Programa ensino médio inovador as a policy for Encouraging curricular change: from the announced proposition to the reported experiences¹

ABSTRACT:

This article analyzes the Programa Ensino Médio Inovador (Innovative High School Program - ProEMI) as a policy aimed at encouraging curricular reformulation and implementation of the National Curriculum Guidelines for the last stage of basic education. The main source for this study were the answers obtained through a questionnaire sent to 2,006 schools that participated in the Program in 2013. A total of 867 questionnaires were answered by school managers and 1,285 by teachers. The answers were categorized and interpreted through Content Analysis (CA) based on a first discussion about the paths, objectives and propositions of the Program. These procedures allowed capturing this policy in action as well as the processes of appropriation, resignification and (re-)interpretation generated by the subjects involved in it. They allowed as well the sketching of an overview of the curricular experiences resulting from this encouragement.

Keywords:
Curriculum Policies; High School; Programa Ensino Médio Inovador; National Curriculum Guidelines; Educational Policy Evaluation

RESUMO:

Neste texto se analisa o Programa Ensino Médio Inovador (ProEMI) como política de indução à reformulação curricular e à implementação das Diretrizes Curriculares Nacionais (DCNEM) para a última etapa da educação básica. A principal fonte para o estudo é composta por respostas obtidas por meio de questionário enviado às 2.006 escolas participantes do programa no ano de 2013. Retornaram 867 instrumentos respondidos por gestores e 1.285 por professores. A partir de uma discussão inicial sobre os percursos, os objetivos e as proposições do programa, são trazidas as respostas categorizadas e interpretadas por meio de Análise de Conteúdo (AC). Esses procedimentos permitiram captar a política em movimento, bem como processos de apropriação, ressignificação e (re)interpretação gerados pelos sujeitos com ela envolvidos. Permitiram, ainda, produzir um panorama das experiências curriculares que resultaram da referida indução.

Palavras-chave:
Políticas curriculares; Ensino Médio; Programa Ensino Médio Inovador; Diretrizes Curriculares Nacionais; Avaliação de políticas educacionais.

Introduction

The Programa Ensino Médio Inovador (ProEMI) was put into practice within schools in 2010 in 18 Brazilian states. In this year, 355 institutions adhered to the Program. In the beginning of 2014, 5,6 thousand schools were participating according to information available in the website of the Ministry of Education in an article of January 21^st. In the same article, it is stated that the intention was to achieve as much as 10,000 schools that year (LORENZONI, 2014).

Before this more effective involvement by the schools, many were the initiatives by the Ministry of Education (MEC). Its inception can be dated back to June 2003 when the Seminário Nacional de Ensino Médio (Middle School National Seminar) took place in Brasilia. In this event, organized by the Secretaria de Ensino Médio e Tecnológico (Middle and Technological School Secretariat - Semtec), the core ideas that provided the Program with its conceptual and methodological groundwork were enunciated: work, science, and culture as structural concepts, basis of human education and of the pedagogical-curricular organization of the Middle School and, associated to this perspective, the knowledge of the subjects, mainly the young, as the basis of the configuration of a meaning to the last stage of basic education.²

In the period immediately preceding the disclosure of the first guiding document, the MEC made at least two attempts to trace a policy for Middle School reformulation. These propositions were presented in the documents "Reestruturação e Expansão do Ensino Médio no Brasil" (Restructuring and Expansion of Middle School in Brazil - BRASIL, MEC/SEB, preliminary version: April 2008) and "Ensino Médio Integrado: uma perspectiva abrangente na política pública educacional" (Integrated Middle School: A Comprehensive Perspective in Educational Public Policy - BRASIL, MEC/SEB, preliminary version: June 2008). The conceptual and epistemological references found in these texts relate to the debate about the aims of Middle School during the discussions that preceded the formulation of the current Law and Educational Guideline (Law 9.394/2996), which referred to the ideas of unified and polytechnic education. These references are resumed and gain strength within the context of propositions for change for Technical Vocational Middle Education within Decree 5.154/2004 that proposes the offering of this modality as "Integrated Middle School."

