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Second generation of privatization of education in São Paulo: the systemic articulation of business actors 1 Responsible Editor: Chantal Victória Medaets. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7834-3834 2 2 References correction and bibliographic normalization services: Ailton Júnior (Tikinet) - revisao@tikinet.com.br 3 3 English version: Sabrina Leitzke (Tikinet) - traducao@tikinet.com.br 4 4 Funding: The article is the result of research funded by Fapesp, proc.2019/11681-5 and Fapesp, proc.2019/12230-7

Abstract

This article analyzes the 2nd generation of public education privatization in São Paulo. Such categorization stems from a study of the processes that institutionalized the incidence of the private business sector in education since 1995. The period corresponds to the effectiveness of Resolution SEE no. 24, of April 5, 2005, during the Alckmin administration, which incorporated the recently created Associação Parceiros da Educação, a network of entrepreneurs, and instituted the Empresa Educadora program. The documentary research and the analysis of the educational offer conditions in 21 school units in the state of São Paulo indicated that the objective of promoting the improvement of the educational offer conditions was not verified. Corporate action in educational policy in an articulated way, however, was implemented.

Keywords
privatization of education; public school education; São Paulo

Resumo

O objetivo deste artigo é analisar o que se designa aqui como segunda geração da privatização da educação pública paulista. Tal categorização decorre de estudo sobre processos que institucionalizam a incidência do setor privado empresarial na educação a partir de 1995. Analisou-se o período em que esteve em vigência a Resolução SEE nº 24, de 5 de abril de 2005, no governo Geraldo Alckmin, que incorporou a recém-criada Associação Parceiros da Educação a uma rede de empresários, e instituiu o programa Empresa Educadora. A pesquisa documental e a análise das condições de oferta em 21 unidades escolares no estado de São Paulo indicaram que o programa não alterou a qualidade da oferta educativa, todavia, foi implementada a presença articulada do setor empresarial na definição da política educacional.

Palavras-chave
privatização do ensino; educação escolar pública; São Paulo

Introduction

This article aims to analyze what is designated here as the second generation of privatization of public education in São Paulo, implemented under the administration of the Brazilian Social Democracy Party (PSDB). The analysis of the processes that institutionalize initiatives of the business sector for education in the state from the perspective of “generations” is related to the advancement in the forms of incidence of private actors: from fragmented actions to systemic interventions in educational policy.

The private actors highlighted are those recognized by the literature as philanthrocapitalists (Adrião, 2018Adrião, T. (2018). Dimensões e formas da privatização da educação no Brasil: caracterização a partir de mapeamento de produções nacionais e internacionais. Currículo sem Fronteiras, 18, 8-28. Recuperado de https://www.curriculosemfronteiras.org/vol18iss1articles/adriao.pdf
https://www.curriculosemfronteiras.org/v...
; Bishop & Green, 2008Bishop, M., & Green, M. (2008). Philanthrocapitalism: How rich can save the world. Bloomsbury Press.). Recently, Nicoletta Dentico, author of Ricchi e buoni? Le trame oscure del filantrocapitalismo5 5 The work, still without translation, was published in 2020 by Editora EMI, Italy. , noted that philanthrocapitalism is an operational model of entrepreneurship that intertwines humanitarian action with business action, in order to “lubricate the gears of companies, mostly multinational industries, to favor their progressive penetration and influence in the places of political decision, at the international level” (Dentico, 2020Dentico, N. (2020, 23 de novembro). “O líquido amniótico do filantrocapitalismo é a desigualdade.” Entrevista com Nicoletta Dentico. Instituto Humanitas Unisinos. Recuperado de http://www.ihu.unisinos.br/78-noticias/604886-o-liquido-amnioticodo-filantrocapitalismo-e-a-desigualdade-entrevista-com-nicoletta-dentico
http://www.ihu.unisinos.br/78-noticias/6...
).

In the context of the research that analyzed educational policies in São Paulo under the administration of PSDB in recent decades6 6 The research, coordinated by Marcia Jacomini and Sérgio Stoco and supported by Fapesp, addressed different aspects of São Paulo’s educational policy. and the research “Análise do mapeamento das estratégias de privatização da educação básica no Brasil: atores, programas e consequências para a educação pública”7 7 The research, coordinated by Theresa Adrião and supported by Fapesp, has as empirical field the 26 Brazilian state education networks, in addition to the Federal District. The study, of interinstitutional nature, takes place within the scope of the Group of Study and Research in Educational Policies (Greppe). , the study of privatization processes allowed us to understand the progress of these same private business actors in a dynamic that begins when the government produces regulations with a view to accepting business proposals still in a fragmented way, which we call first generation (Adrião et al.., 2020Adrião, T.; Garcia, T.; Drabach, N. (2020). Influência de atores privados na educação paulista: a primeira geração da privatização. Políticas Educativas, 13(2), p. 96. Recuperado de https://www.seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/view/107517
https://www.seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/...
), based on the Resolution of the State Secretariat of Education, Resolution SEE 234/1995. A decade later, the government reformulated the legislation and incorporated as a partner an association formed by entrepreneurs, the Associação Parceiros Da Educação (Education Partners Association), a network of entrepreneurs who articulated around the experiences of supporting São Paulo schools in previously atomized actions. The Resolution introduces a second generation of privatization in São Paulo education, which is the object of this article.

