Comparative Education: A Brazilian Perspective Marta Luz Sisson de Castro Sociedade Brasileira de Educao Comparada The Brazilian Comparative

Society was founded in 1983 by a group of scholars in a meeting of the National Association of Policy and Educational Administration (ANPAE), this group reflected a national interest in the field of international and comparative education (Castro, 2007). The foundation of the Sociedade Brasileira de Educao Comparada (SBEC) led to organization of the World Congress in Rio de Janeiro in 1987, and a growing participation of SBEC in international events in the area of Comparative and International Education.. In the early nineties Comparative Education was a strong component of the curriculum of the courses of Pedagogy in the perod of Escola Nova and we have publications on the topic by famous Brazilian educator Loureno Filho (1961), but this focus changed ( Castro & Gomes, 2008)) and today Comparative Education is no longer a required discipline in the curriculum of most education programs in Brazil. But a study developed by Werle and Castro (2004) showed that the area of Comparative Education is an area of growing interest in the Brazilian education context, using as source the data Bank Production of Knowledge in the area of Educational Administration 1982-2000. National Periodicals, developed by Castro and Werle (2002). The study showed that Comparative Administration the key word used,was able to identify 106 articles, and that it was an emergent theme in the Brazilian publication during the period, and a significant increase in number of publication from the year of 1990. This increase was related to the process of the globalization, and the importance of the educational process in the economic development.

Source: CASTRO, Marta Luz Sisson de: WERLE, Flvia Obino Correa. Banco de Dados Produo do Conhecimento na rea de Administrao da Educao- 1982-2000Peridicos Nacionais. (Data Bank Production of Knowledge in the area of Educational Administration 1982-2000. National Periodicals) Porto Alegre, RS: FAPERGS ( Fundao de Apoio a Pesquisa do Estado do Rio do Sul)

Comparative Education in the Brazilian context have a different meaning or use rather than a concept or a scientific definition than in other regions This difference is built up by several conditions and limitations that are characteristic of the country. First, in Brazil we do not have professional graduate programs in the area of Comparative and International Education as program in Europe and the United States do, so we see Comparative Education as knowledge that would enrich our comprehension of education as it is practiced all over the world, and less as a professional field in which we could look for jobs or opportunities. Second, we tend to have an outside look, a tradition of old colonies or of countries with a history of underdevelopment. Comparative education tend to reinforce this tendency to look out for new experiences, ideas in other countries and regions, and not inside the nation. The schools, tend not to value their own experience, and innovations and have difficulties developing a discourse about their practice. The third point, but a very relevant one, is the limitation of language, the majority of professors and students in education do not read English or other foreign language. So, this factor restricts access to major publications in the area. Spanish is the foreign language of dissemination of knowledge in Brazil and Latin America, so if a paper or book is not translated to Spanish or Portuguese is not part of the repertoire of the majority of university professors and graduate students of education in Brazil. Today, with the availability of information with data banks and through the internet we would expect that to change, but even the Data base of Capes from the Brazilian Ministry of Education that makes available information from thousands of periodicals are not used by education students. They tend to use only data bases in Portuguese and Spanish. In relation to the concept of Comparative Education, I tend to see Comparative Education in Brazil linked to International Education. When we compare we are comparing education in an international perspective. We have an outside look, and we are comparing the Brazilian experience to the experience of other countries. I think that is a very important distinction, because the scientific method its comparative by nature, and we compare the control group with the experimental group, in science we are comparing all the time. In my view the essential of the comparative method in comparative education is its international perspective, in this sense the different dimension of comparative analysis proposed by Bray & Thomas (1995) should be marked by the international dimension. The field of comparative education, for example, was dominated by cross-national comparison and made little use of intranational comparisons. In contrast, many other fields were dominated by local foci and failed by to benefit from the perspective that could be gained from international studies. (Bray, Adamson, Mason, 2007, p.8) The objectives of Bray and Thomas, was to offer a comprehensive view of education, but in terms of definition of Comparative Education as a discipline, if we exclude the
2

International dimension than education.

