Pedro Henrique Silva Sanches

Privatization of State Universities in Brazil

The Education System in Brazil is going through a very critical period. More
and more students from private schools are studying in public universities, which are
free of costs in the country. Due to the lack of significant investments on basic
education, many public schools do not have an adequate structure, such as teaching
materials, books, computers, and well-prepared teachers, to prepare their students for
finding their places on the best universities. To solve problems of social inequality
related to education, the current government is planning to privatize the public
universities instead of providing a basic public education of quality. That is the best
strategy ever!
Arguing that 60% of the students from state universities like USP, Unicamp and
UNESP could afford to pay the same tuition of well-known private universities, such as
PUC, some politicians intend to implement the same system of developed countries,
such as the USA where even the state colleges have a paid-tuition system. However,
none of those politicians has taken into account the fact that student debt in America
now exceeds $1 trillion, which is a huge menace for the countrys economy.
Nowadays, hundreds of students from lower-income families have to give up on
going to college because they do not have enough money for essential needs such as
food and accommodation. This number would even go up if they had to pay tuition fees.
If universities like USP were privatized, students would pay twice, since public
universities are sponsored by ICMS (Brazilian Tax on Trade of Goods). The same
discrepancy happens in the health system, in which, besides having to pay taxes that
would be supposedly destined to the improvement of hospitals, people have to resort to
expensive private health plans to have a healthcare of quality.
To conclude, the Brazilians should claim for their rights for a good public
system of education. Instead of blaming the students for the huge debt which is
devastating state universities, the government should assume their irresponsibility and
inefficiency to manage those universities and to provide a good basic education which
would balance the scales of social inequality. The current political scenario well known
for the corruption and apathy, which has plagued the population for decades, needs to be
changed.