In 2009, the Brazilian National Council of Education (CNE) received the text that originated the Report CNE/CP n. 11/2009 from which the ProEMI would become an experimental program. Since then, four versions of the CNE Report were produced and disclosed by the Ministry of Education (2009, 2011, 2013 and 2014). The ProEMI was appointed in the CNE Report as a possible reference to the modernization of the National Curriculum Guidelines for Middle Education (DCNEM): "The Programa Ensino Médio Inovador {...} may evidently come to introduce or contribute, with all its successful experience, for a modernization of the current National Curriculum Guidelines (BRASIL, CNE/CP, 2009, p.7). In being published in 2011 the Report n. 05 proposing the new DCNEM, the ProEMI is presumed as a policy of induction³ of curricular reformulation having as its groundwork and propositions what is defined in this Report, homologated by the Minister of Education Fernando Haddad in February 2012 (BRASIL, CNE/CEB, Resolution CNE/CEB 02/2012).

This research assumes as a core idea the current formulation within the DCNEM and the documents of the ProEMI that the Middle School curriculum should conceive of school knowledge in a more integrated manner, which would imply broader dialog among fields of knowledge and subjects and/or disciplinary and non-disciplinary knowledge. Another proposition that is pursued in this analysis concerns increasing school hours and, considering the intentions declared, this increase would be based on a greater integration among the fields of knowledge, curricular times and spaces. A third proposition taken into consideration is that of curriculum restructuring through 'macrofields':

The Curriculum Restructuring Projects (CRP) will be able to present actions in different formats (subjects, workshops, interdisciplinary projects, acquisition of materials and technologies from the modernized Technology Guide, among others) and will be able to include specific training for educational workers involved in the performance of the activities. The set of actions that compose the CRP of each school should contemplate at least the mandatory macrofields: Educational Follow-up and Undergraduate Research and Research. The actions within the other macrofields will be proposed according to the needs and interests of the educational team, the teachers and the school community.{...} The macrofield is understood as the set of didactic-educational activities that lie within a field of knowledge perceived as a large field of educational and interactive action, possibly encompassing a diversity of actions that qualify school curriculum (Brasil, MEC/SEB, 2011, p. 13-14).

The research was structured into two investigative axes: a) quantitative and qualitative analyses of the Curriculum Restructuring Projects (CRP)⁴ elaborated by the schools-this axis enabled us to obtain the primary approach to the meanings attributed to the propositions of the guiding documents of the ProEMI; and b) the gathering of information from the subjects directly involved with the Program, a procedure that allowed advancing in this approach and assess what the schools could be putting into practice, which offered further information about the meanings attributed to the inductions made by the Program.⁵ In the article, the results of the study in the CRP are briefly discussed and the results obtained with the questionnaires sent to school managers and teachers are presented in greater detail.

For the study proposed here, two theoretical-methodological references were drawn upon: the perspective offered by Basil Bernstein (1996) about the concept of recontextualization and the Policy Cycle Approach as conceived of by Ball and colleagues (BALL and BOWE, 1992; BALL, 1994).

The incorporation, appropriation and/or resignification by the teachers and other school workers of the discourses found in texts referring to curricular policies may be understood through the concept of recontextualization. Thus, we take as a starting point the presupposition that the subject(s) reading these texts will face already instituted and/or institutionalized discourses and practices and that the individual and collective conditions, as well as the accumulated experience, provide the groundwork for interpreting and re-signifying the instructional devices. This movement is configured as a recontextualization process from which the distancing of signification between what is written in the texts and the meanings attributed to them becomes something common. This movement is marked, as well, by positions that express a greater adhesion or resistance toward what is being proposed and frequently a hybrid of these two positions (SILVA, 2008; 2014).

The enunciations of the Policy Cycle Approach were also considered relevant in the orientation of this study from the information gathering phase to the process of interpretation of the movements generated as a response to the ProEMI. We agree that this approach offers a conceptual and methodological structure able to guide the analysis of the history of the policy (LOPES, MACEDO, 2011). In addition, it contributes to the understanding of the intertwinings through which are formed textual and contextual compositions that allow capturing the movements of the policy without characterizing them in a linear way in face of their temporal dimensions.

Initially formulated considering three contexts⁶-the Context of Influence, the Context of Production of the text and the Context of Practice-to which the Context of Effect or Results and the Context of Strategy were further added-the Policy Cycle Approach allows interpretations that go beyond the slicing in fixed and unarticulated stages that frequently result in simplifications.

These references for the study of curricular policies constituted presuppositions and methodological principles that were present during all the moments, from the analyses of the documental groundwork composed by the CRP to the interpretive possibilities of the texts by school managers and teachers produced as a response to the questionnaires.