As in a previous study (Adrião et al.., 2020Adrião, T.; Garcia, T.; Drabach, N. (2020). Influência de atores privados na educação paulista: a primeira geração da privatização. Políticas Educativas, 13(2), p. 96. Recuperado de https://www.seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/view/107517
https://www.seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/...
), we are based on the following assumptions: the induction of privatization of São Paulo's public education is constitutive of the educational policy implemented by the PSDB’s administration, with Resolution no. 234-1995 as its original milestone8 8 Resolution no. 234, of October 2, 1995, establishes the Escola em Parceria program (Adrião et al., 2020). (Adrião et al., 2020Adrião, T.; Garcia, T.; Drabach, N. (2020). Influência de atores privados na educação paulista: a primeira geração da privatização. Políticas Educativas, 13(2), p. 96. Recuperado de https://www.seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/view/107517
https://www.seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/...
); the processes of privatization of Education result from the performance of business-based actors and inaugurate in São Paulo education practices called “risky philanthropy” (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, 2014Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. (2014). Venture Philanthropy in Development: Dynamics, Challenges and Lessons in the Search for Greater Impact. OECD Development Centre.) or philanthrocapitalism (Bishop & Green, 2008Bishop, M., & Green, M. (2008). Philanthrocapitalism: How rich can save the world. Bloomsbury Press.); finally, the articulation between this segment of entrepreneurship and different governments has presented different degrees over the past two decades. This article, with these assumptions, analyzes the period of institution of two programs involving segments of the private sector: the programs Escola da Família9 9 Gabriel Chalita, responsible for the Education agenda from April 2002 to April 2006, instituted “Escola da Família” among the priority programs, with the opening of school buildings on weekends for activities involving the community living around the school (Santos, 2019), which had the partnership of Unesco. (Family School) and Empresa Educadora (Company that Educates), the latter focusing on operationalizing the second generation privatization of education in São Paulo.10 10 In 2012, with the creation of the Educação Compromisso São Paulo government program, expression of corporate administration within the scope of SEE-SP, the initial milestone of third generation privatization starts, as described by the authors.

Resolution SEE no. 24, of April 5, 2005, introduced by the Geraldo Alckmin administration, reformulates the Escola em Parceria (School in Partnership) program by the creation of the Empresa Educadora program, the coordination of which was delegated to the Associação Parceiros da Educação, although under the supervision of the Education Development Foundation (FDE), an autarchy of the State Secretariat of Education. It is understood that this transfer from a government program to private actors establishes the second generation of privatization in São Paulo basic education and inaugurates the systematic and articulated incidence of these actors in the definition and operationalization of educational policies in the state.

The information systematized here were obtained from primary and secondary sources and include: consultation and study of the standard that establishes and regulates the Empresa Educadora program; characterization of private actors, using research on official pages of the state government and private institutions; consultation of national school censuses and databases of the State Secretariat of Education of São Paulo.

We sought to characterize the actors regularly articulated around the Associação Parceiros da Educação. For this purpose, we consulted an article published by the Secretariat of Education that informed the set of companies that joined the Empresa Educadora program in 2007. This indication, collated with information collected by Perinasso (2011)Perinasso, C. (2011). Parcerias público-privadas em educação: construção de sujeitos. [Dissertação de mestrado]. Unicid. http://arquivos.cruzeirodosuleducacional.edu.br/principal/old/mestrado_educacao/dissertacoes/2011/dissertacao_claudio_perinasso.pdf
http://arquivos.cruzeirodosuleducacional...
and Adrião (2015), was taken as a reference to identify the business actors that most organically integrated the Associação Parceiros da Educação between 2007, the first year with localized information, and 2013.

Studies conducted by Lourenço (2014)Lourenço, P. R. (2014). Cidadania e Responsabilidade Social: um estudo de caso em uma Organização não governamental de São Paulo – SP [Dissertação de mestrado]. Unisal. https://unisal.br/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/25.02.14Disserta%C3%A7%C3%A3o-Paulo-Robertolourenco.pdf
https://unisal.br/wp-content/uploads/201...
, Guimarães (2004), Martins (2019)Martins, E. (2019). Empresariamento da educação básica na américa latina: redes empresariais em prol educação. [Tese de doutorado]. Repositório Unicamp. http://repositorio.unicamp.br/bitstream/REPOSIP/335551/1/Martins_ErikaMoreir a_D.pdf
http://repositorio.unicamp.br/bitstream/...
, and Perinasso (2011)Perinasso, C. (2011). Parcerias público-privadas em educação: construção de sujeitos. [Dissertação de mestrado]. Unicid. http://arquivos.cruzeirodosuleducacional.edu.br/principal/old/mestrado_educacao/dissertacoes/2011/dissertacao_claudio_perinasso.pdf
http://arquivos.cruzeirodosuleducacional...
also were important sources in the data collection on private actors and on the Empresa Educadora program.

The consequences of privatization for education in the selected educational units, in turn, were analyzed from: information contained in the set of microdata of the School Censuses of the Anísio Teixeira National Research Institute (Inep); and information available in the database of the Evaluation System of the state of São Paulo (Saresp). In both cases, information were selected for 21 school units that remained in the program for at least five years. The five-year period was considered a selection criterion because it extrapolated a government administration, indicating constancy in the actions proposed by the “partners,” a condition that, in theory, would lead to satisfactory results regarding the objectives declared by the program: improvement in the conditions of supply of school units and student performance.

The schools were selected from a list of units that integrated the Empresa Educadora program between 2005 and 2010, provided by FDE. Once the school units were selected, information were collected about the conditions of educational offer in each school, based on the studies by Carreira and Pinto (2007)Carreira, D., & Pinto, J. M. R. (2007). Custo aluno-qualidade inicial: rumo à educação pública de qualidade no Brasil. Global. and Dourado and Ferreira (2009)Dourado, L. F., & Oliveira, J. F. (2009). A qualidade da educação: perspectivas e desafios. Cadernos CEDES, 29(78), 201-215. https://doi.org/10.1590/S010132622009000200004
https://doi.org/10.1590/S010132622009000...
, which establish relationships between inputs and quality of education. Information related to the general conditions of teaching offer, physical facilities, and availability of equipment were considered. Finally, student performance was analyzed from the information on the official website of Saresp11 11 The limitation of the index to evaluate the quality of the educational proposal in a school is recognized. Despite this, the results measured by Saresp were adopted as data, since the program refers to it. .

