Nicaragua
A New Challenge: A People’s Education in the Midst of Poverty
Envío team
“What I am calling for is a critical examination of our education system and teaching methods. We should review the contents of this system with the goal of providing an education that is truly responsive to the emergency of our times, in both form and content. We must empower our people once and for all to think of education not as a hierarchical public service, but as a shared responsibility.” (Father Fernando Cardenal, Minister of Education, quoting Sergio Ramírez, Vice President of the Republic, during an education conference in April 1985).
In Diriamba between April 22 and 25 an important conference was held on “Grassroots Education in the Educational Context of the New Nicaragua.” High-level members of the Ministry of Education and education experts from other countries participated in the conference. Together the participants reviewed and analyzed the experiences of five and a half years of education in Nicaragua. The object was to assess the practical achievements since 1979, and consolidate the theoretical and methodological advances so they can be applied to all levels of education in Nicaragua.
An education that is truly relevant for the people, and in the midst of poverty: these are the challenges that confront education in Nicaragua today. Five years of innovating and experimenting have given Nicaraguan educators enough data to begin to confidently build on the worthwhile and discard the ineffective. But one factor above all else dramatically hinders such a reform process: the war. This aggression affects schools, teachers, supplies, and the students themselves.
The 1980 Literacy Crusade and the Grassroots Education Collectives that followed up on that campaign promoted participatory teaching methods. In both, students and teachers learned from each other, drawing upon the new changes in their daily reality to give meaning to their studies. This participatory ideal and its realization to date provides the focus of all current deliberations.
Grassroots education means education for the massesOne of the first steps in making a truly “grassroots” education system is to reach as much of the population as possible. Through the Literacy Crusade, 406,056 people out of a population of 2,700,000 were taught the rudiments of reading and writing. This experience went a long way toward realizing this primary goal of the revolution: that education be a right enjoyed by all.
Since 1978 student enrollment has risen from 501,660 to 1,127,428 in 1984, including those involved in adult education. Preschools, which before 1979 were completely private, have been incorporated into the public school system. Preschool enrollment has risen from 9,000 in 1978 to 70,000 in 1984. The number of teachers has gone from 12,075 to more than 40,000, including the 25,760 teachers from rural areas who direct the Grassroots Education Collectives. In the first five years since the revolution, an average of two schoolrooms was built each day. There are now 1,404 new primary schools and 48 new high schools.
This government effort has provided access to education to the poorest sectors of society, who have traditionally been excluded. In both elementary and high school, the number of students enrolled has increased by 109%. The rate of attendance for children between 7 and 12 years of age has gone from 64.7% in 1978 to almost 80% in 1984. Most of these new students come from the impoverished majority.
Grassroots education is for the workersEducation also becomes grassroots when it addresses the needs and characteristics of the majority, and not just those of the privileged elites. One of the objectives of education in the new Nicaragua, according to the principles drawn from a nationwide grassroots consultation in 1981, is “to shape students in and for creative work, and to develop in them an awareness of the economic, social and cultural value of productive labor, and of the fundamental role of the working class in the formation of the new society.”
Toward this end, a work-study program has been implemented at all educational levels since 1981. Students participate directly in work projects both within the school and in the surrounding community. The jobs are quite diverse: manufacturing clothes and tools, local sanitation, clearing land and harvesting crops. All schools in the country organize Student Production Brigades which take part in the coffee and cotton harvests during vacation months. Some managers of state or private plantations as well as some farm workers object to the brigades because the students are unskilled and, therefore, unproductive workers. But promoters of the brigades maintain that student involvement in tasks requiring sacrifice is important in developing social awareness.
A special application of this concept, called the “Rural Work-Study Schools,” was begun in the countryside in 1981. At present only nine of these schools are operating in Nicaragua, but the results have been encouraging. The schools are full-fledged production centers: poultry farms, vegetable gardens and carpentry shops, in the main. Students graduate with middle-level technical training in agriculture after nine years.
On February 24, 1985, the Ministries of Culture and Education signed an agreement promoting further development of the work-study concept. Classes in traditional crafts were already being developed at the fifth and sixth grade levels. Although these courses are still at the experimental stage, the creativity they stimulate promises to be a good addition to the educational environment.