Studying the Curriculum Restructuring Projects: First Approaches

Through the analysis of the CRP it was possible to assess, in a first approach, how the schools interpreted the guidelines contained in the documents that guide the Program and, from the possibilities found in their realities, how they have proposed and which actions and targets were defined for the two mandatory macrofields⁷ in the elaboration of their Curriculum Restructuring Projects. An initial quantitative evaluation was made with the aim of characterizing the distribution of the macrofields by the schools' CRP's. The qualitative study was performed considering the production of three states (Paraná, Rio Grande do Sul and Mato Grosso).⁸Even if the material of the qualitative analysis did not comprise the totality of schools participating in the Program on a national basis, it was considered representative of the ways through which the schools interpreted, attributed meanings, incorporated (partially and relatively) and recontextualized the propositions found in the guiding documents of the ProEMI.

From the three states wherein the CRP was analyzed, Rio Grande do Sul stands out due to the actions characterized as reformulations very typical of the curricular discourse in this educational network, the Polytechnic Middle School, and that were articulated with the ProEMI's propositions, mainly the integrated seminars that would eventually replace the organization of school knowledge by subjects. In the case of Mato Grosso do Sul, the CRP's of the schools frequently mentioned the axis "work, science, culture, and technology," identified as elements that should be found within the activities and projects developed. In Paraná, among the three cases studied, the CRP's with greater distance in relation to the texts of the guiding documents of the ProEMI were found.

From the analysis of the set of CRP's, however, the following situations stand out: the description of isolated activities with an emphasis on daily actions that include the students, particularly the 'remedial classes'; recurring themes that, due to a certain transversality, would corroborate with a more integrated curricular treatment, but constitute 'projects' or 'workshops' dissociated from the conventional curricular organization (by subjects); projects, workshops and field activities frequently treated as extracurricular activities; increase in the time dedicated to 'after school' activities, which are developed without their articulations with conventional curricular time (fractured and organized by subjects) being visible. The dominance of this type of formulation indicated that a movement of school duplication was taking shape as, for instance, one school in the morning and another school in the afternoon in two complementary, yet distinct projects; and that this 'school duplication' was related to an opposition between disciplinary knowledge and the diversified knowledge found in the activities, workshops and projects labeled as extracurricular.

These first indications have guided the elaboration of two questionnaires, one aimed at school directors/managers and another aimed at teachers. From the assessment made at SIMEC, this material was sent to all the 2006 schools in the country via e-mail or printed letters. These procedures allowed capturing the policy in its movement and the processes of appropriation, resignification and (re-)interpretation generated by the subjects involved in it. They have also allowed the production of a panorama of the curricular experiences that have resulted in the induction referred here.

The study of the CRP's resulted in a hypothesis that has guided the analysis and interpretation of the texts received. The hypothesis was thus formulated: "Activities, projects and workshops not articulated with the curricular basis structured by subjects have been predominant; the macrofields are perceived more as a set of educational activities and practices and less as axes inducing curricular integration and reformulation." Based on this hypothesis, the categorization of the questionnaires was made considering the experiences associated to the subjects, times, spaces and school knowledge.

What the 'Practice' Subjects Say: Intertwinings between the Contexts of Influence, Text Production and Practice

From the total of 2006 schools that participated in the ProEMI in 2013, 893 answered the questionnaire, which stands for 44.52% of the institutions. A total of 867 questionnaires received were answered by the managers. In many schools, more than one teacher answered, amounting to a total of 1,285 questionnaires received. The percentage of the questionnaires answered varies along the regions: In the Southern Region, 64.62% of schools answered; in the Southeastern Region, 51.71%; in the Northeastern Region, 40.03%; in the Center-Western Region, 36.66%; and in the Northern Region, 29.97%. Among the factors that explain a lower incidence of answers in the Northern, Center-Western and Northeastern regions is the more restricted access of schools of these regions to broadband internet and even conventional mail.

For the treatment of this database, the methodological procedures followed the Content Analysis (CA) that allows classifying and interpreting meanings of texts from thematic categories and inferring what these categories have in common in relation to the researched object. This methodology has been considered suitable to the purposes of this study due to the nature and volume of data gathered.⁹

The ProEMI in the Managers' View

The questionnaire was composed of seven questions that aimed at assessing three main elements: contextual aspects as the knowledge of guiding documents and the existence of the articulating teacher; curricular questions, related both to the elaboration of the CRP's and to the changes that may be occurring; and the difficulties found with the Program. It was a total of seven questions, two open and the other six of multiple choice, but with space for other responses and/or additional information.

