Equipe de Elaboração
Mary Garcia Castro – coordenadora de pesquisa UNESCO
Miriam Abramovay – consultora BID
Maria das Graças Rua – consultora UNESCO
Eliane Ribeiro Andrade – consultora UNESCO
Assistente de Pesquisa
Leonardo de Castro Pinheiro – coordenador da equipe de assistentes
Perla Ribeiro
Vanessa Viana
Colaboradores
Claudia Beatriz Silva de Souza
Claudia da Costa Martinelli
Diana Barbosa
Danielle Oliveira Valverde
Indira Marrul
Laura Segall
Marilia Gomide Mochel
Thiago Galvão
EQUIPE DE PESQUISA DE CAMPO
BAHIA
PARÁ
Antonio Jonas Dias
Aldalice Moura da Cruz
Ricardo Moreno – assist
Lúcia Isabel Silva – assist
CEARÁ
Verônica Parente
Eugênia Figueiredo – assist
PARANÁ
Ana Inês de Souza
Gisele Carneiro Blasius – assist
ESPÍRITO SANTO
Luiza Mitiko Yshiguro Camacho
Kátia de Sá – assist
RIO DE JANEIRO
Alexandre da Silva Aguiar
Cleide Figueiredo Leitão – assist
MARANHÃO
Cléa de Souza C.A. Ribeiro
Sandra M.T. da Costa – assist
SÃO PAULO
Maria Dirce Gomes Pinho
Vilma Bok – assist
MATO GROSSO
Eugênia Coelho Paredes
Daniela Barros da S.F. Andrade – assist
The authors are responsible for the choice and presentation of facts contained in this
publication and for the opinions expressed therein, which are not necessarily those of
UNESCO and do not compromise the organization in any way. The terms used and the
presentation of material do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the
part of UNESCO concerning the legal status of any country, territory, town, or area, or that
of its authorities, or in regard to the location of their frontiers or limits.
UNESCO BRAZIL Editions
Publishing Council of UNESCO Brazil
Jorge Werthein
Cecilia Braslavsky
Juan Carlos Tedesco
Adama Ouane
Célio da Cunha
Executive Team
Mary Garcia Castro – UNESCO research coordinator
Miriam Abramovay – IDB consultant
Maria das Graças Rua – UNESCO consultant
Eliane Ribeiro – UNESCO consultant
Publishing Assistant: Larissa Vieira Leite
Copy Editing: DPE Studio
Cover: Edson Fogaça
UNESCO, 2002
Cultivating life, disarming violence: experiences in education,
culture, leisure, sports and citizenship with youth in situations
of poverty situations / Mary Castro et alii. – Brasília :
UNESCO, Brasil Telecom, Kellogg Foundation, Interamerican
Development Bank, 2002. 564p.
1. Social Problems-Brazil 2. Education-Brazil 3. Culture-Brazil
4. Citizenship-Brazil 5. Leisure-Brazil 6. Sports-Brazil
7. Poverty-Brazil 8. Disadvantaged Youth-Brazil I. Castro, Mary
II. UNESCO
CDD 362
Division of Women, Youth and Special Strategies
Youth Coordination Unit/UNESCO-Paris
Organização das Nações Unidas para a Educação, a Ciência e a Cultura
Representação no Brasil
SAS, Quadra 5, Bloco H, Lote 6, Ed. CNPq/IBICT/UNESCO, 9º andar.
70070-914 – Brasília – DF – Brasil
Tel.: (55 61) 321-3525
Fax: (55 61) 322-4261
E-mail: [email protected]
Notes on the authors
Mary Garcia Castro - Research Coordinator for UNESCO Brazil. Masters
degrees in Urban Planning (Federal University of Rio de Janeiro); and in
Sociology of Culture (Federal University of Bahia); Ph.D. in Sociology from
the University of Florida. Associate Researcher at the Center of International
Migration Studies - University of Campinas; Retired Professor from the
University of Bahia; Member of the National Commission on Population
and Development; Coordinator of the Feminism and Gender Studies Section
for Latin America of LASA - the Latin American Scholars Association
(2000-2001). Publications in the areas of gender, international migration,
cultural studies, and youth. Among recent publications are Identidades,
Alteridades e Latinidades (ed.) in Caderno CRH, 32, January - June,
2000; Transidentidades no Local Globalizado. Não Identidades,
Margens e Fronteiras: Vozes de Mulheres Latinas nos Estados Unidos
(in Bela Feldman Bianco and Graça Capinha, org.), Estudos de Cultura e
Poder Editora Hucitec, São Paulo, 2001); Migrações Internacionais Subsidios para Políticas. (coord.), CNPD-IPEA, Brasília, 2002
Miriam Abramovay - Consultant to UNODCCP and to the World Bank on
research and evaluation concerning questions of gender, youth, and violence.
Graduated in Sociology and Educational Sciences from the University of
Paris, France (Paris VII - Vincennes). Masters degree in Education from
the Catholic University of São Paulo, Brazil. Coordinator, Social Conservation
Program of UICN for Central America and Mexico and the Gender Program
within FLACSO for Latin America. Has worked as Consultant for the
World Bank, UNICEF, OPS, UNIFEM, IDB, ACDI/Canada, and FAO
among others. Among her many published works are: Gangs, Crews,
Buddies, and Rappers – available in Portuguese and English, Editora
Garamond, Rio de Janeiro, 1999; Schools of Peace, - available in Portuguese
and English, Edições UNESCO, Brasília, 2001; As Relações de Gênero
na Confederação Nacional de Trabalhadores Rurais (CONTAG) in
Baltar da Rocha, Maria, Trabalho e Gênero, Editora 34, São Paulo, 2001.
Maria das Graças Rua - Professor at the University of Brasília and
Consultant to UNESCO in Research and Evaluation mainly on questions
of gender, youth, and violence. With a Bachelor’s degree in Social
Sciences, she did postgraduate work in Political Science at the University
Research Institute in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Among her many publications
are the following: (with Miriam Abramovay) Partners in the Struggle
or “Pots and Pans Coordinators” available in Portuguese and English,
Edições UNESCO, Brasília, 2000 and her doctoral thesis: Políticos e
Burocratas no Processo de Policy-Making: A Política das Terras
no Brasil, 1945-1984. Coordinator of the Working Group on Public
Policies of the National Association of Postgraduate Studies in Social
Sciences (ANPOCS) - 1994-1996.
Eliane Ribeiro Andrade - Education Specialist at the State University of
Rio de Janeiro, Education Department. Professor at the University of
Estácio de Sá, Education Department. UNESCO consultant in the area
of youth/education, co-author of the book Escolas da Paz (Schools of
Peace) - UNESCO. Member of the Coordinating Committee of the Forum
on the Education of Youths and Adults of the state of Rio de Janeiro.
Currently studying for a doctorate in Education from the Federal
Fluminense University, Rio de Janeiro. Masters degree in Philosophy of
Education from the Institute of Advanced Studies in Education of the
Getúlio Vargas Foundation. She has done postgraduate work on the
evaluation of Social and Educational programs for the Inter-American
Institute of Co-operation in Agriculture - IICA.