The study is organized in this article in the following four items: the first presents the regulations and the Empresa Educadora program; then the business performance is analyzed by the Associação Parceiros da Educação; the third item addresses the information obtained on student performance and educational offer conditions in the 21 units selected for the five-year period. Finally, the results and considerations that can be reached with the study are presented.

Resolution SEE 24/2005 and the Empresa Educadora Program

Resolution SEE 24/2005 was published during Alckmin’s first term as elected governor, in 200212 12 Geraldo Alckmin took over as governor of the state in 2001, when Mario Covas, the then governor, died. In the following election, he was elected governor for the period from 2003 to 2006. In 2011, Alckmin was again elected, remaining at the head of the executive branch for two consecutive terms, until 2018, reaching almost 14 years in the government of the state of São Paulo. .

The legal document amended the Resolution SE no. 234/1995, which, in the first PSDB administration, institutionally introduced business activities along with school units (Adrião et al., 2020Adrião, T.; Garcia, T.; Drabach, N. (2020). Influência de atores privados na educação paulista: a primeira geração da privatização. Políticas Educativas, 13(2), p. 96. Recuperado de https://www.seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/view/107517
https://www.seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/...
). Most of the articles were preserved, but there were significant changes that defined more clearly the responsibilities and role of the private actor and the participation of the FDE, an autarchic agency linked to the Secretariat of Education. Chart I summarizes information from the two Resolutions organized into: justifications for the standard; objectives; bodies responsible in the school unit for the agreements with the private actor; FDE; and distribution of responsibilities between the government and private actors.

Chart 1
Comparison between Resolution SEE no. 234/1995 and Resolution SEE no. 24/2005, considering justifications, objective, APM, School Board, FDE, SEE responsibilities, and private sector responsibilities

Chart 1 allows us to conclude that Resolution SE no. 234/2005 advances in the regulation of the incidence of the private sector in the state education system, normalizing more precisely its responsibilities and expanding them by the coordination role in the management of the “partnership”13 13 The word partnership is here written in quotation marks because the authors, agreeing with Adrião (2018), understand that it is not adequate in studies on privatization, since it hides what is done through the transfer of responsibilities to private actors. Although the term has been used in previous works, the authors only use it in quotation marks and when referring to the language adopted by private actors and public managers. Therefore, the authors prefer the term privatization. . The explicitness of responsibilities, as well as the association with FDE, are not minor details, as they indicate greater articulation between the public power and the private sector.

The then Secretary of Education, Gabriel Chalita, promoted, after the publication of Resolution SE no. 234/2005, a meeting with entrepreneurs to announce the Empresa Educadora program, in which Jayme Garfinkel, executive vice president of Porto Seguro (Bandarra, 2005Bandarra, C. (2005, 7 de abril). Governador e Secretário da Educação divulgam detalhes do projeto Empresa Educadora. Secretaria de Estado da Educação. Recuperado de https://www.educacao.sp.gov.br/governador-e-secretario-da-educacao-divulgamdetalhes-do-projeto-empresa-educadora/
https://www.educacao.sp.gov.br/governado...
) was one of the highlights.

An article published by the newspaper Valor Econômico in 2006, under the title “Pioneiro propõe incentivo fiscal” (Pioneer proposes tax incentive) (Adachi, 2006Adachi, V. (2006, 8 de agosto). Pioneiro propõe incentivo fiscal. Valor Econômico. Recuperado de https://www2.senado.leg.br/bdsf/bitstream/handle/id/470680/complemento_1.htm ?sequence=2
https://www2.senado.leg.br/bdsf/bitstrea...
, p. A16), highlighted the protagonism of Jayme Garfinkel, owner of the Porto Seguro company, along with three public schools in the capital of São Paulo located in the Paraisópolis Complex14 14 The Paraisópolis Complex has approximately 60 thousand inhabitants. It occupies the 2nd place among the favelas of the city of São Paulo in population and households (Mazieiro, Santos, 2018). . According to the article, the company invested R$ 3 million (values of the time) per year in these supports and in the cost of a preschool education project for children in the community, called Crescer Sempre.

The information available on the Ashoka Changemakers website15 15 Ashoka is a non-governmental organization founded in 1980 in the United States of America, aiming to support social entrepreneurs around the world. Ashoka Changemakers is a program that aims to accelerate the impact of social entrepreneurs, promoting their articulation in networks. Retrieved from: https://www.ashoka.org/pt-br/program/sobre-o-changemakers systematizes the path of the group in the educational field:

Porto Seguro Seguradora started this project in 1991 with the Educação em Parceria program, whose objective is to contribute to the improvement of the quality of education in the State Public Schools of Paraisópolis. It initiated contact with the State School Professora Etelvina de Góes Marcucci, where the initiative was so successful that, in 1997, it allowed the expansion of this program to another school in the community, the State School Professor Homero dos Santos Fortes. Based on this experience and social analyses carried out in the community, the educators involved identified a large number of children who reached the first grade of the then primary school without attending early childhood education, a service that Paraisópolis lacked at the time. From this need, in 1998 the Associação Crescer Sempre Escola de Educação Infantil was created, a direct service and non-profit segment. In the respective years of 2003 and 2009, the Educação em Parceria program began to serve the State Schools Maria Zilda Gamba Natel and Governador Miguel Arraes. In 2008, in turn, the Programa Escola, in partnership with the school Pueri Domus, established the High School in addition to Early Childhood Education, which currently serves 90 full-time students. The Educação em Parceria program, initiative of Porto Seguro in Paraisópolis, inspired the Empresa Educadora program of the State Secretariat of Education of São Paulo, as well as a group of entrepreneurs, who founded the Associação Parceiros da Educação

(Porfirio, 2014Porfírio, W. A. (2014). Porto Seguro iniciou este projeto em 1991. Changemakers. Recuperado de https://www.changemakers.com/pt-br/%5Bparent-path%5D/nominations/associa%C3%A7%C3%A3o-crescer-sempre
https://www.changemakers.com/pt-br/%5Bpa...
).

