Um estudo acerca da gestão democrática nas escolas públicas do Ceará (2007-2010) : avanços e recuos

Abstract

The present Master's dissertation titles “A study concerning the democratic management in the public high schools of Brazilian State of Ceará in the period 2007-2010: advances and regressions”. The overall purpose was to analyze the public policy of democratic and participative management in the public high schools of Ceará state in the period of study. Also, this work assessed whether this public policy provided advances or regressions in relation to public policy established since 1995. Firstly, the Brazilian education policy was discussed, focusing its democratic management since the concepts of reform, State and democracy. In this context, the historical perspective of democratic management in Brazil, and the breakdown and the progress of the Constitutional principle since 90’s were also discussed. This study highlighted the democratic management in Ceara state, in the context of reforms, and its relationship with the federal and regional political power. For that, qualitative methods were utilized. As research source, official documents of educational policy were analyzed. In addition, interviews with population related to Secretaria da Educação, 6ª Coordenadoria Regional de Desenvolvimento da Educação (6ª CREDE), north region of Ceará state, were carried out, namely: students, parents, teachers, directors and coordinators of two schools, regarding democracy, autonomy and participation as categories. The theoretical referential that supported this work based on previous studies, such as that performed by Arelaro (2000), Barroso (2011), Bastos (2002), Bobbio (2000), Frigotto (2004, 2011), Hora (2006), Krawczyk (1999, 2000, 2008), Leitão (2010), Marques (2007), Oliveira (2004, 2009) and Vieira (2002, 2007, 2011) among others, which have discussed the democratic management and concepts of autonomy, participation and State reform. The findings of the present study indicate the democratic management established in the period 2007-2010 does not represent an experience of democracy progress, whereas it reproduces the model recommended by education policies since almost twenty years ago in Ceará state. However, the evaluated democratic management maintains the community participation tools. The educational policy of democratic management performed in the public high schools of Ceará state is based on the concept of “management by results”. This concept is present on the aims guidelines of the large-scale evaluations in the monitoring and following of democratic management. On the other hand, there are contradictory results, whereas the election process for scholar directors by community is considered an advance, but also a regression. It was also identified some mechanisms of community participation such as Student’s Association and Scholar Council, but these committees seemed be weak. Finally, the democratic management policy is a principle of educational system that contributes for an effective democratization of public high schools of Brazilian State of Ceará, which show significant progress despite of regressions.