SUMMARY
Acknowledgements............................................................................11
Foreword..........................................................................................13
1 – Introduction
1.1 The Study and its Origins......................................................19
2 – Methodology
2.1 Fieldwork.............................................................................35
2.2 The Exploratory Study...........................................................37
2.3 The Database.......................................................................38
3 – Exploring the Dimensions of the Lives of Youths on the
Peripheries of the Cities Studied
3.1 Demographic Spread of the Youths........................................41
3.2 Work....................................................................................43
3.2.1 Working conditions...........................................................45
3.2.2 The Meaning and Importance of Work..........................46
3.2.3 Use of Money....................................................................48
3.2.4 Obstacles Perceived in Terms of Having Work.................49
3.3 Leisure.................................................................................53
3.4 Discrimination.......................................................................59
3.5 Violence................................................................................65
3.5.1 Domestic Violence..........................................................70
3.5.2 Institutional Violence......................................................72
3.6 Drugs...................................................................................75
3.6.1 Reasons for Becoming Involved with Drugs...................77
3.7 A Not Very Happy Ending – But With Luck It’s Not
Over Yet.......................................................................80
4 – Case Studies Profile of Experiences
4.1 The Field of the Research......................................................85
4.2 Bahia....................................................................................95
4.2.1 Centro de Referência Integral de Adolescentes – CRIA
(Integrated Reference Center for Adolescents – CRIA)..............95
4.2.2 Bahia School of Arts and Crafts....................................110
4.2.3 Fundação Cidade Mãe (Mother City Foundation).........................123
4.2.4 Grupo Cultural Olodum (The Olodum Cultural Group)..132
4.2.5 Circo Picolino (Picolino Circus)....................................143
4.3 Ceará..................................................................................151
4.3.1 Associação Curumins (The Curumins
Association) ...........................................................................151
4.3.2 Comunicação e Cultura (Communication
and Culture)..........................................................................166
4.3.3 Escola de Dança e de Integração Social para a
Criança e o Adolescente – EDISCA (School of Dance
and Social Integration for the Child and
Adolescent – EDISCA)...........................................................180
4.4 Maranhão...........................................................................194
4.4.1 Circus School (Circo-Escola)..........................................194
4.4.2 Projeto Descobrindo o Saber (Discovering
Knowledge Project)................................................................209
4.5 Mato Grosso......................................................................220
4.5.1 CIARTE.........................................................................220
4.5.2 Recorder Orchestra.....................................................229
4.6 Pará..................................................................................241
4.6.1 Colors of Belém (Cores de Belém).................................241
4.6.2 Radio Margarida..........................................................253
4.7 Pernambuco........................................................................266
4.7.1 Coletivo Mulher Vida (Woman Life Collective)......................266
4.7.2 Auçuba..........................................................................278
4.7.3 Centro das Mulheres de Cabo (Cabo Women’s Center)..290
4.7.4 Centro de Cidadania Umbu Ganzá (Umbu Ganzá
Center for Citizenship)...........................................................303
4.7.5 Programa de Atendimento à Criança e ao
Adolescente – PACA (Service for the Child and
Adolescent Program – PACA)..................................................315
4.8 Paraná................................................................................325
4.8.1 Escola de Rodeio Erê (The Erê School of Rodeo)...................325
4.8.2 Movimento de Expressão – Artvistas M.D.E. Hip Hop
(Hip Hop Expressive Movement – Artvistas M.D.E.)...............335
4.9 São Paulo............................................................................346
4.9.1 Cidade Aprendiz School - Projeto “100 muros”
(The City Apprentice School – 100 Walls Project)...................346
4.9.2 Fundação Gol de Letra (Letter Goal Foundation).........359
4.9.3 Meninos do Morumbi (The Boys and Girls
of Morumbi)...........................................................................372
4.9.4 Fundação Travessia (Crossing Foundation)..................384
4.10 Rio de Janeiro....................................................................398
4.10.1 Vila Olímpica da Mangueira (Mangueira
Samba School Club)....................................................................398
4.10.2 Comitê para a Democratização da Informática
– CDI (Committee for the Democratization of
Computer Science)..................................................................411
4.10.3 Grupo Cultural Afro Reggae (Afro Reggae
Cultural Group).....................................................................423
4.10.4 Grupo de Teatro Nós do Morro
(Nós do Morro Theatre Group)..............................................436
4.10.5 Viva Rio......................................................................445
5 – Vocabulary of Meanings
5.1 Clarifications.......................................................................463
5.2 Vocabulary..........................................................................465
5.2.1 Youth Protagonism.........................................................465
5.2.2 Self-esteem.....................................................................468
5.2.3 Belonging.........................................................................474
5.2.4 Identity............................................................................476
5.2.5 Identity Consciousness – Race..........................................476
5.2.6 Citizenship.......................................................................478
5.3 Fields and Phrases..............................................................480
5.3.1 Culture............................................................................480
5.3.2 Deconstructing cultural prejudice: capoeira.................484
5.3.3 Street Culture and Graffiti.................................................485
5.3.4 Languages.......................................................................486
5.3.5 School and Art-Citizenship................................................487
5.3.6 Art Education..................................................................488
5.3.7 Between Expression and Discipline...................................489
5.3.8 Art and Education of and for Participation........................490
5.3.9 Art Education: The Circus................................................491
5.3.10 Rights and Limits...........................................................492
5.3.11 Cultural Citizenship and the Exercise of Social Criticism.......493
5.3.12 Sports – Sports and Citizenship – Rights and Limits.........493
6 – Conclusions............................................................................497
7 – Recommendations..................................................................505
8 – References.............................................................................513
9 – Lists........................................................................................521
10 – Anexos.................................................................................529
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Many people were interviewed in the course of this research in Brazil –
principals, teachers, and participating youths - as much in the institutions
focused on here as in other related ones. Interviews were also held with
the parents of those youths and leading community figures related to the
institutions. In addition, many other people cooperated in this study at different
stages and in different ways in the elaboration of this project.
We would like to express our appreciation to all these people and hope that
in some way we can answer to the expectations of those who gave their
time and cooperated in the study. We would like to reaffirm our involvement
with alternative ways of dealing with youths, in particular those living in
situations of poverty and violence.
We would also like to thank Brasil Telecom, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation,
and the Inter-American Development Bank, partners in financing this work,
for giving us the opportunity, not only as researchers but above all as citizens,
to share this search and provide visibility for these experiences that invest
in creativity, self-esteem, and the collective responsibility of youths. The
experiences accomplish this using education, art, sports, and culture as
trapezes from which the youths may fly further.
UNESCO’s cooperation once again challenges dichotomies, linking a
preoccupation with rigorous diagnostics to a sensitivity to youths’ gestures,
in social terms. It is not by accident that the design for the research was
based on projects carried out by government and non governmental
organizations, using different qualitative and quantitative instruments and
observations in loco in distinct parts of Brazil. This is shown in greater
detail in the body of the study.
Both our own rigor and our sensitivity in the course of the research owe
much to the enthusiasm, criticism, and reflections of UNESCO’s
representative in Brazil, Jorge Werthein, who worked closely with the
development of the study.
In the course of the research we learned that it is necessary to develop a
certain investigative shrewdness in order to identify practices that go beyond
well-intentioned discourse. To this end, it helps to listen to what the youths
and the community have to say. Many times we have to read between the
lines, or listen between the lines.
We are also grateful to Vera Regina dos Vasconcelos, the assistant to the
UNESCO Representative, for her administrative support.
We are grateful for the criticism and suggestions of Célio da Cunha, Marlova
Jovchelovitch Noleto, and Marta Porto, of UNESCO.
We would like to stress that the following 30 experiences are considered
innovative in the field of working with youths exposed to diverse types of
violence. These experiences are felt to be so especially in relation to their
creativity in terms of education, art, culture, sports, leisure, and citizenship,
betting on the participation of the youths involved. However, even if these
projects are innovative, they are not necessarily the only ones.
On the one hand, we must bear in mind that many other agencies have for
some time been contributing to creating alternative spaces in which youths
may participate in cultural production. This study makes no pretension to
being able to encompass the vast richness of this field. Many of these
agencies, for example Projeto Axé, are quoted as being part of a collective
consciousness that is betting on youth. On the other hand, if we are talking
about innovation, collective references and constructions must be implicit,
since a single idea or model would be meaningless. We would like to
acknowledge all the institutions working in this field, to which those portrayed
here also owe a great deal, for their work and indirect collaboration in our
understanding of the experiences we studied.
12
Cultivating life, disarming violence
FOREWORD
The research presented here is intended as a contribution to broadening the
social visibility of projects that work with youths - in particular those living
in situations of poverty - in the fields of art, culture, citizenship, and sports.
The aim is to integrate their methodologies and practices and offer assistance
in the forming of public policy focusing on youth.
In international forums on youth, it is common to find references to youths
in language that appeals to the senses and to a playful spirit. This occurs as
a way of emphasizing the importance of modernizing educational practices,
in order to build bridges between formal education and the knowledge that
contributes towards citizenship, emphasizing ethical values and stimulating
aesthetic sensibility. When discussing public policy concerning youths, it is
customary to consider art, culture, and sports not as activities that are
complementary to training and broadening the stock of information, but as a
right of citizenship with many repercussions. These activities contribute to
positive values and to recapturing pleasure in life. These are benefits not
only for the youths, but also for society in general.
For example, in the Lisbon Declaration on Policies and Programs for
Youth, a result of the First World Conference of Ministers Responsible for
Youths, held from August 8-12, 1998 (Appendix I of this document),
reference is made to the “economic, social, educational, emotional, cultural,
and spiritual needs of youths as well as to their problems.” Among other
commitments, we find the one of investing in policies to “strengthen and
create new partnerships that permit youths of both sexes to learn, create,
and express themselves through cultural, physical, and sporting activities
for a balanced physical, intellectual, artistic, moral, emotional, and spiritual
development, as well as for that of their social integration.”
13
This study aims to contribute to a new perspective on social exclusion,
vulnerability, and models for public policy in the debate concerning culture
and youth. This study emphasizes the participation of the youth both as a
producer and consumer of culture, as well as the importance of encouraging
networks, channels of exchange, and the opening up of institutional areas
such as schools for extra-curricular activities with youngsters. This is a
demand that UNESCO has been noting empirically in a growing stockpile
of studies on youth in different states in Brazil.
As for the problems that affect particularly youths, international conferences
and different studies within Brazil all emphasize violence as a risk which,
even if it doesn’t belong to a particular period, has currently taken on
proportions and forms that require creative responses.
One innovative way of dealing with violence would be to move away from
the logic of repression and listen to what the youths want. Listening to
what fills their heads and stimulates their desires pits beauty against the
beast. It allows for re-appropriating feelings, cultivating lives, and disarming
violence, as this study suggests.
The very organizations that are the object of this study set limits on the
scope of their efforts and on the importance of solutions that will have
continuity and a more permanent effect upon the lives of the youths. They
are all concerned with school, family, and community. They consider public
policies regarding youths and the fight against poverty to be important.
Beyond this, they also invest in their projects so they will not be restricted,
protected spaces, but projects that give youths the opportunity to circulate
in many different areas, both public and domestic, without the fear of
violence and without participating in it. Therefore, they recognize that
although they are doing innovative work by using art, culture, and sports as
values that go against with the cultures of violence, they perceive the
limitations of the State and other agencies in society in not accepting the
importance of youths as individuals who have rights. These entities make it
difficult to open up spaces for cultures that cultivate life and material
opportunities in distinct areas in order to generate social mobility and a
more dignified life.
