The New secondary education: a path toward human development

223 Pages·2005·12.49 MB·English

The New Secondary Education:
A Path Toward Human Development
UNESCO/OREALC
Santiago, Chile, 2002
The N e w Secondary Education:
A Path Toward Human Development
As long as the source is duly attributed,
this text may be reproduced and translated
either wholly or in part.
The selection and presentation of the facts
in this publication,a s well as the opinions
expressed herein,a re the sole responsibility
of the autor(s)
UNESCO neither assumesr esponsibility for,
Nor necessarily endorses,s uch facts and opinions.
Published by TheR egional Office of Education
for Latin America and the Caribbean
UNESCO-Santiago
Translation:
William Gallagher
Ernest0 Leigh
Cover design: Claudia O’Ryan
Printed in Chile by Andros Ltda.
Santiago,C hile,n ovember,2 002
The publications of this book has been made possible by the voluntary contribution of the Spanish
Government to the activities of the Regional Education Project of Latin America and the Caribbean
Indice
Prologue 9
Introduction 11
Rethinking secondary education 15
Beatriz Macedo y Raquel Katzkowicz
Quality secondary schools, schools that learn from diversity 37
Carles Monereo
N e w curricula and new demands for teacher training 59
Cecilia Braslavsky
Initial and in-service training of secondary teachers:
tools for change in education 101
Maria Eugenia Paniagua
Values education in schools 117
Pbro. Lic. Javier Galdona
Understanding students: necessary condition for living together
democratically in schools 153
Jorge Baeza Correa
The need for the prosecution of justice 173
Hilda Surraco
Youth and labor in Latin America:
tensions and challenges for secondary education and vocational training 191
Claudia Jacinto
Improving secondary education in the Caribbean Region:
The contribution of the Caribbean examinations council (CXC) 213
Stafford A. GrifJith
Prologue
UNESCO has always sought to promote opportunities for countries to exchange ideas
and work together. This publication, which has been made possible thanks to the
financial contribution of the Government of Spain, brings together work carried out
by researchers from various countries in the Ibero-American and Caribbean region,
who have contributed their ideas to enrich reflection and debate on secondary educa-
tion. This is an important effort to seek new paths to foster the education of our
young people.
W e h ave been witnesses during recent decades to increases in social and eco-
nomic inequalities at the world level, and especially in our region. This situation
demands that our governments respond with measures that offer quality education
based on equity to all of their people. The yet unpaid social debt to education requires
that education policies respond to this pending agenda and help to dissolve the ten-
sions present in today’s world.
These include tensions between what is local and what is global. W e a re citizens
of a world that is in continual change,i n which we must learn to speak the language of
modem technologies and be familiar with progress in science,w hile not forgetting our
cultural identity and without becoming disconnected from our roots.
W e a re also aware of the tension between the long and the short term. W e l ive
surrounded by a cloud of instantaneous information that tempts us to concentrate only
on immediatep roblems,a nd which sometimes distract us from the more transcendent
subjects of our lives. Similarly, education policies must overcome the tension be-
10 SECONDAREYD UCATION:
tween the need to prepare ourselves for the development of science and necessarily
expensive new technologies,a nd the concern to offer equal opportunities for educa-
tion to everyone.M oreover,t hat these tensions increase in the case of educating young
people, since it is within this group that social exclusion is perhaps most serious.
Certainly, the creation of secondary education that offers equity and quality should
be everyone’sc oncern. Having available a publication such as this will help to foster
debate and to deepen understanding in order to improve education policies and prac-
tices directed at adolescents and young people in the region.
The secondary level is an area of education that demands our close attention. It
is a matter that is both diverse and complex,t ouching questions ranging from diver-
sity, equity, structure, management,a nd new curricular content,t o the effects of glo-
balization and linkages between academic and occupational training.
The documents included herein treat some of these themes. The authors, who
are specialists from the Ibero-Americana nd Caribbean region, are familiar with the
realities of secondary education,a nd analyze them from various perspectives - those
of researchers,m anagers,t eacher trainers, supervisors,a nd others.
The relevance of the subjects treated in the articles included in this publication,
and the commitment of the authors w eh ave invited to reflect upon secondary educa-
tion, permit us to offer to the reader interested in the question important documenta-
tion for analysis and for a better understanding of a key level in the education of the
young people who will build our future societies.
W e w ish to thank the Government of Spain for its valuable contribution in mak-
ing this possible.
Ana Luiza Machado
Director,U NESCO/OREALC
Santiago,C hile
Introduction
The paper of Beatriz Macedo and Raquel Katzkowicz treats some of the most impor-
tant questions to be considered when making decisions that have an impact on changes
in this level of education. Given that our region presents very troubling indicators of
equity, and that secondary schools receive, and will increasingly continue to receive
young people with serious deficits in the mastery of various skills,t he authors analyze
different strategies for reducing the inequality gap in this area. From the perspective of
quality secondary education for all, they suggest a re-definitiono f its role and struc-
ture, and discuss new contents designed to help students develop skills to be better
prepared to face to social, political, and economic future. The authors treat as well
methodological changes linked to new ways of learning and of using knowledge;r e-
definition of the profile of teachers and their training; and the new role that secondary
schools should play in our societies.