Most managers affirmed that they have knowledge of the ProEMI's guiding documents (86.7%). This number corresponds to 100% of the answers in some states, such as Paraná, Espírito Santo and the Federal District. In 115 questionnaires, corresponding to 13.2%, the answers show unawareness of the documents or were left blank. The year of 2012 was considered as the year of onset of the activities of the ProEMI in 577 answers (66.6%). An expressive number (600 occurrences) of subjects answered affirmatively to the question about the existence of the articulating teacher, one of the counterparts of the states. A set of 267 questionnaires answered 'no' or left the answer blank; among those, in 214 cases (24.7%) the answer was categorically negative, even if the articulating teacher is something included in the Program. A total of 14 managers affirmed the inexistence of a project related to the ProEMI in the school, demonstrating either lack of knowledge or some inconsistency between what was found in the SMEC database and the reality of the school since the criterion used for the questionnaire being sent was precisely the school being registered in the SIMEC. These cases, however, stand for 1.6% of the sample and are distributed along the states of Santa Catarina, São Paulo, Mato Grosso do Sul, Pernambuco, Paraíba, Ceará and Rondônia.

In relation to the process of elaboration and register of the CRP in the SIMEC, almost half of the managers (49.6%) mentioned a collective work, respecting the criterion for 'collective work' adopted by this research, that is, work that involves at least two segments of the school community. Nearly 23% (200 answers) mentioned some type of instruction by the Secretariat of Education or the MEC. In these cases, instances of technical-operational or educational assistance were cited. More than a few answers affirmed that "the CRP came ready-made" or that some curricular structuring was imposed to the school without any consultation to or consent by the school community. A smaller number, 3.7%, mentioned non-governmental organizations, all of them referring to the Projeto Jovem de Futuro (Promising Youngster Project - PJF) of the Instituto Unibanco. As seen in the answers, the PJF was present in nine states, one in the Southern Region, one in the Southeastern Region, two in the Center-Western Region, three in the Northeastern Region and two in the Northern Region.

In relation to the curriculum restructuring actions, the answers showed that the majority chose to work with projects in after-school activities. This occurred in 699 answers, corresponding to 80.6%. The workshops were also highlighted since they comprised 57.9% of the answers, occupying the second place in a scale of number of answers. This pattern was equally found in all the regions of the country with small variations along the states.

In relation to the alternatives of increasing the school hours to 5-7 as recommended by the Program, there was the addition of the option '6 hours', a very common situation. The prevalence of the five-hour school day as an increase enabled by the ProEMI was evidenced. This value stands for more than half the sample (51.2%) and is also seen, with some variations, in all the regions. The significant number of 206 blank answers (23.8%) referring to the increase of the daily school hours stood out. This percentage is practically equivalent to that of the answers reporting an increase to 7 hours (209 answers, corresponding to 24.1%).

The reading of the managers' answers evidenced harsh criticisms to the State Secretariats of Education and/or the MEC, referring mainly to the lack of guidance and the difficulties with the deadlines established for filling and registering the proposition/CRP. These criticisms are related to the difficulties of implementation of the ProEMI, one of the questions of the questionnaire.

In relation to the difficulties, the most recurrent answer among those offered was the availability of workers, marked by 481 (55.5%) managers. The second most frequent answer (52.4%) was physical space; the third (49.9%) was teacher training. These three alternatives form the first and most significant group of difficulties. There is a second, intermediate group of answers, composed of 29.8%-40.1% of the questionnaires. In this group are found difficulties related to planning meetings, articulations between fields of knowledge, understanding of the ProEMI's directions and technical support by the governmental institutions. Other difficulties cited included transportation, insufficient school time or hourly load, partnerships, service rendering, execution of the perspective of field education, school management and administration (mainly linked to the use of financial resources) and teacher turnover.

The managers were also asked about the changes occurred in the school by inductions of the ProEMI. In 432 questionnaires (nearly 50%), changes in the participation or greater student involvement were cited, the latter being the most frequent category. Secondly, changes associated to, respectively, curricular knowledge/subjects and time organization were found in 354 and 353 questionnaires, which correspond to approximately 41%. These three categories form a first group with the main changes identified by the managers. An intermediate group encompasses answers that report changes related to a better academic performance by the students, the (better) relationship between the teachers and the school, the physical and material infrastructure and spatial organization. These possibilities were identified in 24.5%-37.3% of the answers. Forming a group of less recurrent answers, those marked by less than 15% stand out, among which those related to changes and negative impacts in the school processes provoked after the implementation of ProEMI, with 18 answers, corresponding to 2.1% of the sample.¹⁰

The ProEMI in the teachers' experience

From the questionnaire sent to the teachers, three questions remained open: the first asked experiences associated to the ProEMI to be highlighted; the second asked the reporting of one of these experiences; and the third asked about the possibility of the Program being contributing with the solution of educational difficulties. The fourth and last question asked to indicate whether the guiding documents of the Program were known.