The W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Brasil Telecom, and the Inter-American
Development Bank, with the cooperation of UNESCO, supported this study
14
Cultivating life, disarming violence
on the experience of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and public
agencies with the youths, most of whom live in situations of poverty,
collaborating in the discussion of public policies in which the potential of
cultural activity, especially for this public, is recognized.
This study shows projects in activities such as workshops, courses, shows,
conferences, meetings, etc. on the subject of art, culture, education for
citizenship, sports, and leisure. This study also identifies the construction of
a vocabulary of meanings (or the language of values of the experiences)
aimed at creating a culture to counteract the cultures of violence. Thus, the
research also aims to contribute to the documentation of the efforts to
construct spaces for democratic access to cultural benefits. This study
contains testimonies of the impact of these experiences, especially changes,
on the lives of the youths, their families, and the communities. In addition, it
documents the conditions of their lives according to various aspects and
recommendations expressed by those interviewed or arising from the study.
Jorge Werthein
Representative of UNESCO in Brazil
Henrique Neves
President, Brasil Telecom Participações
Francisco B. Tancredi
Latin American and Caribbean Regional Director, W.W. Kellogg
Foundation
Waldemar S. Wirsig
Representative of the Inter-American Development Bank in Brazil
15
I
Introduction
Cultivating life, disarming violence
1.1 The Study and its Origins
Ilya Prigogine has pointed out that the twentieth-century has turned
the planet from a finite world of certainties into an infinite world of
inquiry and doubt. The active meaning contained in the word ‘culture’
in its original sense needs to be restored. Culture comes from the act
of cultivating. Today more than ever we need to cultivate human
creativity since, in a context of rapid change, individuals, communities,
and societies can only adapt to what is new and change their situations
by way of initiative and creative imagination.
(Cuéllar, 1997: 102)
A reasonable investment in studies on youth preceded this project.
These studies were funded by UNESCO and used quantitative and qualitative
methodology, that is, in-depth analyses in different areas of Brazil. A concern
with listening to and learning from different voices in the community has
guided these studies,1 endeavoring to explain concepts and identify demands
and recommendations based in reality in order to provide better orientation
for public policies. A result of these studies with youths in different social
situations and regions in Brazil was the discovery that levels of juvenile
violence fluctuate during the week and increase on the weekends.
In these studies art, sports, education, and culture appear as a
counterpoint, a strategic element to confront and combat violence, for building
alternative channels of expression, spaces to be explored. These elements
encourage youths to distance themselves from dangerous situations without
denying them the means to express and let out their feelings of indignation,
protest, and the positive affirmation of their identities.
1
Minayo, 1999; Abramovay et al., 1999; Sallas et al., 1999; Waiselfisz, 2000; Waiselfisz, 1998;
Barreira, 1999.
19
When looking at the daily life of youths living in lower-income areas a
common finding is the routine character of their lives, including leisure
activities. This is true either because of the lack of equipment in their
communities or through difficulty in gaining access to equipment which is
concentrated in middle and upper-class areas. It also occurs through not
having the economic resources to be able to take advantage of urban cultural
facilities. Even those activities that are provided in public areas are not
attended. The cost of transport, for these youths, is one of many difficulties
encountered in the relationship between class and culture.
There are not only distinctions of class in terms of access to cultural
benefits; there is also the construction of a social imagination. This social
imagination considers some cultural expressions as belonging to the elite.
This idea has historical roots and has been legitimized by differentiated
patterns of educational habits. For example, going to libraries, cultural centers,
and theatres are activities that form no part of the cultural spectrum offered
to the poor, or of their cultural socialization.
Research carried out in Belo Horizonte on the subject of culture draws
attention to the relationship between some forms of culture, access to them,
and class:
For the studied population, culture is fundamentally characterized
by conceptual imprecision and by its distance in relation to their
daily lives. Culture is a number of things .... The one common thread in
the various views on the subject is the image that culture is equivalent
to information and knowledge ... the various images connected to the
subject are inevitably connected to one another: the image of the
cultured person. It is in this discussion that we see most clearly one of
the aspects of the matter that is most widely agreed on.... The world of
culture is very distant and almost unattainable. Not one of the
participants believed him or herself to be cultured. The ‘common
citizens’ feel themselves excluded and looked down on by the ‘world
of culture’. For them it is one more way in which social differences are
outlined. People are put ‘in their place’. Instead of creating a hiatus
in daily life through the possibility of pleasure and entertainment,
cultural phenomena tend to separate and delineate the hierarchy in
society even more clearly. The ‘possession of culture’ emerges as an
indicator of those sectors of population with higher incomes, a distinct
indicator. The world of culture is always one degree or more above
that at which the speaker believes himself to be.
(Municipal Council, Belo Horizonte and Vox Populi, 1996:51)
20
Cultivating life, disarming violence
Artistic events are not part of the universe of the youths who were
interviewed. In addition, the youths’ language is trimmed back. This language
is precious to them and this makes it difficult for them to cultivate their
creativity in recreational and artistic activities that would develop the means
for what Castells calls “alternative disorder”, referring in the following terms
to the channeling of juvenile energy towards violence:
While we organize the new economic and technological order from
above, a broad section of youths is building an alternative disorder
from below that is made of their negation of a system which negates
them. (Castells, 1999:10)
Castells’ idea is constructed on the basis of research funded by
UNESCO in towns on the outskirts of Brasília which identifies a pattern of
low accessibility to artistic, sporting, and leisure activities for the youths.
The same tendency is shown in other research, in addition to this, funded
also by UNESCO and the FioCruz Foundation. This research on youths in
the city of Rio de Janeiro also alerts us to the limited leisure options among
youths in other socio-economic situations (Minayo et al., 1999:10). For
example, according to this study, more than 20% of youths in the A, B, and
C classes never go to the movies. Another study, also carried out in Rio de
Janeiro more recently (2001), shows that 70% of the youths interviewed
never go to the beach, 55% said they don’t play any sport, and 11% said
they do nothing in their spare time. (Abramovy et al., 2001)
If lower-income youths have less access to cultural benefits - which
by their nature should be within the reach of the whole population - they do
manage to create other forms and channels of optional expressions to
violence. Rap, for example, is the sound of youths on the outskirts, appearing
as a way of expressing their revolt. It is also an element of their social
juvenile identity, a way for these youths to stay away from gangs and crime.
Considering that sociability performs a fundamental role among youths
in internalizing values and that relationships of cooperation and solidarity
are important mechanisms of interaction, especially for people at this stage
in their lives, it is worrying that it is exactly in activities that could make
such elements as leisure, culture, and sport viable that we find limitations.
This is a fact which is also shown in this study. As insisted upon in a study
on “Schools of Peace”, recognizing these areas as belonging to an agenda
of public policies allows for the demystifying of the dichotomy between
work and leisure and also of the forming of hierarchies that occurs within
these areas of life.
21
The social vulnerability of populations living in peripheral areas, which
include those with the greatest rates of urbanization in Brazil, is also highlighted
in the mapping of the city of São Paulo funded by the World Health
Organization, which is interested in evaluating the youths’ vulnerability to
drugs. This study returns to the defense of using leisure, cultural, and sporting
activities to prevent the use of time and energy on violence and drug abuse. It
is interesting to note the territorial coexistence of a lack of cultural and leisure
equipment and high rates of violence. There is also information concerning
the cultural distancing of youths from different social classes. For example,
88% of those interviewed had never seen a classical ballet, 52% had never
been to an art museum, and 59% had never been to the dream of most youths:
a rock concert. (See Folha de São Paulo, 6/5/2001: C1 and C3)
It is worth noting that beyond corroborating the tendencies already
referred to concerning the absence of public cultural, sporting, and leisure
equipment in low-income communities, the studies funded by UNESCO
and others indicate that there is a clear demand for this equipment on the
part of the youths. These studies also demonstrate that there is a distinct
relationship between being a producer and consumer of culture and feeling
like a person, with social responsibilities and personal gratification. The
following idea takes the studies referred to as a point of reference:
It can be demonstrated through the studies funded by UNESCO that
there is a demand by youths for areas for socializing and expressing
creativity ... and that the youths harbor feelings of exclusion,
disappointment with institutional organizations, discrimination, loss
of an ethical point of reference, and low self-esteem.
(Werthein, 2001)
These results served as a reference for founding the UNESCO program
Making Room: Education and Culture for Peace (UNESCO, 2001), whose
central idea is to encourage the opening of schools on the weekends and to
make alternative spaces available to attract the youths. These strategic elements
have shown themselves to be so decisive in rescuing the citizenship of the youth
that they are being adopted by government agencies. This is happening, for
example, in the states of Rio de Janeiro, Pernambuco, Bahia, and Mato Grosso.