The mobilization of entrepreneurs, as recorded in the note, is mentioned by the FDE as one of the objectives of the Empresa Educadora program. The program, according to the Foundation, among other aspects, aims to: “trigger mobilization processes in the business world, aimed at investments in state public schools, thus promoting the social responsibility of the participating company” (Matheus, SICSP/FDE, 2020Matheus, A. SICSP – Solicitação de Informação. Anexo. Mensagem recebida por: nadiapdrabach@gmail.com em 27-10-20.).

The program, according to the autarchy, allows action on several fronts, from the maintenance of the school building to the implementation of pedagogical projects, involving the training of professionals and students. Such possibilities are provided for in Resolution no. 234/2005, which has as Annex a term of Intent to be signed between the Parent Teacher Association of each school and the company or NGO responsible for the project. Also according to the FDE, all financial resources mobilized come from the private sector, without interference from the State (Matheus, SICSP/FDE, 2020Matheus, A. SICSP – Solicitação de Informação. Anexo. Mensagem recebida por: nadiapdrabach@gmail.com em 27-10-20.).

Associação Parceiros da Educação: articulation in a network of São Paulo entrepreneurs

In view of the characterization that the performance of the business sector with public education in São Paulo gains organic and systemic conditions with the creation of the Associação Parceiros da Educação, the actors prioritized in this study refer to the associated companies and organizations that made up the “partners” in its origin. The protagonism of Parceiros da Educação in the definition of educational policies and programs has already been reported in previous research (Adrião, 2015; Adrião & Garcia, 2014Adrião, T., & Garcia, T. (2014). Subsídio público ao setor privado: reflexões sobre a gestão da escola pública no Brasil. Políticas Educativas, 7, 110-122. Recuperado de https://seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/view/51031/31749
https://seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/view...
; Guimarães, 2004Guimarães, S. (2004). Gestão escolar: parceria empresa e escola pública [Dissertação de mestrado]. FLACSO. https://doi.org/10.1080/14767724.2020.1764336
https://doi.org/10.1080/14767724.2020.17...
), here complemented by information collected on the institutional websites of each member company of the association, by consulting shareholder reports and articles published in the press available on the web and located by searches on Google associating the company name with the expression “educação paulista” or “educação SP.” The documentary survey also involved searches on the website of the State Secretariat of Education by the descriptors: partners and company.

Created as an Association in January 2004 and, as of 2015, qualified as Civil Society Organization of Public Interest (Oscip)16 16 Civil Society Organization of Public Interest is a non-profit legal entity that has been constituted and has been in regular operation for at least 3 (three) years, provided that the respective social objectives and statutory standards meet the requirements established by Law no. 9,790, of March 23, 1999. Retrieved from: http://www.planalto.gov.br/ccivil_03/LEIS/L9790.htm. For a critical consideration, see “O marco regulatório do Terceiro Setor: a oferta da educação infantil no Município de Porto Alegre” (Pires & Montano, 2019). , Parceiros da Educação has its origin in the leading performance of a group of entrepreneurs from São Paulo with public schools, a process analyzed in Adrião (2006)Adrião, T. (2006). Educação e produtividade: a reforma do ensino paulista e a desobrigação do Estado. Xamã.. The inspiration stems from the performance of Porto Seguro Seguradora and Natura in public schools in the capital of São Paulo, and “articulates a group of entrepreneurs who start to adopt a ‘model’ of partnership between school and companies to be replicated by other companies”17 17 Retrieved from: https://gife.org.br/associacao-parceiros-da-educacao-e-nova-associada-gife .

The Bylaw of Parceiros, in its Article 4, provides for its field of action: social work, culture, sports, and leisure, in addition to the support to volunteering, the development of research, and the establishment of partnerships with public education for the costing, by the Association, of support, improvements, and advice to public and private sectors aimed at improving educational management. The Bylaws is signed by its then President, Jair Ribeiro, partner of the controlling group of Banco Indusval & Partners and managing partner of Sertrading S.A. In summary, the Association acts on the one hand as a philanthropist, by stimulating donations and voluntary work of the companies that compose it, and, on the other, it presents itself as a consultancy company, providing advice to the public and private spheres.

According to its website, it would have two focuses:

Promoting partnership of companies, entrepreneurs, and civil society organizations with public schools, aimed at improving the academic performance of students; and supporting the government in the adoption of consistent public policies that promote the quality of public education. By programs formulated and monitored by a team of experts, all partnerships aim to enhance government investments in the area of education, making education networks and schools more efficient with the central objective of improving students' academic achievement18 18 Retrieved from: https://prosas.com.br/empreendedores/1468-associacao-parceiros-da-educacao .

In 2005, this Association proposes and releases, with the State Secretariat of Education of São Paulo, the Empresa Educadora program (Porfírio, 2014Porfírio, W. A. (2014). Porto Seguro iniciou este projeto em 1991. Changemakers. Recuperado de https://www.changemakers.com/pt-br/%5Bparent-path%5D/nominations/associa%C3%A7%C3%A3o-crescer-sempre
https://www.changemakers.com/pt-br/%5Bpa...
), making a leap in quality concerning the atomized actions of the sector in the first generation of privatization of education. The change in quality is expressed both in the way in which the companies started to articulate themselves, now in the form of a private law Association inaugurating a nationally perceived action strategy with the release in 2006 of the NGO Todos pela Educação (All for Education), and in the systemic incidence with the SEE perceived in the incorporation of its proposal by the government as a policy and in the assumption of its coordination with schools, as seen in the previous item.

