Democratic management of schools in Brazil: challenges for the implementation of a new model

Abstract

The democratic management of Brazilian public schools is a guiding principle defined by the 1988 Constitution and endorsed by the 1996 Lei de Diretrizes e Bases da Educação Nacional (Law of Directives and Bases of National Education). Its implementation in the public school system allows its association to the emergence of a new school management model, where traces of a client and patrimonial state as well as a management conception live together, fueled by large-scale assessment processes and other large scale evaluation measures in the Brazilian educational system. In order to capture this movement, this article discusses advances in the Brazilian legislation and initial policies aimed at strengthening the democratic management, seeking to associate them with problems studied in a sample of teachers and managers of public schools in order to understand the guide lines of public school management in Brazil. We used documentary analysis of legal documents and government initiatives in this area and also data obtained through questionnaires answered by principals and teachers, applied by the 2011 Sistema de Avaliação da Educação Básica (Saeb) Prova Brasil (System of Basic Education Evaluation (Saeb) Test Brazil) particularly those associated with the proposed theme. The reflection is presented in four distinct topics covering: 1) the principle of democratic management in the Brazilian legislation, since the 1988 Constitution until the Plano Nacional de Educação – PNE (the National Education Plan – pne) approved in 2014; 2) education policy initiatives to strengthen that principle; 3) school management features from the perspective of teachers and school principals; and 4) considerations of management practices that are opposed to the proposed model.