The purpose of this essay is to discuss the Prouni--University for All policy, which has been implemented in Brazil in an effort to increase access of the underprivileged to postsecondary education. In order to provide a better understanding of the problem, three points of interest are initially addressed: income inequality, illiteracy, and a…

This dissertation encompasses three chapters that study the Brazilian higher educational system and determines the barriers to acquiring higher education in the country. Below are the individual abstracts for each chapter. Chapter 1: "Rural and urban schools' performance in Brazil and its impact on access to higher education". Recent…

This paper aims to understand the effect of international mobility in higher education on Brazilian education inequality by examining the Science Without Borders programme for undergraduate students. The SWB aimed to award 101,000 scholarships for Brazilian undergraduate students to conduct part of their studies in a foreign university between…

What drives governments with similar revenues to publicly provide very different amounts of goods for which private substitutes are available? Key examples are education and health care. This paper compares spending by Brazilian municipalities on pre-primary education--a good that is also provided privately--with spending on public infrastructure…

Large household surveys are used to analyze links between schooling inequality and earnings inequality in Brazil and South Africa, countries that have long had among the highest levels of income inequality in the world. The studies were the 1995 South African October Household Survey (32,000 households) and the 1995 Brazilian Pesquisa Nacional de…

Although the challenges of Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) have become apparent in middle-income countries, the making of these systems has not been systematically theorised and compared. This article discusses such processes in Brazil --a recognised emerging economy, and Chile-- one of the last economies to join the high…

Today, young adults from lower-income backgrounds are pursuing educational trajectories that would have been distant dreams for their parents. In many Global South countries, this expansion has followed a neoliberal logic in which private universities purport to provide students skills and increased earning capacity, and employers the necessary…

The Oswaldo Cruz Scientific Vocation Program is a scientific initiation educational program for High School students, in Biological, Health, Human, and Social Sciences areas. We consider that living in less advantaged neighborhoods impacts on the students, advisors and co-advisors' emotions. In this paper, to illustrate our hypothesis, we selected…

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to address its drastic socioeconomic inequality and to compel its higher education institutions to diversify significantly while democratizing access to those schools. Brazil recently passed a sweeping affirmative action law requiring its public universities to reserve half of their available spots for…

Most studies find a positive correlation between family cultural capital and educational achievement. As compelling as the evidence on the advantages of family cultural capital for educational achievement is, most studies have focused on countries characterized by having a large middle class and high levels of income, not addressing societies with…

This paper examines the determinants of students' performance on the entrance test at Universidade Federal de Pernambuco, Brazil. Particular attention is paid to the importance of family background variables, such as parents' education and family income, on students' performance and how they relate to the probability of attending public schools…

Research in the industrialized world shows that the influence of family background on educational attainment has remained stable or declined over time. In contrast, very little is known about the developing world. Using high-quality data sets and a standard protocol, this article offers a comparative analysis of trends in educational…

A statistical study of Brazilian education reveals that children of high-income, well-educated groups enjoy better educational opportunities and a usually higher rate of return on their educational investment than do the children of low-income groups. Poorer regions of the country, however, have a higher rate of return than do regions with a…

The studies presented in this volume help readers to understand the constraints faced in addressing the key problems within the Brazilian education system. Steps to address the issues and benefits to be gained by addressing those issues are discussed. Forty-two authors reiterate that the success of Brazil's education reform will have an important…

Data from the 1970 Brazilian Census are used to explore the effects of parents' investments in their children's education on the pattern of future income distribution and on the intergenerational transmission of inequality, using a simulation model. Appended are 21 references. (Author)