comparative education, would become science of

How can we overcome the problems identified in the first part of this paper, we will offer some suggestions based on the experiences and recent developments. In order to expand the role of Comparative Education in Brazil and Latin America, we need to have periodical publications in Spanish and Portuguese, and translations of good works in the field. The initial effort of the Sociedad Argentina de Estudios Comparados en Educacin (SAECE) of publishing a virtual periodic called Revista Latino Americana de Educacin Comparada (RELEC), this periodic is published once a year in Portuguese and Spanish. The translation of the book organized by Mark Bray, Bob Adamson, and Mark Mason Comparative Education Research. Approaches and Methods to Spanish is another example of positive action. In the case of Brazil, using as a focus the area of studies Brazil-Portugal is in my view a promising development in Comparative Education, because it overcomes the limitation of language and offers a very good example of the possibilities of Comparative Education in the context of the Brazilian educational context. The book Educao Comparada: Rotas de Alm- Mar organized by Donaldo Bello de Souza e Silvia Alicia Martinez is a tentative in this direction. The first part of the book presents a discussion of the limits and possibilities of Comparative Education using mainly Portuguese speaking authors, and a German author translated, the other three parts look at different aspects of education in Brazil and Portugal, part one focus on the History of Education in the two countries, the second part looks at higher education, teacher education, adult education and use of the school resources in both countries, part three focus on management and evaluation in Basic Education. The results of international evaluations like PISA brought media and public attention to the question of education. An considering the economic importance of Brazil in Latin America and in the world , the pressure for good results and for additional comparisons is great. The new developed Brazilian quality indicator the IDEB, is highly publicized, the schools are ranked, and all this is relatively new in the Brazilian context. If the results are going to be used for real improvement in education we have to wait to see. The economists, and the media are using education for their own benefit, but crucial questions like teacher education and conditions work and low salaries remain unchanged. The SBEC is growing every year we have new members, but some of the old members are not paying their fees, or they change their address or e-mail and is very hard to keep in touch with all members. We have had difficulties with the structure of the society that was modeled after the World Council, with a President and a Secretary General, in our case the two functions seemed to be done by the President. The main challenge for the Brazilian Society is to finished the process of the legalization of the Society, we were able to transfer all the documents to a Porto Alegre notary, and considering Brazilian bureaucracy that was quite a victory. We still have to legalize
3

SBEC into Income Taxes Services, that was started but it was not conclude, and it one of our objectives for 2011 and for the next year. Activities for 2011 and 2012 In order to overcome the limitations of language and the problems identified above and to offer new activities to our members we are planning the following actions for 2011 and 2012. Regarding research, a group of our graduate students translated Mark Bray book on Confronting the Shadow Education System. What government policies for what private tutoring ? adapt the research instrument to the Brazilian reality and did a pilot study in the school they worked. The results provided the basis for articles and changes in the instrument . We are planning to develop a research project at a national level involving the Regional Vice-President of SBEC creating this way another way for integrating the society of a huge country. Every regional vice-president will participate and organize forms of participation of the different states in the region, with the objective of increasing the participation of members in the activities of the society and producing at the same time data about private tutoring in the country. The plan is to organize a research project and to submit it to funding agencies such as National Council for Research (CNPq) to have support for a national research effort at SBEC. The annual meetings are another objective rather difficult to achieve, because they mean a lot of work, you have to raise funds , and it is difficult to find partners to assume this job. The last meeting of the Brazilian society was held in 2008, and the other tentatives failed because of the problems listed. But, right now Dr. Terezinha Monteiro dos Santos, from the Federal University of Par, in Belm, Vice-President for the North Region is planning an International meeting for April of 2012, trying to integrate with scholar of the North part of South America. The International meetings held in 2008, and in 2006, were all held in Porto Alegre, integrating with countries of the Mercosul. The idea now is to open to the states in the North and in the Northeast of the country and to the nations in the North of South America. Another plan is the organization of a virtual publication under the coordination of Gabriela Rizzo from the Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro, and Newton Bryan Paciulli from the University of Campinas and the new Vice-President from the Southeast Region Dr. Luiz Aguilar also from the University of Campinas. They are working in the project of a virtual journal for SBEC, that is an old aspiration that was voiced during the Presidency of Robert Verhine, that we hope to be able to put in practice. The publication of a book with works presented during the 2008 Annual Meeting and selected papers translated , this book will receive support from SENAC ( Nacional Service for Comercial Learning) and will help in the dissemination of ideas of Comparative Education in the Brazilian education context. Every new member will receive a copy of the book, we used to do that we previous publication.
4

The Sociedade Brasileira de Educao Comparada SBEC- is a small society that should become more active in order to meet the needs and interests of a growing number of members, and the best strategy is to diversify activities and involve the largest possible numbers of associates.

References BRAY, Mark. ADAMSON, Bob, MASON, Mark. Introduction. In Comparative Education Research Approaches and Methods edited by Mark Bray, Bob Adamson and Mark Mason, Comparative Education Research Centre. The University of Hong Kong, Springer. 2007. CASTRO, Marta Luz Sisson de. The Brazilian Comparative Education Society. (SBEC). In Common Interests, Uncommon Goals Histories of the World Council of Comparative Education Societies and Its Member edited by Vandra Masemann, Mark Bray & Maria Manzon. , Comparative Education Research Centre The University of Hong Kong, Springer, 2007. CASTRO, Marta Luz Sisson de; GOMES, CandidoSmall is beautiful. CASTRO, Marta Luz Sisson de: WERLE, Flvia Obino Correa. Banco de Dados Produo do Conhecimento na rea de Administrao da Educao- 1982-2000Peridicos Nacionais. (Bank Production of Knowledge in the area of Educational Administration 1982-200. National Periodicals) Porto Alegre, RS: FAPERGS ( Fundao de Apoio a Pesquisa do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul- Foundation for Research Support of the State of Rio Grande do Sul) LOURENO, FILHO, M. B. Educao comparada. So Paulo: Melhoramentos, 1961. WERLE, Flvia Obino Correa; CASTRO, Marta Luz Sisson de Castro. Administracin Comparada como rea tematica.: peridicos brasilens. 1982-2000. Paper presented at World Congress of Council of Comparative Education Societies, Havana, Cuba, 2004.