There were difficulties in identifying the companies and groups that were part of the Association due to the absence of information available for public access and for periods prior to 2007. Despite the limitations, it was considered relevant for the apprehension of the incidence of Associação Parceiros da Educação that its composition could be perceived at least in two distinct moments. Although the records relating to the composition of the Association in its foundation are no longer available on its website and do not integrate its Bylaw, an article published by the Secretariat of Education informed the group of companies that joined the program in 2007.

Chart 2
Business organization members of Parceiros da Educação in 2007 and 2013* * Excluding two individuals choosing to keep the company to which they were linked.

It is important to highlight that the “partners” of the Association are relatively stable, so that, according to the inventoried data, between 2007 and 2013, of the 33 “founding” companies/entities, 21 remained in the Association, which are the group characterized in this item: AME Campos de Jordão; BASF; Grupo TV1; Credit Suisse/Instituto; Fundação Lemann; Grupo ABC; Grupo Pão de Açúcar; Iguatemi Empresa de Shopping Centers; Instituto Rukha; Machado, Meyer, Sendacz e Opice Advogados; Mattos Filho, Veiga Filho, Marrey Jr. e Quiroga Advogados; Mineradora Santa Elina; Ourinvest; Porto Seguro Seguradora; Rio Bravo Investimento; Sertrading; Suzano Papel e Celulose; Tarpon Investimentos; Tecnisa; Tozzini Freire e Advogados; Votorantim Cimentos.

Chart 3 characterizes the private actors who remained in the Association in the selected years from 2007 to 2013, according to their social name, sector of activity, business group to which they are linked (when applicable), and whether it has a profitable purpose. The chart also provides information on the closure of activities and indicates the primary sources consulted.

Chart 3
Member companies of Parceiros da Educação between 2007 and 2013 according to nature, link to business group, purpose of profit, record of closure of activities, and primary sources consulted

The data collection, although exploratory, allows us to underline five important aspects regarding this group formed by 21 business actors: (i) among the members of “Parceiros,” none worked in the private education sector; (ii) the segment with the greatest presence is the financial market (six), in addition to an insurance company that indirectly approaches this segment; (iii) the second business sector with the greatest presence is law firms (2); (iv) only three are non-profit; and (v) 11 (52.3%) are associated with transnational business groups.

The distinctions between the three organizations named Institute or Foundation are also emphasized, since they represent philanthrocapitalism in Brazil. The first, Lemann Foundation, has assumed a prominent role in defining educational policy at the national level, including the financing of campaigns of federal deputies Tábata Amaral (SP), Daniel José (SP), Felipe Rigoni (ES), Tiago Mitraud (MG), and Daniel José (SP) (Montesanti, 2019). The deputies have in common the fact that they took courses at American universities with the support of the Foundation. This is the social arm of the “Lemann Group,”

whose founder, Jorge Paulo Lemann, is also one of the main investors of the Eleva Educação Group, an education holding company, created in 2013, which operates both in the direct offer of private education, through its own schools, and in the development of a private education system adopted by about 80 schools. In turn, part of the investment required to create this holding company came from Gera, a venture investment company of the same group, focused on educational ventures

(Adrião & Domiciano, 2018Adrião, T. (2018). Dimensões e formas da privatização da educação no Brasil: caracterização a partir de mapeamento de produções nacionais e internacionais. Currículo sem Fronteiras, 18, 8-28. Recuperado de https://www.curriculosemfronteiras.org/vol18iss1articles/adriao.pdf
https://www.curriculosemfronteiras.org/v...
, p.5).

Instituto Credit Suisse Hedging-Griffo, the main social investment of Credit Suisse, presents itself as a Social Investment Manager, whose differential is in the application of its expertise arising from the performance in the financial market to select social investments that present results for the social “portfolios” of philanthropists. The website of the Institute informs that one of its “objectives is to transform the culture of philanthropy in Brazil so that it goes from being punctual and amateur to becoming continuous, professional, and impactful.”

The third non-profit association, Instituto Rukha, closed its activities in 2011, while AME Campos de Jordão develops activities focused on the host city.

A second group of philanthrocapitalists is directly integrated by companies linked to the financial sector: BTG Pactual, GP Investimentos, Ourinvest, Rio Bravo Investimento, and Tarpon Investimentos. Indirectly, it is considered that Porto Seguros Seguradora has a close relationship with this sector.

Schools served by the Empresa Educadora program from 2006 to 2010: conditions of educational provision and student performance according to Saresp

According to information obtained from FDE by the Citizen Service, the Empresa Educadora program served, from 2006 to 2010, a total of 181 schools, distributed in each year according to Table 1.

Table 1
Number of schools benefited by the Empresa Educadora program from 2006 to 2010

According to the text of the project informed by FDE, the initiative:

... opens perspectives for public school service, in issues ranging from the conservation and maintenance of school buildings to investment in pedagogical projects for the cultural enrichment of students and educators, and in actions that provide favorable conditions for the operation of spaces such as laboratories, libraries, courts, and others that can increasingly provide the school community with modern resources

(Matheus, SICSP/FDE, 2020)

The analytical category conditions of educational offer was adopted as a synthesis effort on a set of inputs that present the possible impacts of the Empresa Educadora program.

The construction of this category took into account information regarding the selected school units according to the length of stay in the project. Thus, of the 37 schools that joined in 2006, 23 remained until 2010. However, during the process of refining the information, two units with ambiguities in the data were discarded, leaving 21 school units for analysis.