The initial procedure for analyzing the teachers' answers involved the search for keywords among the answers.¹¹ The research was based on the presupposition that the teachers who know the guiding document(s) are qualified observers to speak about the implementation of the Program in their schools. It was considered that these qualified observers would draw upon the terminology used in those texts and would then be able to translate the reality experienced in the schools with more or less proximity to what was enunciated in the documents. The parameter for characterizing this qualified observer was the positive answer for question n. 4. Among the 1,285 teachers, 999 marked 'yes' and 286 marked 'no' as an answer.¹²

The second moment consisted of a survey of keywords to be researched. Initially, a set of terms was produced based on the experience of accumulated research. Some samples of the questionnaires were selected by state and the most recurrent words were selected, originating two sets of words: one for questions 1 and 2 (with 42 words) and one for question 3 (with 22 words).¹³ Drawing upon the information gathered, the codes of the questionnaires whose answers had these terms or synonyms were listed. The codes generated a data bank from which the states they referred to were listed. One code could be present in more than one list referring to a specific term, that is, could generate a double record.

The third phase consisted of a control reading of the answers that referred to the codes selected. The objective, in this case, was building up a control for the records to ensure their pertinence in relation to what was understood by the term. The understanding of the terms was being elaborated as the reading progressed and described in details in a methodological archive. Similarly, in this controlled reading, the questionnaires referring to teachers that worked in the same school were listed in order to enable further discussions. These records were grouped in questionnaires from the same school that presented equal or different answers.

The fourth phase involved a quantification of the terms researched. Two methodologies were used-in the first, the total number of occurrences of the terms in the answers was calculated as well as the percentage of answers that cited the term in relation to the total universe considered. In the second, the percentage of answers within the total universe of each state that cited the terms researched was quantified.

The most frequent term used in the answers was 'activities', found in 279 answer (27.9% of the total investigated). In the second place was the word 'project', found in 249 answers (24.9%). The third position was occupied by the term 'knowledge', which appeared in 15.9% of the answers. In relation to the activities performed in the school, the term 'visit' and its many synonyms should be highlighted (field work, visitation etc.). In total, 120 teachers cited this activity as an answer to question 1, totaling 12% of the universe researched. Still in this direction, the term 'workshop' had a high incidence (113, or 13.3% of the total). The other activities varied according to the incidence of 0.8% (students' union) to 4.9% (theatre) of the answers.

The low frequency of central terms of the ProEMI's documents in the teachers' answers stands out. It is the case, for instance, of the word 'macrofield',¹⁴ which has figured in only 4.6% of the answers. The macrofields were also rarely cited in the answers: 'Undergraduate Research' appears with a greater incidence (2.2% of the questionnaires).¹⁵ The other macrofields appear with the following frequencies: 'educational follow-up' (0.5%), 'culture and arts' (0.2%), 'communication and use of media' (0.2%), 'body culture' (1.0%), 'reading and Literacy' (0.7%), 'student participation' (0.9%) and 'digital culture' (0.2%).

The state of Paraíba has almost all the incidence of the term 'macrofield' observed in question n. 1 (44.4% of the answers). This had already been pointed out by the control reading, which has also revealed an interpretation of the educational use of 'macrofield' in the sense of organization of a workshop or thematic activity. The state of Amazonas stands out for the high incidence of two terms: 'remedial classes', in 30% of the answers, and 'increasing the hourly load', in 20% of the answers.

The term 'activity' frequently appears in all the states. Among them, Mato Grosso do Sul stands out, a state in which the term is seen in almost half of the answers (55.6%). The lower percentage is found in the Federal District, with 10.0%. The second place, 'projects', which was also misspelled 'progeto' ('progect'), appears with the greatest frequency in Sergipe (75.0%), Amazonas (50.0%) and the Federal District (50.0%). In relation to the most frequently cited practice ('visits'), the states of higher frequency were Santa Catarina (21.8%), Rio Grande do Sul (21.1%) and Pernambuco (19.1%). Another frequently cited practice ('workshop') had a high incidence in Bahia, figuring in as much as 34.5% of the answers, followed by Maranhão (31.3%).