What does opening school spaces really mean? In addition to
collecting and making maximum use of cultural resources belonging either
to society in general or to the neighboring community and satisfying the
youths’ demand for such activities, themes relevant to the youths’ wellbeing are explored, joining ethics with aesthetics, pleasure, reflection, and
22
Cultivating life, disarming violence
creativity. These themes must be tackled using language more suitable to
the youths such as their own artistic and cultural creation. Thus, we might
make use of dance and music (rap and hip hop for example), writing
plays, theatre, writing workshops, games, and sports (capoeira, karate,
and soccer, establishing rules that encourage cooperation and teamwork),
as well as debates involving the youths themselves. Topics dealt with are:
sexuality; drugs; intolerance; violence in society and in the family; AIDS;
teenage pregnancy; public ethics, citizenship, social relationships and group
activities, and political participation.
It was on the basis of these analyses that the importance of acquiring
better knowledge of the world of the experiences that work with youths
and that are in some way making a difference was identified. In other
words, positive interventions occurred in the sense of confronting violence
with culture or, as will be repeated throughout this research, in the
testimonies of the youths, their parents, and project motivators in the projects
analyzed, contributing to the creation of alternative spaces and keeping youths
away from the situations, behavior, and ideas of violence.
This study deals with projects developed by non-governmental
organizations (NGOs) and agencies from the public sector that work with
youths in situations of poverty2, organizing workshops, courses, and activities
linked to the arts, culture, education for citizenship, sports, and leisure. The
aim is to explore the construction of a vocabulary of meanings for a culture
that can be pitted against the cultures of violences3; to document efforts at
building spaces that will make access to cultural benefits democratic, and to
record testimonies of the impact of these experiments on the lives of youths,
their families, and their communities, especially in terms of changes or in
getting away from violences.
The research hopes to contribute to increasing the social visibility of
these experiences, to make their methodologies and practices part of social
action, and to aid public policies focusing on youths. It is hoped also that the
study will help programs like the one illustrated in Making Room: Education
and Culture for Peace. Another aim is to stimulate the formation of networks
2
3
A few projects also involve youths from other backgrounds such as those from the middle and
upper classes.
“Not being singular, but plural, violence cannot and should not be indiscriminately identified
with a certain class, segment, or social group and even less confined to certain territories. To
associate violence with living on the edges of society, poverty, social inequality, spatial segregation,
etc., is to reveal only one of its facts. This facet is of undeniable importance, but constitutes
only part of the sociological explanation of the phenomenon, whose starting point can be
found most appropriately in the nature of social relations themselves and not only in the
different ways they are expressed.” (PORTO, 1995)
23
between the experiences and to stimulate exchange from a national point of
view. The UNESCO office in Rio de Janeiro is already working towards
this aim with programs such as Fala Galera (Say It People), which brings
together different experiences in which youths are participating by means
of “workshops, thematic debates and other events”, in addition to creating
links between these experiences and public and private institutions and the
communication media. (UNESCO, 2001).4
On the one hand, the area covered by of UNESCO’s studies on youth
(see note 2) provides the groundwork for this research and gives it a place
to take off from, and it does for an attempt to resolve the subtle nexus
between saying ‘yes’ to life and ‘no’ to violence in institutional practices.
On the other hand, both those studies and this one are links in a civilizing
chain that is betting on peace and on the cultivation of ethic-aesthetic
humanist values. These values go against disillusionment with the world
and the destruction of young lives that occurs through drugs, drug dealing,
intolerance, and discrimination.5
Therefore, the background of this study is made up of its frameworks.
These are part of UNESCO’s stockpile of studies in Brazil and on an
international level. They are projects- publications and programs- that record
principles, values, and recommendations concerning education, school,
knowledge, culture, ethics, youth, and the culture of peace.6
4
5
6
Also regarding the creation of a network of projects working with youths, see the entry under
CRIA in “Profile of the Projects” in this work. In Salvador CRIA stimulated and is a part of the
Integrated Movement for Cultural Action (MIAC), founded in 1997, which is now responsible
for about 300 projects.
The dialogue with the youth-related literature in Brazil, which in recent years has gained a
particular impetus as a result of warnings from various media concerning the rise of violence
among youths, falls outside the scope of this study (for more on this area see, among others,
Mello, 1998; Bercovich et al., 1998).
On youth and Culture in Brazil, see, among others:
ABRAMO, 1994; CARDOSO and SAMPAIO, 1995; MADEIRA, 1997; GONZALEZ, 1996;
LANDIM et al., 1996; NOVAES et al., 1996; SILVA, 1995; ABRAMO et a l., 2000; GROPPO,
2000, and the Brazilian Education Magazine, 1997.
‘The history of UNESCO, an institution that has existed for more than fifty years, is basically
notable for its incessant struggle to provide democratic access to the knowledge humanity has
historically produced. Its scope, which includes the areas of Education, Science and Technology,
Culture, Communication, Information Technology, and Social Development, shows that by
spreading knowledge mankind will be able to achieve acceptable patterns for living together in
solidarity. This concept and this view formed part of the basis of the constitutional acts of the
Organization in 1946, immediately after the Second World War’. UNESCO 2001. Some of
the contemporary texts whose production was funded by UNESCO may be found n this
document, such as the work by Cuéllar (1977) already quoted; Delors, 1998, and Morin,
1999. Also discussed are the International Charter for Physical Education and Sports adopted
by UNESCO’s General Conference in 1978 and the International Charter for Leisure Education
of 1978. See also Gomes, 2001.
24
Cultivating life, disarming violence
For example, the reflection from the “Report on the World Commission
of Culture and Development” cited at the beginning of this chapter is part
of the concern with the development and cultural diversity. It defends the
importance of the “human factor, the complex network of relationships,
beliefs, values, and motivations that exist in the heart of every culture.”
(Cuéllar, 1999:9) Culture is debated as an instrumental end for development
and as an end to itself, one that gives meaning to human existence. This is
done through emphasizing solidarity and the exercise of creative liberty in
favor of collectivity.
In the Report, the Culture of Peace is introduced as a construction
that requires participation and the recognition of diversity. Therefore, it does
not incorporate passivity or the camouflage of conflicts, inequalities, and
social injustices. In addition, there is the presupposition of investment in
education and knowledge of ways of being and thinking. This has been
based on research on generations about the “equity in each generation and
between generations” and on time periods and communities.
In the founding idea of the Culture of Peace, emphasis is given to the
material basis and to the required tonic for the eradication of poverty. This
is done treating social exclusions not as timely measures or as policies that
are limited to certain people, areas, or moments, but alerting to the importance
of good will and structural political investment. On the one hand, this
emphasis rejects the dichotomy between culture and economy. On the other
hand, it seeks, through knowledge of cultural practices and diversity, to
avoid cultural and economic bias or reductions. There is recognition,
therefore, of mutual conditioning, transitory elements, and the potential of
cultural expressions to deal with situations of poverty, so that they do not
become expressed in individualized violences against themselves and others.1
The idea is that even though there is no complete linear relationship
between poverty and violence, poverty, besides having negative effects
in material life, facilitates perverse cultural meanings. These include
meanings that compromise subjectivity, creativity, and the disposition
for a culture of peace.
Participation would be a pre-requisite for the construction of this culture.
Another prerequisite would be the recognition of various languages such as
that of images, of meanings, and of irreverence. This theme is referred to in
the UNESCO Report on Culture as follows:
Members of the outskirts of society might be content with their own
cultural practices, which institutionalize social dualism. They know
what it is to be drifting and what self-depreciation is, associated with
25
the assimilation of negative images they have of themselves and of
society, and the problems that emerge from this. This is particularly
true in the case of the youths, whose frame of reference and of values
moves away from traditional standards. This is caused by the lack of
means and resources that prevent these individuals living on the
outskirts of society from effectively participating in social life.
Therefore, the battle to eradicate poverty should include a cultural
dimension. (Cuéllar, 1997:125)
The Report also calls attention to the cultural character of “intangible
heritage” or “immaterial riches that are stored in minds”, whose value would
not be considered by the logic of the commercial market.
All of the experiences analyzed in this project emphasize the
preoccupation with the life conditions of the youths, their poverty, and
the lack of alternatives for the survival of their families. As already
advised in previous projects on successful experiences with youths in
the area of art and culture in Salvador, “the examination is not of bread
or circus, but of the combination between bread and circus.” (Castro
and Abramovay, 1998:573)
The preoccupation with redeeming culture in public policies is present
in a literature that is not new, but that has received new blood from community
studies and institutional practices. This has occurred on the level of debate
on development, deconstructing the observed departmentalization of culture
and economy, and it has also occurred through the attention to the strength
of desire, feelings, and the meanings given by individuals to social relationships,
which encourages or discourages economic policies and well-intentioned
general principles. According to Arizpe:
The theory and the policies for development should incorporate the
concepts of cooperation, trust, ethnicity, community, identity, and
friendship since these elements make up the social fabric in which
politics and economy are based. In many places the limited focus of
the commercial market that is based on competence and utility is
changing the delicate balance of these factors and in this way
aggravating cultural tensions and the feeling of uncertainty.
In defending the idea that the youths should be partners in the
construction of a culture of peace, and not be treated as “passive consumers”
or “indifferent spectators”, the previously cited UNESCO Report explicitly
questions that they stimulate and develop the discursive world of the youths
and the agencies that work with youths, on a community basis.
