Becoming a state school teacher in Sao Paulo: hiring practices and the teacher condition

Author(s)

Juliana Regina Basilio

• Document type: Doctoral Thesis
• Press: Campinas, SP.
• Institution: Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Faculdade de Educação
• Defense date: 2016-02-26

Examining board members

Ana Maria Fonseca de Almeida; Belmira Amelia de Barros Oliveira Bueno; Graziela Serroni Perosa; Maria Alice de Lima Gomes Nogueira; Mauricio Ernica

• Advisor: Ana Maria Fonseca de Almeida

Abstract

This research aims at contributing to the understanding of the production and reproduction of educational inequality in elementary education. In order to do so, it draws on a study on teachers¿ professional socialization in São Paulo state schools. From a perspective inspired by Bourdieu and his co-workers, the research intends to provide understanding on the professional dispositions of teachers as a result of the combination of their individual history, which is also the history of their social group, and the history of schools. The text is divided in three parts. The first one looks at the role played by state schools in the educational system of São Paulo state by means of a study on the present configuration of the job market for elementary education teachers in São Paulo. Based on a dataset containing the number of schools and enrollments in public schools (run by the state, the city or the federal government) and in private schools; work contracts of state school teachers; the Human Development Indexes of the São Paulo capital¿s neighborhoods, administrative regions, and other cities in the state released by the United Nations Development Programme, which were analyzed geometrically; this market is constructed as a social space. By resorting to interviews with a group of eighteen teachers and two hundred and eighteen questionnaires answered by teachers from different school networks, the second part of the research reveals how the encounter of jobs in the market, individuals ¿ teachers ¿, and their socialization takes place, rendering problematic their initial experience at school. Finally, also based on the interviews and questionnaires, the third part shows how job opportunities and teachers¿ work conditions are related to the construction of teacher careers in elementary education, a context in which both the processes of professionalization and de-professionalization are possible. The results suggest that: (i) great part of the teachers start their careers in state schools in temporary work contracts; (ii) in those schools, the initial experiences, mainly those ruled by temporary work contracts, are characterized by situations that contribute to the de-professionalization of teachers; (iii) after having started their careers, teachers seek work positions in the various school networks that take part in the elementary education system in São Paulo (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 14/06025-8 - Becoming a public school teacher in São Paulo: hiring practices and the teacher condition (1985-2013)
• Grantee: Juliana Regina Basilio
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate