EDUCATION-ARGENTINA: TV or Reforms to Blame for Poor Performance?

By Marcela Valente Reprint | | Print |

Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES, Feb 23 1998 (IPS) - Teachers and analysts in Argentina spurned remarks by Minister of Education Susana Decibe, who blamed TV for poor student performance.

While Decibe urged students to watch less TV, experts blamed recent demonstrations of poor performance by high school students on a government programme for reforming the educational system, which has enjoyed little support among teachers.

The most shocking indication came when not one of 1,727 aspiring medical students passed the entrance exam to the University of La Plata’s Medical School.

Results were not much better in the Faculty of Exact Sciences of La Plata, the capital of the province of Buenos Aires, where only 25 percent passed the entrance exam, which was wholly based on courses given in high school.

Only five percent of 1,900 students passed the entrance exam for the Faculty of Exact Sciences in Rosario, a city located in the province of Santa Fe, northwest of Buenos Aires. Performance was shown to be especially poor in mathematics.

And only four of 540 students made it into the La Plata Faculty of Veterinary Sciences.

Minister Decibe warned last week that young people should watch less TV and do four hours a day of homework, thus blaming families for the students’ shortcomings.

But many critics argue that the problem lies in the educational reform plan.

Teacher Adriana Puiggros pointed out that the programme, which included changes in content and standards, had received little support among teachers, and was not providing the hoped-for results in terms of performance among high school students.

Mariano Nardowsky, a graduate in Education Sciences, said that when all students failed a particular exam, the first thing to do was to evaluate the test itself.

Nardowsky added that TV was not necessarily an enemy of students, but could even be an ally.

He cited a study carried out in 1997 by the firm Espacio Media Tester, which found that children and teenagers in Argentina – who spend six hours a day in school – watched TV for an average of four hours and 20 minutes a day. The study also found that in low- income homes, those who watched the most TV performed better in school.

Argentina’s educational system has been in crisis for years. Teachers taking turns fasting in a tent outside Congress since April have been demanding a law guaranteeing financing for the educational system, higher salaries, improved training for teachers and new installations.

The teachers and Minister Decibe have been at loggerheads, because the protesters’ demands have not yet evoked a response.

Teachers in this Southern Cone nation earn an average salary of 300 dollars a month, compared to a minimum of 500 for a factory worker or domestic.

Sociologist Emilio Tenti, a researcher with the UN children’s fund, UNICEF, pointed out to IPS that the reform of the educational system did not have the support of the teachers, who were chiefly responsible for its implementation, and that the results of that disagreement were starting to be seen.

“We have buildings, teachers giving class, students graduating. But the students are not really learning, they are not acquiring knowledge or developing aptitudes,” said Tenti, an expert in education.