort to reach a consensus between the parties, Lira received the two at the Chamber’s official residence. The meeting, however, had an atmosphere of tension and an exchange of barbs and, at the end, Santana and Mendonça apologized to each other.

On Tuesday (19), however, they managed to reach an agreement. The Palácio do Planalto always anticipated the need to give in on some points to avoid a greater defeat. Planalto’s pessimism regarding the issue in the Chamber began the moment Lira appointed Mendonça to report the matter.

This is because the deputy was the Minister of Education under Michel Temer (MDB) and responsible for formulating the secondary education reform sanctioned in 2017, which the current government is now trying to overturn.

WHAT THE CURRICULUM LOOKS LIKE

The project foresees five areas in which students will be able to delve deeper in high school. They are: languages, mathematics and natural sciences; languages, mathematics and human and social sciences; languages, human and social sciences and natural sciences; mathematics, human and social sciences and natural sciences; and professional courses.

The first four will have 2,400 hours of common curriculum, while the last may have 1,800 hours. Schools will be required to offer at least two of these areas.

In a speech in the plenary, Mendonça stated that the reform approved in 2017, when he was Minister of Education, was positive, but that the project approved now makes the changes in secondary education even better.

“Instead of revoking the virtuous reform, we improve it. I’m not a person who has a fixed idea. Everything that is done can be improved,” he said.

PSOL deputies, however, remained against the text due to the reduction in the common curriculum for professional courses. Deputy Tarcísio Motta (PSOL-RJ) praised the Lula (PT) government’s initiative to propose a new secondary education reform, but criticized the text proposed by the rapporteur.

“The logic of maintaining 1,800 hours for technical education, I’m sorry, is the continuation of precariousness, the continuation of fragmentation, it is a return to the past, where we will have two secondary education: one for general training which could be integral and another for training precarious technique, because this will be for the poor”, he stated.

WHAT WAS LEFT OUT

Another point that caused divergence among deputies more to the left of the rest of the House concerns the authorization for professionals with “notorious knowledge” to teach professional courses. The criticism was that the forecast devalues ​​teaching staff with specific training to teach.

On the other hand, defenders claim that people with extensive knowledge in certain areas can pass on their experiences to students. In the end, to garner more votes, Mendonça removed this section of the project, but under the argument that there is already another law that authorizes the notorious knowledge as a requirement for hiring a teacher.