26
Cultivating life, disarming violence
How will the new generations be able to learn and live together in
tomorrow’s world and how can we construct a world where the defenses
of peace are built into the institutional structures and the youths’
minds at the same time? Many responses to these challenges may and
should come from the youths themselves, provided they are given the
opportunity to express themselves. The potential is great. If they are
not treated as passive consumers and indifferent spectators of their
own fate, the youths become active agents and participants in the life
of their communities. (Cuéllar, 1997:200)
It is worth noting in advance that the findings of this study support
the correction of the road taken to arrive at these responses in terms of
how feeling like a subject and participant can give new meaning to life.
Many of the analyzed experiences invest in the training of young artists
and teachers from lower income areas. They are program motivators
from the agencies and communities themselves. They put on shows with
themes of citizenship and teach other youths and children, serving as
positive examples. Aside from this, they move away from violences by
being social subjects and by being useful. This also happens because they
realize that the way they use their body in their artistic cultural projects is
incompatible with bad habits, like drug use.
This study intends to be another link in what is called the civilizing
chain. In fact, we highlight the right to culture as one more right like the
right to dignity, education, and access to public services. These are rights
that appear again and again in the statements as rights that those surveyed
feel entitled to. In this way we also highlight investment in solidarity. This is
the key-note of the analyzed experiences, which illustrate the potentiality of
a theme that has been emphasized by a wide variety of authors: the
importance of attaching public policies to participation.
Culture, the arts, sports, and education for citizenship values are
the subjects of this study. This cultivates beauty, and if beauty is not
sufficient in and of itself, it is a necessary counterpoint to the beast,
which is the violences.
Yet what do beauty, joy, entertainment, leisure, sports, education for
ethical values, and the cultivation of life have to do with the beast, with
violence? Isn’t there a risk in the instrumental use of culture in uniting the
intention of documenting experiences in the field of art, popular culture, and
education for citizenship in the same study? This includes highlighting these
elements as a potential for contributing to disarming violences, activating
self-esteem, participation, solidarity, and values for a culture of peace and
27
providing opportunities to the youths in order that they become the stars in
their own shows, winning respect and admiration in their communities and
stimulating spaces that provide a creative outlet for their youthful adrenaline.
Depending on the equation made between these constructions – culture
and violence – the risk does exist. However, the experiences mapped out in
these studies indicate that relating these constructions, forming an equation
in which the beauty faces the beast, does not necessarily imply classic
reductionism – “economicisms” versus “culturalicisms” – or current
reductionism, such as the micro-sociologist accent on civil society and
community organizations. With this accent the State is discarded, as well as
the political economy. On the other hand, neo-culturalism puts emphasis on
discussion, a symbolic perspective, expressions of subjectivity and the
performance languages. These are times when the challenge is to combine
economy and culture, and to be aware of the nexus between them.
The experiences analyzed here and other related ones that work with
youths, based on their own languages and their own desires, have been
making a difference in the life of many of those living in situations of poverty.
By being spaces of laughter and pleasure, these experiences guarantee
access and the right to culture, arming the participants with a critical
perspective on violences and drugs. These experiences encourage
participation and the development of self-esteem, contributing with
alternatives spaces as much for being part of, as for taking part in, and
collaborating in resistances.
A vocabulary of meanings7 was organized in a specific chapter based
on the reflections of a wide variety of agents. The target public of these
experiences and partners in them, including program motivators, educators,
and the youths, speak about the meanings given to their work and the way
in which they deal with common concepts in the literature that talks about
youth, culture, and violences. These concepts include, for example, youth
participation, youth protagonism, citizenship, and self-esteem. In another
chapter each experience is described based on a series of aspects related
to the methodology and ordering of the activities. Testimonies about the
impact of the experiences on the life of the youths, the families, and their
communities are included in another chapter.
7
The vocabulary of meanings is composed of a set of words, expressions, and reflections on
perspectives of life, based on themes related to the practices of the experiences that work
with the youths. These include topics that emerged from the discussions, proposed by those
interviewed, and expressions that are common and particular to the field, values, and cosmic
viewpoints of the experiences, activities, and the contemporary questions of youth life
experiences.
28
Cultivating life, disarming violence
In outlining the experiences, thirty illustrations of innovative experiences
were drawn from the states of Pará, Maranhão, Ceará, Pernambuco, Bahia,
Mato Grosso, Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, and Paraná. Each one of them is
described according to a selection of related categories and aspects. These
are: sustainability (history, budget, and funding sources); objectives;
professional staff profile; methodology; impact of spreading project
information and multiplication (types of partnerships); profile of target public;
impact and evaluation of the experiences, according to the interviewed parties
(youths, educators, project motivators, and members of the communities
the youths live in).
Methodology is described in the other chapters, emphasizing field study
and the context or areas the youths live in.
29
2
Methodology
Cultivating life, disarming violence
G
iven the complexity of what we have called ‘innovative experiences’
in this study, the methodology utilizes techniques that are different,
though complementary, because of their nature, their results, and the
strategies used: questionnaires, individual and focus groups interviews,
combined in a way that employs their respective advantages and overcomes
the limitations of each means of collecting information.
The words of the youths, program motivators, parents, heads of
institutions, and others who spoke to us were taken as the focal point of
analysis, while the questionnaire was used to acquire detailed information
on the different institutions.
The techniques utilized make up a comprehensive approach that seeks
to work with the content of demonstrations of social life related to the
activities of the subjects that interact according to meanings (individual,
social, cultural, etc.) attributed to both their own actions and to those related
to others. By means of this approach, an attempt was made to reconstruct
the fragmented participant in the first place, in objective dimensions that
are also important in the description of a specific socio-cultural morphology.
As Bourdieu (1979) points out, objects are not objective: they depend
upon the social and personal characteristics of the informants. In other
words, in a comprehensive approach, the bases of scientific discourse do
not take into account the subject’s independent characteristics. Instead, in
the search for meaning, they base their perceptions on the intentions, motives,
and values of the social participants.
In general terms, the main aspects of the comprehensive approach
are: a) collecting the perceptions of the social participants without
preconceived ideas: analytical categories and concepts are constructed
on the basis of discussion and not a priori assumptions; b) understanding
and explaining social behavior, surrounding a problematic area, its causes
and its effects; c) enabling the inclusion of the participants, stimulating
their speech and recognizing that each person is the specialist of their
own life story.
Among the techniques adopted in the qualitative approach, the highlight
is the focus group - a procedure in which group members narrate and discuss
visions and values about themselves and the world they live in (Krurger,
33
1994). Often used in social sciences to seek an answer to the ‘why’ and
‘how’ of behavior, the focus group has shown itself to be a valuable strategy
to help understand the attitudes, beliefs, and values of a group or of a
community related to the specific research themes.
In accordance with this approach, a thorough study was carried out by
means of focus groups, with the youths participating in the analyzed
experiences and with the fathers, mothers, or other individuals responsible
for the youths, with coordinators, teachers, or program motivators in the
institutions. Individual interviews were held with the directors of the examined
agencies, with agents working in the environment of the beneficiaries and
with partners in the experiences.8
In summation, the methodology used was aimed at identifying innovative
projects and comparing different solutions in relation to distinct socio-spatial
contexts, based on the views and statements of the very same diverse
participants and agencies, based on different modalities of inclusion.
The most important stage of work in the qualitative approach is the
analysis of information carried out by systematizing the participants’
responses and identifying and classifying their most significant dimensions.
Beginning with the survey questions and its hypotheses, problem areas, and
key themes, the categories arise from the main questions based on scripts
of the interviews and on the data.
In the first stage of the analysis, data are categorized in a descriptive
manner so that the cultural patterns guiding the interpretation may be
identified in the second stage. In this second stage, the preoccupations,
priorities, and perceptions of the surveyed individuals are identified and
presented as they were expressed, without censorship or discrimination.
Analysis continues by means of progressive examination of the results,
using sub-categories of data organized by themes, so that they can be
rearranged by cultural categories. This means that the categories emerge
from the data according to patterns and repetitions, based on and supported
by the cultural references of the group studied. A comparison is then
made of what the different groups studied have in common and what
differentiates them.
Finally, after the information is categorized, a synthesis of the results is
performed in order to show the main messages, points of convergence and
divergence, contradictory points of view, and dialogue that occurs among
individuals and/or in groups.
8
The names of those interviewed do not appear in the study in order to protect the anonymity
and privacy of those who gave statements. Institutional names, however, have been kept.
34
Cultivating life, disarming violence
Questionnaires that the subjects could fill in themselves were sent to
the institutions. These were intended to illustrate detailed aspects of the
procedures adopted in developing activities. In addition, administrative
records of the experiences were examined. These included folders, minutes,
enrollment figures, etc.
Primary data were contextualized in the light of secondary data from
IBGE, mainly information provided by the PNAD, as well as data from the
Ministry of Health (SIM and DATASUS), CEDBRID, and INEP, MEC
(School Census).
2.1 Fieldwork
This study was started in August, 2000 and ended in May, 2001. It
was carried out in ten states: Bahia, Ceará, Espírito Santo, Maranhão, Mato
Grosso, Pará, Paraná, Pernambuco, Rio de Janeiro, and São Paulo, dealing
mainly - but not exclusively - with the metropolitan regions and state capitals.
First of all, the various data collection instruments and the projects to
be studied were identified and designed by means of contacts. Then, the
local teams were formed.