Information on the offer conditions have been obtained from the microdata of the National Educational Censuses and the State Censuses for the years 2007 to 201020 20 Microdata processing was performed using SPSS software. . Information were also requested from the State Secretariat of Education and Education Development Foundation, using the Access to Information Law.

Based on Carreira and Pinto (2007)Carreira, D., & Pinto, J. M. R. (2007). Custo aluno-qualidade inicial: rumo à educação pública de qualidade no Brasil. Global. and Dourado and Oliveira (2009)Dourado, L. F., & Oliveira, J. F. (2009). A qualidade da educação: perspectivas e desafios. Cadernos CEDES, 29(78), 201-215. https://doi.org/10.1590/S010132622009000200004
https://doi.org/10.1590/S010132622009000...
, the conditions of educational offer were formed by data relating to the infrastructure, classified for the purposes of this analysis as follows:

  1. General conditions: refer to the guarantee of general facilities adequate to the offer of education, such as: existence of drinking water; sewage system, electricity, and garbage collection.

  2. School facilities: school environment with adequate conditions to carry out teaching activities, such as: teachers' room, reading room/library, science laboratory, computer laboratory, and space for recreational and sports activities such as sports court.

  3. Equipment: TV, copier, printer; computers available for student use and internet access for online research.

  4. Student performance: the results of the Saresp/Idesp evaluations are considered.

To get a glimpse of the 21 schools involved in the program, chart 4 presents information on: number of enrollments; stages of education; names of companies, institutes, foundations, and NGOs; and organization that coordinated the Empresa Educadora program in each of the educational units.

Chart 4
Schools benefited by the Empresa Educadora program from 2006 to 2010, regarding the number of enrollments, stages of education, partner companies, and project coordination

It is noticed the predominance of participation in the program of schools that offered the final years of Middle School and High School, since only six units with exclusive offer of the early years of Elementary School integrated the initial group, and most of the units, 14 (66%), offer High School.

Chart 4 also shows that in 2006, in seven schools, the project was coordinated by Associação Pró-Saber; Associação Crescer Sempre worked in three schools; FDE - Escola em Parceria, in turn, coordinated only one school. The largest presence was that of the Parceiros da Educação group, which concentrated its activities in 10 units. The last column of the table shows the changes in the coordination of the project in some units throughout the period and reaffirms the protagonism of Parceiros da Educação, which further expanded its performance, adding under its coordination the seven schools that were previously coordinated by Associação Pró-Saber, totaling 17 of the 21 schools selected for analysis.

Regarding the general infrastructure conditions, in 2007 all schools had filtered water, public electricity network, and periodic garbage collection. Only one school was not served by the public sewer system, a number that increased to four in 2010. The other schools maintained, in 2010, the same conditions presented in 2007, as shown in Chart 5.

Chart 5
Infrastructure conditions of schools, general conditions, facilities, and equipment in 2007 and 2010

Regarding the facilities, in 2007 all schools that participated in the Empresa Educadora program had a computer laboratory and a sports court. Only one unit had no reading room or library. The greatest shortage of schools was the Science Laboratory: in 2007, only five schools had this structure, and this number increased to six in 2010. There was therefore no significant improvement in this aspect. The same can be said about reading rooms and computer labs. The latter even ceased to exist in two schools in 2010.

Regarding the equipment necessary for the development of education, all schools had television, internet, and printer in 2007 and in only 12 schools there was a copier, and this number decreased to 11 in 2010, when one school no longer had a printer.

Concerning the number of computers available for students to use in schools, Chart 6 shows an improvement especially for those with up to 10 computers: in 2007, there were nine schools in this condition, decreasing to five in 2010. The improvement, however, was restricted to these cases, since in the period most schools (16 out of 21) had up to 20 computers for student use, and only five schools had more than 20 computers for this purpose. In view of the high number of enrollments met by these schools, the lack of most of them in this regard is evident.

Chart 6
Computers available for student use in schools in 2007 and 2010

Regarding the conditions of educational provision, it is noted that the participation of schools in the Empresa Educadora program did not result in significant improvement, since the general conditions remained the same for most of the units in the selected period, except for the worsening in the supply of public water and sewage. Concerning the facilities, there were also no relevant changes in terms of quality expansion, on the contrary, there was a reduction in computer laboratories in 8% of the schools and a small expansion in what was the largest deficit of the units: the science laboratories. The latter, in 2007, were available in only 22% of schools, and in 2010, they were present in 27% of them. Finally, the number of student computers represented the only major improvement for schools with fewer computers.

The performance of students enrolled in the 4th/5th grade of state schools showed improvement between 2007 and 2010, and the same occurred with the schools selected for this analysis, in Idesp26 26 The Education Development Index of the State of São Paulo (Idesp) is a quality indicator of the initial (1st to 5th grade) and final (6th to 9th grade) grades of Elementary School and High School. Idesp considers two complementary criteria: the performance of students in the Saresp exams and the school flow. The school flow is measured by the average approval rate at each stage of education, being the initial grades and final grades of Elementary School and High School, collected by the School Census. Retrieved from: http://idesp.edunet.sp.gov.br/2019/ , as shown in Graph 1. Nevertheless, among the 12 schools with offer for 4th and 5th grades, seven did not reach the state average in 2010. Two of them were, even in 2010, below the 2007 state average.

Graph 1
Idesp of 4th/5th grade elementary school students in 2007 and 2010 in schools participating in the Empresa Educadora program

In 2007, the Idesp of the state network for the initial years was 3.23, and, in 2010, it increased to 3.96. Despite the improvement observed in practically all schools in the period, those that in 2007 already had the Idesp below the state average remained below the average in 2010, except for two schools that showed a significant improvement.