Refining the strategyIncreasing participation in education and tying education to production have been important steps in creating a new education model. The high level of grassroots participation in Nicaraguan education is unparalleled in the rest of Central America; even Costa Rica cannot match Nicaragua’s enrollment figures. This broad base of participation has survived the effects of the war and should continue to be the strength of Nicaraguan education. The challenge facing the Ministry of Education now is to refine and extend this model so that it is available to all despite the scarcities and insecurities imposed by the war.
Education Minister Father Fernando Cardenal is convinced that the experience accumulated since the Literacy Crusade will provide the basis for the creation of an even more relevant and accessible education system. At the Diriamba conference, Father Cardenal stated, “We must examine our methods and our programs.”
After five years of radical changes in education, this period of examination seems necessary. As one participant acknowledged during the analysis at Diriamba, “The principles and goals of the new education system are well defined, but we still lack the strategy and tactics to achieve these goals.”
It is now becoming evident that the principles are not more important than the methods of bringing them alive for the students. Inadequate methods have often prevented a real integration of work and study. Instead of a dialectic relationship between the two, there has been mere juxtaposition; first you study, divorced from reality, then you work. The lesson of this can be applied in all aspects: revolutionary content cannot be communicated with traditional methods.
In search of improved teaching methods, Father Cardenal, who coordinated the Literacy Crusade, is returning to that experience, and to the adult education programs that followed it. These projects achieved mass participation and created an appropriate methodology as they went, based on their own discoveries in practice. Teachers were trained in workshops where they formulated principles collectively. Both projects succeeded in incorporating daily experience into the adult education process. The spirit of these achievements must be brought to bear in questioning the authoritarian teaching methods that are still generally applied in formal education.
Other programs, too, have successfully tested innovative teaching methods. Student participation initiatives used in the preschool Child Development Centers should also be applied at other levels, as should programs used in the Filemón Rivera Institute to raise the academic level of the army and the police.
By the beginning of next year the Ministry of Education expects to have finished restructuring the process. This will be based on a complete evaluation, reaching even those areas reviewed in past years. Such questions as this are being asked: how can secondary students in Northern Zelaya be expected to carry eight courses, including English and French, when this zone is impoverished and immersed in war?
Evaluators are also asking if it is reasonable to expect all students to complete the same amount of homework. Many students come from poor families and spend the majority of their time outside of class working to contribute to the family income. They live in such impoverished, overcrowded homes, sometimes without a table or even electricity, that it is impossible to complete homework assignments. The ambitions of the education project must conform to these harsh realities. The scarcity of materials and the disruption caused by the war (military service, rural-urban displacement, etc.) also necessitate projects of limited scope and a great deal of flexibility.
“When we speak of grassroots education,” says Father Cardenal, “we are not necessarily referring to projects bearing that name in Latin America. These have undoubtedly been worthy efforts, but here in Nicaragua we refer to certain methodological tendencies without giving a stamp of approval to the concrete experience of other countries. Instead, we want to promote methods that we believe can completely transform the education system. When we speak of grassroots education we are talking about an education based in concrete reality, from which students can use science to seek answers to their questions.”
An education in the midst of poverty and warThe determining factor in Nicaragua’s “concrete reality” today is the war. When the plans and programs of the new educational system were drawn up in 1979-80, Nicaragua was living in relative tranquility. The counterrevolution was nothing more than a few small bands with limited resources pillaging along the border. The goals set then—to contribute to the reconstruction of the nation and the formation of a new consciousness—are the same today, but the contradictions of the country have changed drastically.
According to Ministry of Education data, 800 schools are now closed for reasons relating directly or indirectly to the war. Twenty-seven have been totally destroyed by the counterrevolutionaries. A few, such as those in the Pantasma valley, have been rebuilt by international brigades in safer areas, but in the areas where the fighting is most intense, schools cannot be kept open due to constant contra threats. But the worst effects of the aggression have been suffered by human beings. One hundred and seventy rural teachers have been assassinated, some of them tortured first, as a warning to the rest of the community not to participate in any government projects. Another 133 rural teachers have been kidnapped by the contras; it can be assumed that at least some are dead.
In addition to the victims of counterrevolutionary terrorism, large numbers of youth are now serving in the armed forces. The reserve battalions, peasant militias and regular forces have many students and teachers whose studies or careers have been interrupted by the war.