The choice of experiences with projects developed in the area of this
research - art, culture, sports, and education for citizenship with/for young
people in low income communities - followed a three-point strategy that
had no pretensions to having a statistically significant sample. As the study
was looking at individual projects it was not possible to resort to random
sampling or to have a sample based on probabilities.
The study relied upon a network of researchers, agencies working
either as donor partners or as specialists linked to different projects, as well
as other agencies and individuals directly or indirectly related to the area.
Letters from UNESCO representatives in Brazil were sent to various possible
respondents in order to better map out the field for study.
The study was also based on exploratory research, details of which
are given in the next section. As a result of this planning, it was decided to
opt for fieldwork consisting of ten projects per state - a total of a hundred
projects.
The next step was the choice of thirty research units selected on the
criteria of time-frame, human resources, and materials. Instead of a selection
35
based on probabilities, the intention was to ensure the presence of typical
elements in order to illustrate diversity and creativity, innovations in a field
that is quite heterogeneous and varied (NGOs and public organizations in
the areas mentioned). This would especially include, at this stage, some
features like substantive focus or directed activities and planning on the
level of culture and education for citizenship.
At this point the diversity of the projects became apparent in relation
to size (in terms of budget and public participation) and of social visibility
(some received wide coverage in the media and others were known about
only by specific groups and communities). Another element governing
the choice of projects was their concern with violence and exclusion (social
and cultural).
Thus, without attempting to create research based on formal
representational criteria in the area or on selective hierarchies, a group of
projects that illustrated the wealth of activities on the part of private and
public agencies was included, with young people in particular as subjects of
their attention.
Once the research units had been chosen, first contacts were made
with the institutions connected to the projects. The UNESCO research team
then trained the local research groups. Ten local teams were contracted connected either to NGOs or to universities – with the responsibility of
collecting data from their respective states.
The teams were made up of consultants based in universities or nongovernmental organizations located in the states referred to. In some cases
these consultants had experience in research work and had worked with
UNESCO on previous studies. Thus, it was possible to be sure of previous
knowledge in the area as a result of their accumulated work experience
and the informal links already established between them and the institutions
to be studied.
The data-collection instruments were pre-tested during the training of
local research teams in the cities of Rio de Janeiro, Fortaleza, and Cuiabá.
Closed questionnaires were distributed to the institutions. These
questionnaires were self-applied and were aimed at obtaining an
overview of the set of projects being undertaken by each agency. In this
second stage, the interviews and focus groups were also held in the
institutions studied.
Each local research team also collected administrative records and
secondary material related to the experiences and presented observation
reports on the focus groups after they had been held. Finally, Monthly Activity
36
Cultivating life, disarming violence
Reports (MAR) were produced, in which the teams reported on the progress
of research in their respective states as well as observations gathered during
data-collection in the field.
Structure of Research on Innovative Projects in the Areas of Education
for Citizenship, Culture, Leisure, and Sports with Youths in Situations
of Poverty (100 projects)
Total number of people contacted and involved in the research: 4,300
Total number of focus groups: 400 groups, 4,000 individual participants
Total number of individual interviews: 300 interviews
Total number of questionnaires given out and answered: 100 questionnaires
Structure of Research on Innovative Projects in the Areas of Education
for Citizenship, Culture, Leisure, and Sports with Youths in Situations
of Poverty (30 projects)
Total number of people contacted and involved in the research: 1,290
Total number of focus groups: 120 groups, 1,200 individual participants
Total number of individual interviews: 90 interviews
Total number of questionnaires given out and replied to: 30 questionnaires
2.2 The Exploratory Study
In December, 2000 a preliminary stage of the work, the exploratory
study, was carried out based on interviews with heads of the institutions
studied and on the analysis of material collected during fieldwork visits. The
data were gathered by means of interviews and the filling out of the
questionnaire with information concerning the institutions.
37
The objective of this stage was to gather preliminary information in
the field in the search for tendencies and perceptions that would indicate
broader directions for the main research. To this end, four states were
chosen - Bahia, Ceará, Rio de Janeiro, and Pernambuco - where in depth
research was carried out in a smaller number of institutions (30). These
states were selected for being representative in terms of the basic themes
of the study: levels of violence affecting young people and actions in the
field of social and state policies focusing on youths, as well as ensuring a
degree of regional diversity.
2.3 The Database
In addition to the institutions included in the main survey, a general
map of the projects was planned by means of sending out more than 400
questionnaires. As a result, a database was constructed which listed more
than 300 projects involving youths all over Brazil. The aim of this database
was to draw up a general view of how these projects are organized and
how they work.
The database also allows a certain characterization of the procedures
and impact of the work of these agencies. It must be emphasized, however,
that this impact occurs on an economic, social, cultural, and technical
level and that its main objective is to broaden the understanding of the
practices and formats of these projects so that they may be analyzed by
studies with different objectives. In addition, this knowledge may serve as
a basis for developing state policies directed at youths, especially those in
conditions of poverty.
3
Exploring the Dimensions of the Lives of
Youths on the Peripheries of the Cities Studied
Cultivating life, disarming violence
I
n this chapter we will examine some areas central to the lives of youths
aged between 15 and 24 in the capitals and some of the municipalities
where the research was done. These areas are central according both to
the studies that have been gathered on young Brazilians living in situations
of poverty and to the data, that is, the official information.9 These areas are
also central in terms of what young people, parents, and teachers feel.10
Thus, large-scale analysis is combined with extracts from testimonies of
these participants concerning the meaning, perception, and importance of
the areas analyzed. This study uses typical testimonies common to the
situations in which the young people live. Therefore, in this chapter, the
locations (projects) where the testimonies were taken are not identified.
After an overview of the demographic spread of the young population,
the study focuses on themes associated with work. This includes, for example,
how youths enter the job market, the level of formality of the job they have,
the use of money, and perceived obstacles to getting work. When dealing
with themes associated with leisure, the study maps the facilities available in
urban areas and the opportunities available for using spare time in residential
areas. It also looks at themes associated with various forms of discrimination
young people feel, especially the social group that is the subject of this study—
those related to the analyzed projects. Violence, in its many facets, is a theme
that is investigated with special care, with an emphasis on the meanings,
expressions, and reactions of the youths, as well as on their use of drugs.
3.1 Demographic Spread of the Youths
In the capitals and some municipalities where the study was carried
out, the 15 to 24 years of age group made up about 1/5 of the population in
9
10
Frequently cited is the wide variety of information published by IBGE and CNPD, 1998, and
other information available from IBGE; SIM; the Computer Science Department of SUS;
CEBRID; INEP/MEC.
Material collected in focus groups is the raw material for this analysis. See chapter on
Methodology.
41
1998. The proportions varied from a minimum of 17% in Rio de Janeiro and
19% in São Paulo to a maximum of 24% in São Luís (Table 1). In these
locations the proportion of young people in the total population is greater
than that found in Brazil as a whole in 1995 (8.5%), which is in line with the
figures for young people in urban areas (78% in 1996). There is hardly any
difference in distribution by sex in the 15 to 24 age range.
Table 1 - Population Aged Between 15 and 24 in the National Population,
by Sex, in Selected Cities, 1998 (%)
City
Males
Females
Total
Belém
23 (553,204)
23 (616,664)
23 (1,169,868)
São Luís
23 (378,660)
25 (436,999)
24 (815,659)
Fortaleza
20 (959,251)
21 (1,091,542)
21 (2,050,793)
Recife
21 (634, 416)
20 (729,507)
21 (1,363,923)
Camaragibe
23 (56,268)
22 (59,647)
22 (116,275)
Cabo de Sto. Agostinho
23 (72,148)
22 (74,353)
23 (146,501)
22 (1,066,327)
23 (1,202,220)
22 (2,268,547)
Cuiabá
22 (218,581)
22 (227,656)
22 (446,237)
Vitória
20 (127,022)
20 (141,971)
20 (268,993)
Rio de Janeiro
18 (2,616,395)
16 (2,950,498)
17 (5,566,893)
São Paulo
20 (4,749,910)
19 (5,145,276)
19 (9,895,186)
20 (744,178)
20 (804,170)
20 (1,548,348)
Salvador
Curitiba
Source: PNAD/IBGE, 1998. The overall figures correspond to the total from which the
percentages in each category were calculated.
According to studies on the population dynamic among young people,
which still conforms to the reduction in the rate of population growth, figures
for the whole of Brazil in the period 1991/1996 alone show that cohort
increasing at an average annual rate of 1.7%. In other words, there were
about 31 million young people in 1996. It is also notable that in the majority
42
Cultivating life, disarming violence
of the Municipal Regions - the reference points for the capitals and
municipalities in this study, with the exception of Recife - we find that average
annual rates of population growth among those aged between 15 and 24 are
much higher than in the rest of the country. For example: Belém, 2.43%;
Fortaleza, 2.26%; Salvador, 3.14%; Vitória, 3.37%; Rio de Janeiro, 1.12%;
Saõ Paulo, 2.51%, and Curitiba, 3.81%. (Oliveira et al., 1998)
These data in themselves demonstrate the importance of government
policy for this large segment of the population. On the other hand, the data
noted indicate the growth of this cohort, which counts heavily in the recent
tendency for demographic aging of the Brazilian population. As Madeira
observes, referring to the growth rate of the population between 15 and 24
years of age, we should point out the existence of a ‘youth wave’ within the
overall demographic landscape of Brazil. This draws attention to the fact
that we are living in a period of a sharp peak in the number of
adolescents, whose average age is about 17 (Madeira, 1998: 431).