In the second question, in which an experience derived from the actions of the ProEMI was asked to be reported, the terms 'projects' and 'activities' appear again as the most frequently cited among the subjects researched. As much as 33% of the answers cited the term 'projects' (332) and 19.6% cited 'activities'. The term 'macrofield' should be highlighted, which registers, in this question, a higher incidence among the answers (19.6% or 196). However, the teachers' texts suggest that the macrofields are perceived more as activities or independent educational practices than as thematic axes to induce curricular restructuring or integration. Seldom has any articulation between these activities and the school's curricular basis been mentioned. The names of the macrofields remain terms rarely cited. The macrofield 'undergraduate research' was the most frequent, cited in 30 answers. The citations of the others did not amount to 1%.

From the survey made, the presupposition that the teachers who answered affirmatively to the question about the guiding documents were qualified observers due to knowing the terms from the normative documents was reinforced. The search for the word 'macrofield' was crucial, since this concept is central in the ProEMI's proposition. The search for this term in relation to question n. 1 had a low incidence with its frequency focused in the answers of the state of Paraíba. In the case of question n. 2, the incidence was high, being it the third more frequently cited term among the subjects. The control reading revealed that the concept of macrofield often refers to the distribution of activities in particularized actions within one macrofield; seldom was it possible to observe signs that these activities were articulated with others (subjects/fields of knowledge or other macrofield). This scenario strengthened previous observations that the inductions made by the ProEMI were weakened in relation to the redesign or curricular restructuring planned.

The results of the exploratory research with keywords confirmed that most of the ProEMI's actions seem to be organized in the form of activities, projects or thematic workshops and reinforce the hypothesis that the activities, projects and workshops that are maintained are not articulated with the curricular basis structured by subjects and that the macrofields are perceived more as a set of activities and independent educational practices than as axes inducing curricular integration and reformulation. Based on this preliminary analysis, the qualified reading of the questionnaires answered by the teachers was performed. This reading was oriented by the interpretation of the meanings that are attributed to these terms ('activities', 'projects', 'workshops', 'macrofields' etc.) and by the extent to which these actions could be more or less articulated or integrated with the educational practices resulting from the curricular structure conventionally organized by subjects.

The reading and categorization of the answers, considering the possibilities with the subjects, knowledge, curricular times and spaces, have shown that in less than 20% of the situations (16.61%), this hypothesis is not verified. In these situations, a greater proximity with the intentions of the Program can be identified, if these intentions are seen to include the lower dissociation possible between knowledge-spaces-times "of the ProEMI" and knowledge-spaces-times of the existing curriculum.

Among the practices that reinforce the distance in relation to the ProEMI's intentions and confirm the hypothesis (46.65%) are found those that characterize the dissociation of spaces-times and the absence of any articulation between the actions related to the ProEMI and the other activities based on the conventional curriculum organized by subjects and its spatial-temporal fragmentations. These aspects are evidenced mainly in the frequent use of two terms: 'after-class' and 'extracurricular'.¹⁶ The meaning that the activities derived from the ProEMI are particularly constituted as extracurricular action evidences a perception of the Program in its isolation or, at best, in its complementary character in relation to other school actions. This separation between what is considered 'curricular', frequently referring to the subjects and the conventional logics of time, and what is 'extracurricular', taking place in the moment opposed to that which is dedicated to subjects, has added elements in the sense of the conclusions that a movement of restructuration in Middle School curricula was not really in question.

In relation to the affirmations concerning the subjects/students, the teachers point out as very positive issues the decrease of the rates of school failure and dropout, the strengthening of autonomy and critical thinking in face of "the greater contact between teachers and students, the exchange of experiences with other fields of knowledge, the possibility of turning students into protagonists, historical subjects involved in the quest for knowledge through many projects." The valuing of this protagonist position is stressed by many educators, an aspect already identified in the texts of the managers.

The implementation of full-time education is indicated by many schools, including the seven-hour school day and lunch at school as a relatively positive factor. For others, the full-time experience is mentioned as being responsible for students leaving the institution in search for a conventional school day. Among these speeches, it is possible to observe that, for the teachers who have answered the questionnaire, the main point of the research is qualifying the time spent in school with full experiences for the young rather than increasing school time.