The war has also created a tremendous shortage of educational materials, a problem that is only exacerbated by the US embargo. For the school year that began in March, there were only 500,000 pencils to meet a demand for 14 million. There is a shortage of paper to print textbooks and notebooks, and a shortage of uniforms. Added to the already difficult conditions imposed by underdevelopment, the aggression has succeeded in keeping the Nicaraguan educational system impoverished.
The priorities of defense together with measures to combat inflation have led to a freeze on education spending for 1985. During the two previous years, as the military aggression increased, the government proclaimed three “untouchable” priorities: defense, health and education. Now only the first two are budgeted for growth. “This year, we’re not even going to build one school,” said the Minister of Education, “and we will be hard put to repair what we have already built. We have to forget our dreams of great buildings, with big laboratories. Instead we must respond to these shortages with effort, faith, and better teaching.”
Totalitarian education?For years some Nicaraguan opposition sectors have characterized the new education as a totalitarian project, politicized and destined to destroy the family and undermine people’s religious beliefs. The complaints have centered on such issues as freedom of curriculum, the right to private education, the rights of the family and the Church, and the dangers of Marxist atheism. At times the polemic has become quite abrasive and unhelpful, and it is almost always encouraged by political sectors tied to education, such as UNAPAFACC, the Nicaraguan Union of Parents of Children in Catholic Schools. For the past few years, educational practice has respected private and religious secondary schools and has not interfered in religious teaching. This is calming some critics, but not all.
The debate has gained new momentum over past few months. On April 13, La Prensa’s front page carried the following headline in extra-large type: “Parents Reject Political Control of Children, Reject Education Proposal.” The article below consisted of an open letter to Father Cardenal from the Board of Directors of UNAPAFACC. The letter made reference to a supposed educational plan aimed at all primary school children which would “oblige” them to participate in a series of activities such as political discussions, field trips, military practice, etc., “designed to promote class hatred, violence and a proclivity for weapons and warfare.” The letter also denounced the pressures that Catholic schools are experiencing due to the political and Marxist-Leninist content of the education programs. To raise the noise level of the debate, copies of the letter were sent to the Vatican, the Nicaraguan bishops, and the Latin American Bishops Council.
A few days later, Father Cardenal issued a sober statement in which he pointed out that the “plan” denounced in the letter was merely a proposal that had not even been studied, much less approved. As he has done before, Cardenal met with the members of the National Federation of Catholic Schools, an organization of Catholic school directors. In this meeting Cardenal stressed that he should always be presented directly with any complaints about the principles or programs of the educational system that conflict with Christian values.
Thirteen percent of primary school students and eighteen percent of secondary students are enrolled in private education. Ninety percent of the private educational institutions are run by Catholic priests or nuns. Since 1979, the Ministry of Education has signed agreements with 20 religious congregations, and presently subsidizes 114 religious schools.
The new education does not introduce “politics” where during the time of Somoza there were none. In that individualistic educational system politics were conveyed in a masked form, whereas now they are made explicit from a revolutionary perspective. Therefore, when opposition spokespeople denounce “politicized” education, they are not calling for an “apolitical” system. The problem lies in the particular political focus of the current project, which they don’t share.
Now that the electoral period has passed, it appears that the education issue is being used to provoke and confuse popular sentiment. By claiming that religion is under attack in the new educational system, the opposition is using the sensibilities of some very traditional religious people to increase tensions between them and the government.
The role of private education in this process of review and revision is seen as very important. In many cases the private institutions have more money and more qualified personnel than their public counterparts. These advantages give them the opportunity to act as laboratories for the new participatory methods. Not all private schools are against the government’s educational programs, and some have collaborated closely with the Ministry of Education since the beginning of the revolution.
Shortcomings in the current systemThe existing system is not without its problems. The most obvious one is an excessive centralization and bureaucracy in the education system. The effort to increase its scope to include the entire population generated a centralized structure, which was necessary at first to assure the efficacy of the system and to guarantee that the new programs would be put into practice. Also, a certain amount of centralization was necessary for continuity of content and methods. At the same time, the Ministry of Education quickly filled with people who had taken part in the insurrection and now wanted to work. This led to a multiplication of jobs and stifled the flexibility and decisiveness necessary for the successful implementation of new ideas.