Students enrolled in the final years of Elementary School had no improvement in the Idesp results for the selected period. There were even schools in which the Idesp was lower in 2010, as shown in Graph 2.

Graph 2
Idesp of 8th/9th grade elementary school students in 2007 and 2010 in schools participating in the Empresa Educadora program

Graph 2 also indicates, for most of the 14 schools selected, the maintenance of Idesp, or when there was improvement, it was below the network average. Only three units presented indices higher than the state average in 2010. In 2007, only two units of the program had an Idesp higher than the state average.

Graph 3 presents information on Idesp for the third year of High School of the schools participating in the Empresa Educadora program. One can see that in 2007 all schools had an Idesp below the state average, which was 1.44. In 2010, only three schools exceeded this average, which rose to 1.81. The other schools, although registering an improvement in the performance measured by Idesp, failed to reach the state average Idesp.

Graph 3
Idesp of third-year high school students in 2007 and 2010 in schools participating in the Empresa Educadora program

In summary, if we take the information related to the performance indicator adopted by the São Paulo government, it was not possible to identify significant impacts of the Empresa Educadora program in the other aspect on which it proposed to act: student performance in the Saresp/Idesp external tests.

One can observe, concerning Idesp, an improvement in the general state average in all segments of basic education, but this improvement was not observed in all the schools analyzed here, despite the existence of the Empresa Educadora program.

Final considerations

A first element to highlight in this second generation of privatization concerns the composition of the Associação Parceiros da Educação and its role in aligning groups and companies to influence public education in São Paulo, inaugurating in São Paulo in 2004 what the international literature would recognize as new philanthropy (Verger & Robertson, 2012Robertson, S., & Verger, A. (2012). A origem das parcerias público-privada na governança global da educação. Educação & Sociedade, 33(121), 1133-1156. https://doi.org/10.1590/S0101-73302012000400012
https://doi.org/10.1590/S0101-7330201200...
) or philanthrocapitalism (Bishop & Green, 2008Bishop, M., & Green, M. (2008). Philanthrocapitalism: How rich can save the world. Bloomsbury Press.). Still on the composition of the Association, the prominence of companies associated with the financial sector is notable, with emphasis on a new market “niche”: the management of a social investment portfolio proposed by the Instituto Credit Suisse Hedging-Griffo, the main social investment arm of Credit Suisse, and offered to the “new philanthropists” as a mechanism to increase the efficiency of their donations and, as far as possible, also bring financial returns to the “donors.”

Another aspect to highlight, to be confirmed in future research, is the inauguration in Brazil of a type of business articulation, organic and with the specific objective of focusing on educational policy, in these terms, anticipating what would be instituted at the national level by the NGO Todos pela Educação (Martins, 2019Martins, E. (2019). Empresariamento da educação básica na américa latina: redes empresariais em prol educação. [Tese de doutorado]. Repositório Unicamp. http://repositorio.unicamp.br/bitstream/REPOSIP/335551/1/Martins_ErikaMoreir a_D.pdf
http://repositorio.unicamp.br/bitstream/...
). It was not about recommendations for public education based on business interests, as promoted by the Grupo de Líderes Empresariais (Lide), organized by the former governor of São Paulo João Doria, elected in 2018; it is about the objective presence of companies in the proposition and operationalization of a project designed and proposed by this segment of civil society in the condition of a program for public education that replaces state action regarding education offer, curriculum, and school management. The actions, when analyzing the 21 units under study, focus with greater emphasis on the final years of elementary school and on high school, which may represent the focus of greatest interest of the business community.

Education offer, curriculum, and school management are considered by this study three fundamental dimensions of the privatization of basic education (Adrião, 2018Adrião, T. (2018). Dimensões e formas da privatização da educação no Brasil: caracterização a partir de mapeamento de produções nacionais e internacionais. Currículo sem Fronteiras, 18, 8-28. Recuperado de https://www.curriculosemfronteiras.org/vol18iss1articles/adriao.pdf
https://www.curriculosemfronteiras.org/v...
), since they cover the set of responsibilities and fields of educational action traditionally assumed by the state in public education. The regulations that support the Empresa Educadora program provide that all dimensions of school education, therefore, can be transferred to some extent to companies directly or through their institutes and foundations, even if under various aspects effective results are not created.

Despite having as one of its objectives to promote the improvement of the infrastructure conditions of schools, especially regarding the guarantee of adequate facilities and the presence of environments and equipment that enable the provision of education, the data to which we had access through the microdata of the School Census did not reveal significant changes in these aspects.

Adherence to the Empresa Educadora program also had no significant impact on the educational results of students in Idesp. Some schools served by the project continued to have their indices below the state average. Others, however, showed improvement in results – which seems to be more a reflection of the growth of Idesp observed in the state network in all segments of basic education in the period than the result of the performance of the Empresa Educadora program on schools.

One cannot deny, however, that despite not verifying relevant effects concerning the announced objectives, the program was effective in expanding the corporate incidence in a more articulated way on São Paulo Education, representing progress compared to the previous period in the forms of privatization. It is reiterated that this movement does not occur without contradictions, and demands continuity in the studies.