3.2 Work
Various sources give warnings of the vulnerable situation of youths in
relation to work, being that this is one of the sectors of the population that
shows some of the highest rates of unemployment and under-employment
in the country.11 They face special problems when entering the job market,
due to the requirement for previous experience. This is also a sector of the
population that is demanding a new focus in professional training and a new
look at professional qualification, especially among the poorest families. In
fact, changes in the world of work, deregulation, and a flexible economy
require skills not always available to low-income youths – for example
computer skills and foreign languages – and all this is happening within the
context of a reduction in the number of jobs for a large part of the population.
On the other hand, work and youth are fields of controversy even on
the international level. There is no consensus on the right way to join the
workforce when we are talking of a population which, in principle, should
11
Of the 4.5 million unemployed in Brazil in 1995, about 48% (2.1 million) were youths
between 15 and 24 years of age. That is, 11.1% of the youths in the job market were in fact
looking for work during the week the PNAD data were collected. In 1995, the Metropolitan
Regions had “an average rate of youth unemployment of 16.2%, and in the poorest social
group – that is where per capita income is less than ½ a minimum salary – this percentage
rises to 27.1% and in the next group – from ½ to 1 minimum salary per capita – it rises to
20.7%.” Arias, 1998.
43
be spending its time studying (see, among others, Madeira, 1998 on this
controversy). Nevertheless, it is a fact that young Brazilians are a part of
the economically active population (EAP) - either as workers or as the
unemployed who are looking for work. In Brazil, the 15 to 24 years of age
EAP made up 65,2 % of this age group in 1995, that is, a total of 18.8 million
young people (Arias, 1998). Therefore, we have to take this situation, that
of the present moment (which is not an ideal situation), as a starting point.
This needs to be done when considering the need for means of survival for
a large part of the younger population and of the family members who
depend on their work, either in the sense of reducing the friction between
participating in the job market and long term educational investment or in
terms of the plan of increasing investment in providing qualifications for
these young people.12
Table 2 – Population Aged Between 15 and 24 in the Economically Active
Population (EAP), by Type of Work (1) and by Sex, by Selected Cities (2),
1998 (%)
City
Formal
work
(males)
Formal
work
(females)
Informal
work
(males)
Informal
work
(females)
15 (80,973)
15 (52,977)
33 (44,113)
35 (19,232)
Fortaleza
21 (237,211)
18 (160,172)
38 (148,553)
32 (77,849)
Recife
19 (298,657)
17 (159,581)
39 (137,730)
39 (58,833)
Salvador
18 (291,142)
16 (204,151)
31 (103,599)
33 (56,834)
Rio de Janeiro
17 (1,342,284)
17 (767,805)
31 (364,223)
31 (175,375)
São Paulo
23 (2,175,465)
26 (1,413,303)
39 (755,054)
34 (392,271)
25 (339,609)
27 (218,219)
42 (95,013)
41 (43,068)
Belém
Curitiba
Source:
PNAD/IBGE, 1999. The overall numbers refer to the totals in each group from
which percentages were calculated.
(1) ‘Formal work’ refers to workers with signed employment documents, military
personnel, and government workers. ‘Informal work’ refers to all remaining
categories designated ‘Other’ in the PNAD database.
(2) Data were not found for São Luís, Camaragibe, Cabo de Santo Agostinho, Vitória,
and Cuiabá.
44
Cultivating life, disarming violence
Differences are found among the youths who are actively participating
in the job market according to how they enter it, in terms of formal or
informal work, as well as according to sex. This can be seen in table 2.
As the data in Table 2 indicate, when formal and informal methods of
entering the workforce are compared, percentages of youths in this age
group who are in formal work are far lower than those in the informal
sector. The former vary from a minimum of 15% for both sexes in Belém to
a maximum of 27% for young women in Curitiba. Those involved in informal
work are much more numerous, varying from a minimum of 31% in Rio de
Janeiro, for both sexes, to a maximum of just over 40% of young men and
women in Curitiba (in PNAD/IBGE, 1999).
3.2.1 Working conditions
The information collected through the examination of the projects
reveals a variety of situations that require a careful description of the
relationship between youth and work. The way the youths enter the job
market differs from one project to another.
They all require that the youths study although some of them support
the idea that youth is the time for learning and fun rather than work. There
are those that link their activities in the areas of art and culture, sports, and
social studies to training and an introduction to work.
But there is a consensus in regard to the desire on the part of the
youths to get a job and on the concerns they and their parents have about
the future. Work is a central reference point, a constant source of concern.
On the other hand, in the lives of direct beneficiaries of the projects, work is
as irregular or unstable as it is in the lives of their parents, many of whom
are unemployed. The testimonies that follow, gathered in focus groups with
educators and family members, confirm the concentration of young people
in informal activities, revealing both the precarious situations they experience
in their work and also their vulnerability to exploitation:
12
It is important to note that the 15 to 24 years of age group contains various differences when
participation in the job market is examined, especially in terms of age divisions. According to Arias
(op. cit.), while the rate of activity of 15 to 19-year-olds fell from 59.8% in 1992 to 56.6% in
1995, the rate for 20 to 24 year olds remained static in the same period, at about 75%. This
authority also points out class divisions in the relationship between youth and work. In 1995,
about 39% of young Brazilians belonged to families without incomes or whose incomes were less
than ½ a minimum salary per capita.
45
Chart 1 They’re Begging
Focus group with Educators and Family Members
... they are shoeshine boys, they do odd jobs, little deliveries, they
build things from other things, do some painting, anything they can
do where you don’t need to know much. They go and help their fathers
doing jobs on building sites, then they go and cut some grass, then
they do other small jobs, like watching parked cars for tips. Some of
them, those who have a bit of luck, get steady work, but most are in
this part of the informal market. They don’t get their work card signed.
They don’t know their rights. They’re exploited.They’re begging, selling
things in street fairs that are traditional by now. They work in markets
and on the weekends. They work on the beaches too. At night you find
a lot of children and teenagers too, selling stuff on the street. We don’t
have these youths in the formal job market. No, that isn’t our clientele.
3.2.2 The Meaning and Importance of Work
The youths interviewed emphasize the extreme importance of getting
a job, stressing that this is the means for their own survival and often for
their families. It is also the way to achieve the financial independence
necessary for them to feel like people and to build their self-esteem, that is,
the feeling of gaining respect in the community. They also insist that the
money they get from work gives them greater freedom on the level of
family relationships: not depending on my mom’s money, for example.
In the vocabulary of the youths studied, the expression doing well
in life is common. When the meanings associated with that expression
are examined, the idea of getting a good job stands out, and for many
this consists of a well paid job. This discovery contradicts the socially
widespread social stereotype that young people, especially the poor, usually
associate doing well in life with illegal shortcuts to social mobility. This
last connotation certainly has a reason to exist as a possibility. Nevertheless,
it does not apply, at least in the present field of study. It might be suggested
that, in relation to values, this is a positive effect of the participation of
youths in these projects .
In this sense, the references of the youths in relation to work may be
seen as an element contributing to the development of a sense of
responsibility, as well as the idea that using money and dealing with it
46
Cultivating life, disarming violence
gives a direction to life. However, at no time do they mention work as a
channel for the realization of personal talents and potential, as a source of
personal satisfaction, nor as a means by which their own identities may
be constructed, nor that they might be capable of having an effect on the
world in which they live.
The youths, like their parents, emphasize the importance of work as a
way of occupying their time and their minds, which stops them from thinking
about breaking the law. Thus they claim that if they had jobs, many youths
would not be involved in illicit activities [...] As they say: idle hands are
the devil’s workshop.
The mothers who were interviewed generally agreed that work was
an important factor in the maturing process of their children. In addition to
this, exactly because it keeps them busy, work is seen as an effective way
of keeping the youths off the streets. The streets are considered to be the
places most likely to lead to involvement with crime and drugs.
Fathers and mothers, considering its importance for the survival of the
family group, are torn between the need for their children to have some
source of income and the recognition that it would be important for them to
concentrate on studying and taking part in extracurricular activities, like the
ones in the projects. But this is in fact a point on which different attitudes
are taken. In some cases, it is precisely the fathers and mothers who criticize
the fact that the projects are not concentrating on the area of job training,
and that many of them do not enable the children to get jobs immediately.
Many parents are worried, feeling that the ideal would be to conciliate work
and education. In their view, young people should start working early so as
to not only increase their chances of entering the job market when they are
adults, but also to help the family income.
For example, one of the mothers claims that the youths should start to
work at an early age, around 13, with the reservation, however, that this
should be part time work so as not to overwhelm them in terms of studying.
