Page 12 - aruba-today-20190503

A12 WORLD NEWS
Friday 3 May 2019
Brazil's Bolsonaro wants police in schools, discipline code

By DIANE JEANTET "If for instance there is any
ERALDO PERES kind of friction between stu-
Associated Press dents, the monitor is going
BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) — to go talk with the students,
When students at Ceil- call the parents to solve the
andia state school No. 7 in problem," he said.
Brazil's capital came back It doesn't always work out
from their break in Febru- in such calm fashion. A
ary, they were met by two video posted this month
dozen uniformed police of- on the internet news por-
ficers in a place they barely tal G1 shows police officers
recognized anymore. intervening in a fight in the
Guns in their holsters, the school's gymnasium. Foot-
officers ordered students age shows an officer body-
to form rows in the school- slamming a student to the
yard. The students were ground.
given white T-shirts pend- In Ceilandia, a crowded
ing the arrival of their new working-class neighbor-
uniforms. From now on, hood on the outskirts of
hair would have to be kept Brazil's capital, violence
short for boys and tied at against teachers was not
the back for girls. No more so much the problem. But
shorts, caps, brightly col- drug traffickers operated
ored nail varnish, earrings unfettered around the
or any distinctive pieces of In this March 28, 2019 photo, a Military Police officer oversees students as they form up to sing the school and vagabonds
clothing. Students arriving national anthem and raise the flag at the Ceilandia state school No. 7 in Brasilia, Brazil. were regularly seen drink-
late wouldn't be let in. Associated Press ing and using drugs in the
"Sometimes we feel in- area.
timidated," said Michael program in a school must ated with protection from In 2016, the head of educa- When the news came out
Pereira da Silva, 17, who be approved by a major- violence," said Robert Mug- tion for police in the state that the school would enter
was against the decision to ity of parents, teachers and gah, research director at of Goias revised the school in a partnership with the po-
hire police to instill military- school staff in a referen- the Brazilian think tank Iga- system's internal regulation lice, many parents sought
like discipline in the school. dum. rape. that normalized "expul- to sign up their kids. Some
"Just going out into the hall, The Ceilandia school is one The expansion is a flagship sions" and "forced trans- arrived two days before
we are obligated to bow of four in Brasilia that voted measure of the Bolsonaro fers" of students. The move the school opened, camp-
our heads or say hello to to take part. Officials in Bra- administration although followed a recommenda- ing outside to make sure
police officers." zil's capital hope to add 36 the Education Ministry says tion from state prosecutors to get a spot for their child
Although experiments be- more schools by the end of it has no data on how who argued that expulsions when the doors opened.
gan in previous years, the the year and reach a total many such schools existed from public schools must re- Students must line up in the
quasi-military approach of 200 by 2022. Bolsonaro's or studies on long-term main a last recourse. school yard daily, heels to-
is one of the most visible administration is pushing benefits of the model. "It's not for everyone, that's gether, arms straight along
educational efforts being similar expansions nation- Besides putting police in for sure," said Mauro Olivei- their bodies, heads looking
championed under new wide, though it has yet to more schools, Bolsonaro's ra, deputy-secretary at the straight forward toward the
President Jair Bolsonaro, a say how many it plans to administration has been Brasilia state education school's Brazilian flag.
far-right former army cap- convert across the country. pushing for other changes ministry. Only a small num- "We must prepare our fu-
tain who campaigned on Some states have been ex- in public education, ac- ber of students have been ture starting today," Freire,
promises to improve Bra- ploring the model since the cusing it of being filled with turned away from their the head officer, told stu-
zilian schools, which are early 2000s, but a large ex- "Marxist ideology." The Edu- schools since police ar- dents lining up on a recent
widely recognized as a pansion worries many edu- cation Ministry has talked rived, he said, arguing the day.
problem. A 2015 study by cation experts and teach- of revising history textbooks ends justify the means. During his speech, police
the Organization for Eco- ers' unions, who say such to refer to Brazil's 1964-1985 The administration says it is officers walked down the
nomic Cooperation and schools can become ex- dictatorship as a "demo- targeting violent and low- rows, checking students'
Development ranked ed- clusionary and go against cratic regime of force" and performing schools or those posture and writing down
ucational performance the concept of a free, of excising references to in at-risk areas, where drug the names of those break-
in Brazil as 63rd out of 72 open-to-all public school- feminism, homosexuality trafficking takes place or ing any rule.
countries and regions. ing system. and violence against wom- paramilitary groups oper- The school's director, Adri-
Schools now being co-run They argue that these en. Most recently, Bolson- ate. ana De Barros, said that in
by police are modeled on schools have managed to aro said public funding for "We're not talking about just two months discipline
Brazil's exclusive military improve results because sociology and philosophy normal schools," Oliveira has improved. Petty crime
colleges, which tend to problematic students are could be eliminated. said. He cited cases of stu- has also gone down, Freire
perform better than most quietly replaced by bet- In recent years, some dents and teachers not said.
public schools — a fact ter-performing ones, of- schools taken over by the being able to go to school Adriana da Silva, the par-
that makes many parents ten from wealthier back- police have garnered because they were bullied ent of 17-year-old student
eager to see similarly rigid grounds. Another red flag headlines when prosecu- or threatened. "Is this not Vitor, said it was "amazing"
discipline. for critics is the introduction tors have had to intervene exclusion as well?" that it was April and she
Under the model, teach- of guns in schools, particu- after officers began charg- According to the head had not been called in by
ing remains in the hands larly in the nation that leads ing monthly fees to parents, officer in Ceilandia state the school to discuss the
of the Education Ministry, the world in total homicides imposed expensive uni- school No. 7, Edney Freire, teen's conduct even once.
while police officers over- each year, the majority forms or sought to set aside the duties of police officers, "He used to get in trouble.
see discipline and enforce from firearms. half of the school's places called "monitors," include Now he wants to become
a new code of conduct. "Increased gun access and for children of police offi- making sure students don't a military man," da Silva
Implementation of the pilot possession are not associ- cers. fight. said.q