Final Remarks

The conduction of the research led to the early questioning of the meaning that was being attributed to the term 'innovative'. From the analysis of the CRP's to the interpretations of the answers to the questionnaires, it was concluded that 'innovative' is being signified as that which has not been usual, that has not been instituted as common practice and that, through the inductions effected by the Program, ends up acquiring greater visibility and being performed more often. This meaning refers to the projects that involve one or more disciplines, workshops, field classes, visits to museums, theatres and others. There were few mentions to the meanings of 'innovative' related to the propositions of the Program, such as the search for greater integration between the disciplines, fields of knowledge and between these and the macrofields proposed.

From the experiences analyzed, in those qualified as having greater proximity with the ProEMI's intentions, the teachers and managers emphasize the development of disciplinary or interdisciplinary projects, greater student participation and the importance of acquiring materials that allow greater diversity in school activities, such as painting, musical instruments, audio equipment and theatrical materials, for instance. Affirmations that these actions qualify and diversify the experiences lived within the school were frequent. Some answers have shown, even if with lower frequency, the intention that activities be developed in articulation with the existing curricular structure, pointing to a movement of educational-curricular reformulation. In this set, it was also possible to observe that the practices related to the reconfiguration of the educational-curricular times-spaces have, as presupposition, the organization of the educational work in a collective manner and the follow-up by the articulating teacher.

In relation to the experiences lived by the school subjects, the following alterations were emphasized by teachers and managers: greater integration among students, among teachers and between teachers and students; greater student participation and curiosity; greater interest, among the students, in learning and participating in school activities; greater interest, among students, in research; the fascination of the young with the use of digital technology; students who had dropped out returning to school; greater interest in the contents discussed in the classroom, generating stronger bonds between students and teachers. In face of these affirmations, it was concluded that, even if the changes brought about by the ProEMI were relatively weak in relation to the curriculum restructuring planned for Middle Education, the student is the great beneficiary of the changes effected, since in all the cases a positive alteration was observed in the young's attitude toward school.

Finally, it is worth mentioning that the theoretical framework used has proven to be powerful to the studies performed (BERNSTEIN, 1996; BALL, 1994; BALL and BOWE, 1992). Whether in the institutional texts (CRP) or in the texts produced by managers and teachers in their generous contribution to the research, it was observed that part of what is proposed in the ProEMI's documents was incorporated by the school as well as meanings proper to what was proposed by the documents were produced. These facts were evidenced as the results of a dynamic process from which consolidated practices and discourses and new possibilities intertwine, energized both by the meanings attributed to the propositions and by the conditions in which the teaching activity is performed.

The processes triggered by the Programa Ensino Médio Inovador, studied from the school's standpoint, were understood based on the contexts evidenced in the Policy Cycle Approach. These formed the basis for the analysis toward what could be put into practice as well as the probable strategies to be derived from the inductions made.

Concluding, the research findings allow stressing that "the representations and the practices formalized within the school due to the reading of curricular prescriptions are mediated by codes that generate a new discursive practice" (SILVA, 2014, p. 22) and also that these codes institute other parameters for the teaching activity. In this movement, the old and the new are no longer seen as absolute or opposite, but, in their intercomplementariness, they announce yet other discourses and practices.

