The elementary and medium schools in Brazil weaknesses are evidenced by the results of PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) which seeks to measure the knowledge and skills in reading, mathematics and science of students 15 years of age in both industrialized member countries OECD and partner countries. In turn, the weaknesses of higher education in Brazil are shown at the ranking of universities worldwide conducted by THE (Times Higher Education) that evaluates the performance of college students and the academic production in the fields of engineering and technology, arts and humanities, life sciences, health, physical and social sciences and considers further research, knowledge transfer and international perspective, beyond the learning environment.

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THE EDUCATION SYSTEM WEAKNESSES IN BRAZIL AND HOW TO
ELIMINATE THEM
Fernando Alcoforado *
The elementary and medium schools in Brazil weaknesses are evidenced by the results
of PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) which seeks to measure the
knowledge and skills in reading, mathematics and science of students 15 years of age in
both industrialized member countries OECD and partner countries. In turn, the
weaknesses of higher education in Brazil are shown at the ranking of universities
worldwide conducted by THE (Times Higher Education) that evaluates the performance
of college students and the academic production in the fields of engineering and
technology, arts and humanities, life sciences, health, physical and social sciences and
considers further research, knowledge transfer and international perspective, beyond the
learning environment.
According to PISA data, in 2012, Brazil got the 55th position in reading in ranking of
65 countries. Science, Brazil obtained the 59th place ranking. Mathematics is the only
discipline in which Brazilian students of elementary and medium schools showed
improvement in performance, however small. The improvement was not enough for the
country to move forward in the rankings and Brazil fell to the 58th position in
mathematics.
The weaknesses of the education system in Brazil also happen in higher education.
Brazilian universities are also poorly evaluated in international university rankings
released recently by THE (Times Higher Education), the main today. USP and
UNICAMP, for example, our best universities declined in the rankings. The USP, one
of Brazil who was among the 200 best in the world, rose from 158th in 2012 to the
group of 226th to 250th. UNICAMP also fell and went from 251th to 275th (in 2012) to
301th to 350th.
The THE shows that the United States continue to dominate the world rankings. The
best university in the world, Caltech, is American. In addition, 77 of the top 200 in the
world are in US soil. UK also goes well because the University of Oxford equalized
with Harvard and has two more universities in the 'top ten' (Cambridge and Imperial
College). Brazil was the only country that left the group of countries with universities
among the 200 best in the world.
The catastrophic situation in which it is the education system in Brazil demonstrated by
PISA and THE is demanding that perform a revolution in education and no plan as did
the Dilma Rousseff government that is nothing more nor less than a mere letter of
intent. The construction of a bright future for Brazil depends largely what is done in
education. Education is the key to the progress of Brazil.
It is urgent the outbreak of a revolution in the methods or pedagogy of elementary and
medium schools in Brazil taking into account the successful experience of countries
such as Finland, South Korea and Japan, among others, as well as the teachings of
Anísio Teixeira, Paulo Freire and Edgar Morin. To revolutionize teaching methods
conditions would be created conditions to multiply the number of students in Brazil able
to interpret reality in which they live and transform Brazil and the world.

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For the ever-changing world we are living, it is necessary that, through education, be
created a new type of man conscious and well prepared to turn the world to their
advantage. This concept would require, according to Anísio Teixeira, an education in
permanent change, in permanent reconstruction. According to Teixeira, the new school
responsibilities would be to educate rather than to instruct, train free men rather than
docile men and cope with future uncertainties.
Paulo Freire proposed the establishment of "culture circles" that seek to replace the
classrooms in the upright and traditional relationship between the teacher and the
student. Paulo Freire defended the thesis that it was necessary to overcome the
contradiction between the educator who is who always teaches and the student who is
educated, the educator imposing the discipline and the student being disciplined, the
educator who is the speaker and the student the listening, the teacher who prescribes and
the student following the prescription, the teacher who chooses the content of programs
and the student who receives it as "deposit", which is always the educator who knows
and the student who does not know, the educator who is the subject of the process and
educating its object. The purpose of Paulo Freire would be to make the student becomes
a subject that operates and changes the world.
Edgar Morin formulated the seven knowledge to the education of the future proposing
that it prepare students to be able to criticize knowledge itself, to have capacity to
choose the key points within the current abundance of information, to recognize that
belongs to humanity and at the same time, the diversity of our human condition, to
identify our common homeland which is the Earth, and that all human beings have
problems and a common destiny, to think the unexpected, to think uncertainty and
intervene in the future through the present with information obtained in time and the
time and to seek the understanding among human beings avoiding selfishness and
ethnocentrism.
The education system in Brazil in the contemporary era does not allow students to
acquire the knowledge necessary to be able to think and be trained to build a better
world. It is this situation that makes be general misinformation of individuals in Brazil
about what happens in the fields of economy, science and technology, the environment
and international relations, among others. This misinformation reaches the
overwhelming majority of the population causing it is unable to correctly interpret the
reality in which he lives, much less to transform it. Education in Brazil contributes to
the alienation of human beings because it is not thought of as cultivation of the spirit, as
a condition for the advancement of humanity.
The weaknesses of higher education in Brazil happen among other factors due to the
elementary and medium school weaknesses that don´t prepare students with sufficient
capacity to attend university courses. This is the main reason why there is a great
dropout students in various courses offered by the Brazilian University. Besides dealing
with unprepared students from the elementary and medium schools, public university
deals with the lack of resources which limits its performance and, above all, due to lack
of a consistent national education plan.
An educational policy in Brazil should pursue two main objectives: 1) prepare at all
levels of education (infant, elementary, middle, professional and higher) citizens to
build a better world and become active agents in the advancement of humanity; and, 2)
prepare citizens with the highest possible qualification to meet the needs of the labor

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market. These objectives should constitute the basis on which a consistent National
Education Plan should be structured.
In achieving these two great goals, we described above, it´s necessary: 1) to develop
specific training programs and appreciation of teachers at all educational levels and
region of Brazil; 2) to prepare programs for the development of appropriate
methodologies for each level of education and region of Brazil; and 3) to develop
specific programs for strengthening the existing educational infrastructure to adapt it to
the needs at all levels of education taking into account regional specificities.
*Fernando Alcoforado, member of the Bahia Academy of Education, engineer and doctor of Territorial
Planning and Regional Development from the University of Barcelona, a university professor and
consultant in strategic planning, business planning, regional planning and planning of energy systems, is
the author of Globalização (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1997), De Collor a FHC- O Brasil e a Nova
(Des)ordem Mundial (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1998), Um Projeto para o Brasil (Editora Nobel, São
Paulo, 2000), Os condicionantes do desenvolvimento do Estado da Bahia (Tese de doutorado.
Universidade de Barcelona, http://www.tesisenred.net/handle/10803/1944, 2003), Globalização e
Desenvolvimento (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 2006), Bahia- Desenvolvimento do Século XVI ao Século XX
e Objetivos Estratégicos na Era Contemporânea (EGBA, Salvador, 2008), The Necessary Conditions of
the Economic and Social Development-The Case of the State of Bahia (VDM Verlag Dr. Muller
Aktiengesellschaft & Co. KG, Saarbrücken, Germany, 2010), Aquecimento Global e Catástrofe
Planetária (P&A Gráfica e Editora, Salvador, 2010), Amazônia Sustentável- Para o progresso do Brasil e
combate ao aquecimento global (Viena- Editora e Gráfica, Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, São Paulo, 2011),
Os Fatores Condicionantes do Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2012) and
Energia no Mundo e no Brasil- Energia e Mudança Climática Catastrófica no Século XXI (Editora CRV,
Curitiba, 2015).