Bureaucratism has also given rise to wasteful practices, such as continuous visits of inspectors to the schools. Some private schools received as many as 30 such visits in 1984. Teachers are also required to attend an excessive number of planning and political meetings, often during class time.
Steps are being taken to correct these faults and to decentralize. This year the Ministry’s budget is being cut by 10%, and the reductions will directly affect administrative expenditures. More autonomy is being granted to regional officials regarding salaries and appointments.
More serious still are pedagogical shortcomings. Many teachers with long years of experience consider it perfectly normal to present the new material with traditional teaching methods. They maintain their old, safe authority by refusing to allow open discussion in the classroom, and failing to seek creative methods to stimulant student interest. Although the traditional methods made for fewer discipline problems and reduced the teacher’s workload, they did not always provide the best education. This whole traditional style, which seeks not the best but the easiest, is being challenged.
Teachers will therefore be particularly challenged by this process. Their union has traditionally been viewed as conservative, especially in defending professional practices. During the coming months, they will be conducting a process of study and discussion as well. Their contributions, added to the analysis of technical commissions that are evaluating the textbooks and programs, will be the first fruits of the educational reform.
The majority of Nicaragua’s newer teachers have received very brief training and, as a result, many are poorly prepared. The shortage of qualified teachers in Nicaragua to deal with the educational expansion after the triumph left no alternative but to train teachers on the job. In 1979, there were five teaching schools in Nicaragua, with 1,977 students; today there are twelve, with more than 5,000 students. In 1979, 37% of the teachers who taught there had no formal training as teachers.
Nicaragua’s rapid expansion in student enrollment would not have been possible without the assistance of the international community. The work of volunteer teachers, especially the Cubans, has been invaluable. Since 1984 all the positions they left vacant are being filled by Nicaraguans. Because these new teachers are mainly youths, they are adapting easily to new methods that emphasize student participation and the integration of the classroom into daily life.
Cuba has provided other important forms of assistance to Nicaragua’s education system as well. Last year 1,600 Nicaraguan students received teacher training in Cuba. They were joined by 2,000 teachers with adult education experience from rural communities and poor neighborhoods. The courses were designed in Nicaragua and the majority of the professors were Nicaraguan, but Cuba offered classrooms, and room and board, thus providing the conditions for intensive study. By the end of the year, 1,500 of these students were teaching in the rural area of Nicaragua. Next July, the remaining 2,000 will enter the field, teaching grades one through four in rural schools and cooperatives.
Another problem in the present education system is the lack of coordination between primary and secondary teaching, in the hands of the Ministry of Education, and the university-level programs, under the auspices of the National Council of Higher Education. The latter has set high admission standards for many programs in an effort to produce fully qualified professional graduates, while the former has geared its programs toward the masses, with the goal of providing necessary skills to the majority as quickly as possible.
This has created a gulf between the two levels that students have difficulty bridging. Both approaches have their merits, but many feel that the crisis precipitated by the war and the flight of professionals make traditional criteria for qualification unrealistic, and that Nicaragua’s interests would be better served by shorter degree programs, directed at the country’s most urgent needs. In his inaugural address for the 1985 academic year, Vice President Sergio Ramírez himself called upon the universities to employ austerity and creativity in adapting to the effects of the war and underdevelopment.
The university authorities have responded by prioritizing technical programs and creating a special faculty to prepare peasant and poor urban youth for these professions. After completing sixth grade, these youths will receive three years of specialized training to qualify them for courses in some of these prioritized professions.
ConclusionThe basic model for a grassroots education system, one that serves the real needs of its people, has been established in Nicaragua. In it education and productive labor are united, and a spirit of collaboration is fostered. These distinctive features are more necessary then ever, with the decrease in educational facilities, and the need to share scarce materials. This dynamic compatibility of principles and constraints means that Nicaragua could become the first country in Latin America to launch such a substantial and daring change in its education process.
The inability to make long term plans also makes a creative, flexible approach indispensable. Education must remain fluid because Nicaragua’s reality is fluid, so there will have to be a continual readjustment between ideal and reality. It would be easy for the reforms to become nothing more than a response to limitations imposed by US aggression, but the foundations already laid can counter the destructive effects of US policy while at the same time preparing young Nicaraguans for a peaceful and productive future.
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