Carlos Manereo writes of three concepts that concern education theoreticians,
researchers, and managers in this new century: teaching quality, diversity in educa-
tion, and institutional change. These are three dimensions that mutually interact thanks
to processes of institutional learning. Manereo’s study treats a significant number of
indicators that characterize schools which learn more and better from their decisions
and practices than do others, thus causing a real impact on the progressive consolida-
tion of plans to meet the challenge of diversity. H e argues for the need to establish
guidelines that emphasize the quality of schools in order to deal with diversity and
12 SECONDARYE DUCATION:
thus permitting them to continue their institutional learning., Among instruments
developed are indicators of inclusion. These will help quality secondary schools,w hich
have moved ahead by focusing on inclusive teaching so they-mays elf-regulatet heir
processes of institutional learning and change,i ncreasingly aiding all of their students,
independently of their economic,s ocial,o r cultural origin or their personal character-
istics.
Cecilia Braslavsky offers a preliminary analysis of curricular products and pro-
cesses for secondary education in Latin America through recognition of common trends
in current curricular development that affect the entire region, by using national docu-
ments as a source and emphasizing the production of countries in South America.
Her purpose is to enrich dialogue and debate regarding the curricula, and changes
aimed at strengthening the capacity for shared learning and to improve the impact that
such changes propose and promote. In this context, the author treats the challenges
of cumcular construction for the education of young people, establishing what should
be the new meaning of secondary education in terms of the development of skills and
identities. The author also examines selected current curricular proposals for the
educational level, and the search for a new kind of curriculum,w hile analyzing some
of the consequences of adopting a new conception of curriculum for secondary edu-
cation,i ncluding proposals for international cooperation for fostering such proposals
in Latin America.
The article by Maria Eugenia Paniagua presents the initial and in-servicep repa-
ration of teachers as one of the ways to confront the challenges of secondary educa-
tion in Latin America. These challenges,w hether social,e conomic,s pecifically educa-
tional, ethical, or environmental,c an be faced if teachers are properly prepared to do
so. For the author, teachers are key social actors. Viewing them as such,s he offers
suggestions for changes in search of a new model for the education of teachers,c on-
sidering subjects of study, disciplines to be taught, teaching methodology,t he use of
technology,t eaching practice, and teacher trainers. Similarly,t he author presents an
analysis of in-servicee nhancement of teacher skills and of the re-definitiono f these
skills, presenting alternative solutions to be reflected upon and discussed.
The article by Javier Galdona treats the subject of values education in schools.
The author notes the simultaneous perception of greater individualization and
relativization of traditional moral parameters of different cultures. H en otes the insuf-
ficiency of formal and legal structures and the irreversibility of processes of cultural
homogenization,t ogether with the accentuation of social diversity and their inevitable
juxtaposition. H ea lso notes the growing perception of the population that it does not
possess instruments and skills essential to achieve a fuller life. In this context, he
points to the need of values education, which is a demand made on the formal educa-
tion system by public opinion,t he political system,a nd families themselves. Thus,
A PATHT OWARHDU MAND EVEWPMENT 13
social concern demands review and re-thinking in values education in order to make
changes and improvements,a nd to increase awarenesso f and explain the contents and
pedagogical procedures developed by each school for its assessment and improve-
ment. This article offers a series of proposals; not in order to establish a model to be
applied in schools,b ut rather as dimensions of the theme for assessment and reformu-
lation.
The contribution by Jorge Baeza Correa asserts that “understanding students” is
a necessary condition for a democratic school experience. In this sense,h e reminds us
that secondary school students are not passive subjects, and that the relations that
they establish with their schools are free from their own subjectivity. Young people
construct “knowledge” and “know-how” that allow them to give personal sense and
meaning to what they do. Not understanding such senses and meanings,a s well as the
strategies that they develop in order to make their participation possible can lead to
invalid relationships with them or to the development of inadequate educational pro-
grams. Baeza argues that within non-totalitarian organizations, actors have a certain
freedom of action;t heir behavior is not entirely predictable and is always contingent,
depending upon the context,o pportunities,a nd material and human conditions.I n this
study, he develops the concept of “the pupil’s craft” and its utility in “learning the
rules of the school game”.
The article by Hilda Surraco presents different aspects of traditional focuses on
violence within schools that include positions of the observer. Through this analysis,
we perceive the inequality inherent in many actions within schools that are not neutral,
but are generators of symbolic,p hysical, and psychological violence. Taking equality
as a goal, it is argued that the school principal, the major observer of these phenom-
ena,b oth physically and figuratively possesses the key to the school in terms of inclu-
sion or exclusion. Although principals are not the only centers of power, their free-
dom of action is determined by success in achieving a shared vision. In this article, the
author reflects on school violence as a phenomenon within societies of which students
are a part, but of which they are not the only protagonists. Moreover,s he states that
violence,a s a social construction,s hould be examined in an inter-activea nd diachronic
fashion,i ncluding educational practices and procedures that contribute to violent acts,
arguing that in the analysis of procedures and practices it is necessary to determine
what model of society is implicit and where it is directed. Finally in examining institu-
tions, one should also include the representations,e xperiences, and views of different
actors,f rom their own perspectives.
The document of Claudia Jacinto offers an analysis of employment training of
young people in Latin America,p lacing the situation of young people within the cur-
rent context with reference to data on their entry into schools and the labor market.
The author offers a brief summary of recent discussion regarding the linkage between