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• 1
  Translated into English by Adriano Moraes Migliavacca (Lecttura Traduções).
• 2
  The synthesis of these discussions is published in the book Ensino Médio: ciência, cultura e trabalho, organized by Gaudêncio Frigotto e Maria Ciavatta. Brasília: MEC, SEMTEC, 2004.
• 3
  Not touching upon the duty or right of the State to make decisions upon the curricular bases of schools, this inducing character is identified already in the 2011 document: "Within this context, the Programa Ensino Médio Inovador (ProEMI) integrates the actions of the Plano de Desenvolvimento da Educação (Education Development Plan - PDE) as a strategy by the Federal Government to induce the restructuring of Middle School curricula, understanding that the actions initially proposed will be incorporated in school curricula, increasing school time and the diversity of educational practices, meeting the needs and expectations of middle school students" (BRASIL, MEC/SEB, 2011, p. 6).
• 4
  Based on the macrofields chosen, each school elaborates its Curricular Restructuration Project (CRP). The set of CRP's of all the schools of one state constitutes the Global Attention Plan (GAP).
• 5
  The approaches and methodological tools used in this research are in line with the ethical procedures established for scientific research in Human Sciences.
• 6
  The path of constitution and the formulations of the Policy Cycle Approach are developed in Mainardes (2006) based on the writings of Bowe, R., Ball, S. and Gold, A. (1992) and Ball, S. (1994).
• 7
  In 2012 and 2013, the mandatory macrofields were 'educational follow-up' and 'undergraduate research'; the qualitative study about the CRP was based on them.
• 8
  The choice of these three states was based on the following criteria: In two cases, a very similar approach to that of the ProEMI was found in the local propositions (Rio Grande do Sul, in the document Ensino Médio Politécnico; Mato Grosso do Sul in the text Orientações Curriculares. Concepções para a Educação Básica). In the case of Paraná, the choice was due to the experience that was occurring at the moment of the research called Ensino Médio por Blocos de Disciplinas (Middle School by Discipline Blocks) (biannual instead of annual organization of time). These possibilities were seen to enrich the analyses insofar as signs of relationships that the schools could establish between there propositions and the Programa Ensino Médio Inovador.
• 9
  The AC technique follows three basic stages: 1) Pre-analysis-selection and organization of the material, wherein a first reading of the material is performed (the free-floating reading with no intention of finding specific elements in the texts), the materials that are in agreement with the research goals and should be part of the corpus analyzed are decided upon and provisional hypotheses are formulated; 2) exploration of the material or codification-second reading of all the material, identification of meanings and codification/grouping in empirical categories (analytical units) related to the research object according to common characteristics; 3) treatment of the results and interpretation-identification of the characteristics of similarity or difference among data, description, categorization within thematic units and interpretation (BARDIN, 1977).
• 10
  From the 18 answers, 16 are from questionnaires answered by school managers in Santa Catarina. Most of them refer to questions associated to transportation and school meals, but problems related to the increase of school dropout and lower educational performance were also reported.
• 11
  The following procedures were performed: First, terms to be researched were chosen; second, the codes of the answers that contained the defined terms were selected; third, a control reading was performed aiming at assessing the pertinence of the terms and developing a preliminary interpretation of the meanings they have in the answers; fourth, the results were quantified and analyzed in accordance with the universe studied and the distribution along the states of the Federation. The objective of these procedures was to assess the absence and presence of keywords among the answers. This analysis enabled a general mapping of the answers and, quantitatively, expressed general trends observed among the subjects.
• 12
  The quantification of the positive answers to question four may be perceived according to the states of the Federation. The states of Acre, Roraima and Sergipe presented the higher rates of unawareness of the documents, respectively, 62.5%; 50.0% and 42.9%. However, the weight of these states in the construction of the researched universe is small, since the number of questionnaires sent by them is small. In this regard, the states of Goiás and Santa Catarina should be highlighted, since they show a percentage of 26.7% (48) and 25.3% (42) of teachers who are not aware of the documents. In the other end are the states of Amazonas, Amapá and the Federal District, which represent the lowest rates of unawareness of the document, with 0.0%, 7.7% and 9.1%. The state of Paraíba, which has some weight in the construction of the universe researched (7.0% of the total of questionnaires) registered a percentage of unawareness of the document of 13.6%.
• 13
  Synonyms of the keywords that could be appearing in the questionnaires were researched. To broaden the range of answers, misspelled terms were also considered. The grouping makes sense considering the composition of the questions. The two first asked "experiences" with the ProEMI to be reported. The third has a particular characteristic, since it establishes an evaluation of the Program and its possibilities of facing the educational challenges in the Middle School within the standpoint of the teachers acting in the Program.
• 14
  In the questionnaire directed to the managers there was a question of multiple choice about the macrofields with which the school was working. In this case, not taking into consideration the mandatory macrofields, the most frequently marked macrofield was 'reading and literacy', and 'digital culture' was the less frequently marked. In the teachers' questionnaire, all the questions were open-ended, which allowed assessing the frequency in which the term appears.
• 15
  It should be highlighted that the control reading points that this term refers to undergraduate research activities or workshops developed within the schools and not necessarily an axis of curricular restructuring described by the guiding document.
• 16
  A significant portion of the answers-36.04% of the questionnaires-do not contain elements enough for conclusive interpretations, since either they affirm or deny the reading hypothesis. The quantity of questionnaires in this situation varies between 22.98%, in the Southeastern Region, to 44.35%, in the Northern Region.
• *
  PhD in Education by Pontifícia Universidade Católica de São Paulo (PUC/SP). Professor at the Universidade Federal do Paraná. Coordinator of the High School Observatory Research Group. E-mail: <[e-mail]>.

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  Apr-Jun 2016

History

• Received
  12 Aug 2015
• Accepted
  18 Feb 2016