  • 2
    References correction and bibliographic normalization services: Ailton Júnior (Tikinet) - revisao@tikinet.com.br
  • 3
    English version: Sabrina Leitzke (Tikinet) - traducao@tikinet.com.br
  • 4
    Funding: The article is the result of research funded by Fapesp, proc.2019/11681-5 and Fapesp, proc.2019/12230-7
  • 5
    The work, still without translation, was published in 2020 by Editora EMI, Italy.
  • 6
    The research, coordinated by Marcia Jacomini and Sérgio Stoco and supported by Fapesp, addressed different aspects of São Paulo’s educational policy.
  • 7
    The research, coordinated by Theresa Adrião and supported by Fapesp, has as empirical field the 26 Brazilian state education networks, in addition to the Federal District. The study, of interinstitutional nature, takes place within the scope of the Group of Study and Research in Educational Policies (Greppe).
  • 8
    Resolution no. 234, of October 2, 1995, establishes the Escola em Parceria program (Adrião et al., 2020Adrião, T.; Garcia, T.; Drabach, N. (2020). Influência de atores privados na educação paulista: a primeira geração da privatização. Políticas Educativas, 13(2), p. 96. Recuperado de https://www.seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/view/107517
    https://www.seer.ufrgs.br/Poled/article/...
    ).
  • 9
    Gabriel Chalita, responsible for the Education agenda from April 2002 to April 2006, instituted “Escola da Família” among the priority programs, with the opening of school buildings on weekends for activities involving the community living around the school (Santos, 2019Santos, M. J. (2019). Hibridismo administrativo: marcas da estrutura organizacional da SEESP (1846-2018). [Dissertação de Mestrado]. Repositório Unicamp. http://repositorio.unicamp.br/jspui/handle/REPOSIP/334245
    http://repositorio.unicamp.br/jspui/hand...
    ), which had the partnership of Unesco.
  • 10
    In 2012, with the creation of the Educação Compromisso São Paulo government program, expression of corporate administration within the scope of SEE-SP, the initial milestone of third generation privatization starts, as described by the authors.
  • 11
    The limitation of the index to evaluate the quality of the educational proposal in a school is recognized. Despite this, the results measured by Saresp were adopted as data, since the program refers to it.
  • 12
    Geraldo Alckmin took over as governor of the state in 2001, when Mario Covas, the then governor, died. In the following election, he was elected governor for the period from 2003 to 2006. In 2011, Alckmin was again elected, remaining at the head of the executive branch for two consecutive terms, until 2018, reaching almost 14 years in the government of the state of São Paulo.
  • 13
    The word partnership is here written in quotation marks because the authors, agreeing with Adrião (2018)Adrião, T. (2018). Dimensões e formas da privatização da educação no Brasil: caracterização a partir de mapeamento de produções nacionais e internacionais. Currículo sem Fronteiras, 18, 8-28. Recuperado de https://www.curriculosemfronteiras.org/vol18iss1articles/adriao.pdf
    https://www.curriculosemfronteiras.org/v...
    , understand that it is not adequate in studies on privatization, since it hides what is done through the transfer of responsibilities to private actors. Although the term has been used in previous works, the authors only use it in quotation marks and when referring to the language adopted by private actors and public managers. Therefore, the authors prefer the term privatization.
  • 14
    The Paraisópolis Complex has approximately 60 thousand inhabitants. It occupies the 2nd place among the favelas of the city of São Paulo in population and households (Mazieiro, Santos, 2018Maziviero, M, C., & Silva, A., S. (2018). O caso do Complexo Paraisópolis em gestões: diferenças conceituais em programas de intervenção em favelas em São Paulo. Urbe - Revista Brasileira de Gestão Urbana, 10(3), 500-520. https://doi.org/10.1590/21753369.010.003.ao03
    https://doi.org/10.1590/21753369.010.003...
    ).
  • 15
    Ashoka is a non-governmental organization founded in 1980 in the United States of America, aiming to support social entrepreneurs around the world. Ashoka Changemakers is a program that aims to accelerate the impact of social entrepreneurs, promoting their articulation in networks. Retrieved from: https://www.ashoka.org/pt-br/program/sobre-o-changemakers
  • 16
    Civil Society Organization of Public Interest is a non-profit legal entity that has been constituted and has been in regular operation for at least 3 (three) years, provided that the respective social objectives and statutory standards meet the requirements established by Law no. 9,790, of March 23, 1999. Retrieved from: http://www.planalto.gov.br/ccivil_03/LEIS/L9790.htm. For a critical consideration, see “O marco regulatório do Terceiro Setor: a oferta da educação infantil no Município de Porto Alegre” (Pires & Montano, 2019Montano, M. R., & Pires, D. O. (2019). O marco regulatório do Terceiro Setor: a oferta da educação infantil no Município de Porto Alegre. Práxis Educacional, 15, 16-37.).
  • 17
  • 18
  • 19
    Information collected between July and August 2020.
  • 20
    Microdata processing was performed using SPSS software.
  • 21
    All schools listed in Chart 4 joined the program in 2006. Highlighted in bold are the schools that remained until 2010; the others have records that they remained in the program until 2009.
  • 22
    In 2007, the school offered only the early years of Elementary School.
  • 23
    In 2007, the school offered only Middle School and High School
  • 24
    In 2007, the school offered only Middle School and High School.
  • 25
    None of the schools had a library, only a reading room.
  • 26
    The Education Development Index of the State of São Paulo (Idesp) is a quality indicator of the initial (1st to 5th grade) and final (6th to 9th grade) grades of Elementary School and High School. Idesp considers two complementary criteria: the performance of students in the Saresp exams and the school flow. The school flow is measured by the average approval rate at each stage of education, being the initial grades and final grades of Elementary School and High School, collected by the School Census. Retrieved from: http://idesp.edunet.sp.gov.br/2019/
  • 27
    Information about the Idesp of the schools can be found at the link: http://idesp.edunet.sp.gov.br/boletim_escola.asp?ano=2010
  • 28
    Information about the Idesp of the schools can be found at the link: http://idesp.edunet.sp.gov.br/boletim_escola.asp?ano=2010#

Referências

Responsible Editor: Chantal Victória Medaets. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7834-3834

Publication Dates

  • Publication in this collection
    14 Apr 2023
  • Date of issue
    2023

History

  • Received
    04 Feb 2022
  • Reviewed
    04 Feb 2022
  • Accepted
    29 Mar 2022
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