The lack of jobs is one of the problems that affects the kids because
there are no opportunities for them. The kid who is 13 or 14 can’t work
because he’s too young. After 15 or 16 most of them don’t want to work
because they’re getting near the age of military service and no one
wants to do it. They don’t have experience either and that makes it hard
for them to get a job [...] Now, if they get the chance to start work earlier,
at 13, I think they should. Younger than that, they should have time to
play, the way it should be, but they should have something to do too,
some kind of job. (Interview with mothers)
47
3.2.3 Use of Money
A significant portion of the youths use part of the money they receive
to help their family: I give half the money I get to my mother. Half the
money I spend on clothes and the rest is for my family to buy things
and eat.
Almost all of them point out that part of the money they get is used to
buy their things, indicating how central consumer aspirations have become
in their lives. This satisfaction is usually prevented by a lack of money
resources: The best thing is to be able to buy everything you want.
Whenever I get some money I don’t think about anything, just about
buying things.
Paradoxically, work can be a way of staying away from drugs, but it
can also provide access to them. In some cases, part of the money these
young people earn is used to buy drugs: I buy clothes, marijuana, glue,
crack, cocaine.
In other cases work and violence are associated with each other for
reasons that are independent from what the youths want. This places them
in situations that affect not only the youths but also workers living in the
peripheral areas:
What really makes you worry is when the guy goes to work, he’s got to
get up at five in the morning, and he’s walking along the road. He
doesn’t know if there’s somebody smoking pot and walking around. It
makes you worry because the guy is working and he doesn’t know
what’s up ahead of him. (Focus group with youths)
[...] the guy leaves home early and doesn’t know if he’ll come back
dead or alive. That’s what makes you worry. (Focus group with youths)
[...] you get your money and they’re ready to rob you. (Focus group
with youths)
Some projects pay scholarships to the youths as a way of avoiding
their working in the streets and affecting their studies. There is no consensus
on this strategy either, with criticism coming from some parents as well as
members of the community. Here, the concern is that because the
scholarships are temporary they can’t ensure the economic and financial
security of the youths and their families.
48
Cultivating life, disarming violence
3.2.4 Obstacles Perceived in Terms of Having Work
Some of the parents interviewed complained that their children take
professional training courses but afterwards, when they get out, they cannot
apply the knowledge they have acquired because of difficulties in getting a
job. They are told that they do not have experience. Indeed, when defining
the problems to be faced by the youths in general, what stands out is the
lack of prospects for the future because of the difficulties in getting jobs.
According to statements of many of the people interviewed, the main
problems are: the requirement of secondary education requirement and
computer skills; the fact that the youths did not study in schools that prepare
them for competition in the job market; discrimination because they live in
peripheral communities, which limits their opportunities. Racial prejudice is
also seen by many as an obstacle placed in the youths’ way. In other cases,
involvement with violence and crime is pointed out as one of the greatest
obstacles in getting a job since, in several projects, some of the youths have
already committed misdemeanors and run into problems and when they
need a clean record to get a job.
These obstacles are added to others related to technological progress,
which low-income groups have difficulty in keeping up with and which create
an occupational and digital apartheid, in the words of the coordinator of
one of the projects, referring to the discrimination associated to the emphasis
on computer skills in order to get work in different areas:
There are many illiterates, but what ends up happening is that today,
while a third of Europeans have access to the Internet, in Brazil only
4% of the population have access to the Internet and only 9% have
access to computers on the job or in public places. Of these 4% who
access the Internet, 16% come from Class C and only 4% from class
D. This situation has already created a situation of digital apartheid
in which we are creating armies of people who are excluded from
technology. So, emergency action to combat digital illiteracy is
fundamental. These people with low incomes need to have access to
what technology can bring in terms of the job market, access to
services, leisure, and entertainment and mainly to education.
(Interview with coordinator)
Parents, educators, and community leaders emphasize that the lack of
job options for youths makes it difficult to achieve the proposals of the
projects, such as how to keep them away from violence, influence behavior
and values, and encourage ethical positions of commitment to citizenship:
49
The work of the project is really important because, for example, we
trained a lot of people. But when they get out there, nothing. In the
past they could manage to find something, but now they’re lost and
end up forgetting what they learned and then start getting into trouble
and the whole thing starts again. What they learned here doesn’t have
any value after awhile because as soon as they leave here and don’t
find anything, they get discouraged, they feel it wasn’t worth it, that it
was all waste of time. (Focus group with community leaders)
With these thoughts as a point of reference, members of the community
defend technical education, which already directs the youth towards a
profession. The concrete presence of survival imperatives leads to debatable
positions on the level of ethics and international child labor laws, but these
have to be understood as being nourished by desperate situations related to
the various effects of unemployment and poverty. This also serves as a
warning about the importance of relating investment in ethical values to
policies and actions against social vulnerability.
The youths recognize the difficulties in getting a job especially due to
educational requirements. In other words, the tendency of the job market is
to demand increasingly higher levels of schooling for the most varied kinds
of activity, many of which did not include these demands previously:
Chart 2 – You’ve Got to Have an Education
Focus group with youths
To get work you’ve got to have finished everything. Because today
high school is nothing. You’ve got to finish it to take the university
entrance exam and to be able to work.
Some youths even show signs of bewilderment and despondency
concerning the loss of meaning for schooling as a qualification for work, the
expression of a situation they themselves do not understand: There are no
jobs whether you’ve got education or not. There are people with degrees,
like teachers, who can’t get a job.
50
Cultivating life, disarming violence
Many parents and assistants in the projects studied are quite critical of
the place education has in regard to the occupational lives of their children,
questioning the value of school itself, due to the quality of the education and
its inadequacy in face of the requirements of the job market:
A school that isn’t interesting, a school that doesn’t really go after the
youth, that expects the young person to fit into an outdated structure,
with an uninteresting way of teaching and old fashioned methods.
(Project coordinator).
However, in spite of criticisms concerning the relationship between
formal education and entering the job market, the youths, like their parents,
value education as a basis from which to obtain good jobs: Because the
first job requirement is education, even to be a garbage man.
There is more consensus on the effects of unemployment and leaving
school in terms of creating disillusionment, low self-esteem, and insecurity.
These elements, in turn, might possibly break out in involvement with violence
and drugs:
One problem is unemployment and another is that people don’t have
an education. A lot of people aren’t studying and only a few are
studying. What does unemployment bring? No motivation and low
self-esteem. The fact that they’re not studying leaves them unequipped
for the job market and that leads them to getting involved in different
types of unhealthy activities like drugs and other things. (Interview
with a principal)
Nevertheless, we have to keep in proportion, on the one hand, the idea
that unemployment is a condition associated only with education and, on the
other, that it is a problem of groups of youths. Data on other sectors of the
population suggest that this is one of the problems of a certain time in a
certain society. For example, the balance between finding and leaving a job
in the total population, according to figures from the Ministry of Labor and
Employment in Table 3, are negative in all the cities studied, particularly in
Curitiba, Camaragibe, Belém, São Paulo, and Cuiabá.
The figures in Table 3 confirm the idea that it is not only youths who
have to confront the obstacles that come with first entry into the job market,
but that they have to do this in an atmosphere that is hostile even for veteran
workers. One of the mothers recalls that parental unemployment frequently
makes the precarious situation of the children even more difficult:
51
Table 3 – Workers Finding a Job and Leaving a Job According to Selected
Cities in December, 2000 (overall figures, balance and ratio)
City
(a) Total
of those
finding a job
(b) Total
of those
leaving a job
Balance
(b-a)
Ratio
(b/a)
Belém
4,163
5,246
-1,083
1.26
São Luís
2,604
3,031
-427
1.16
Fortaleza
9,901
10,829
-928
1.09
Recife
7,724
8,777
-1,053
1.14
Camaragibe
128
164
-36
1.29
Cabo de Sto. Agostinho
334
389
-55
1.16
Salvador
9,452
10,838
-1,386
1.15
Vitória
3,829
4,327
-498
1.13
Rio de Janeiro
43,031
47,311
-4,280
1.1
São Paulo
66,895
83,285
-16,390
1.25
Curitiba
14,439
19,222
-4,783
1.33
Cuiabá
2,864
3,512
-648
1.23
Source: MTE – General Record of Employed and Unemployed, 2001
Among the employed youths, criticism in relation to work and pay is
common. They often feel that their present job is contributing little to their
future lives. They complain about the lack of professional recognition and
the lack of opportunities for advancement in their current activity. Among
the young people who are working in the arts, however, even when they do
not perform frequently or when they receive little money, it is more common
Chart 3 – Unemployment
Focus group with mothers
Unemployment affects the kids because the parents don’t have work
and that affects the kid a lot. Lots of them, young or not, sell drugs.
When they can’t get a job, they’re going to find some way to get money.
52
Cultivating life, disarming violence
to hear positive statements about what they are doing, which suggests that
their low earnings are compensated for by their pleasure in doing what they
do, gaining satisfaction in other ways.
3.3 Leisure
Significant numbers of the youths involved in the projects attend school
as a condition of participating in the project. However, cases were found in
which this requirement is not made or is not necessarily fulfilled. Youths
often reported that in their communities many give up school without having
paid work, without recognizing the association between these two situations.
In fact, data on education and work show that young people not
attending school are not necessarily employed and vice versa. According to
Madeira (1998), approximately 12% of youths aged between 15 and 19
years of age in Brazil - about 2 million people - are neither working nor
studying. What do these young people do with this idle time? And what do
those who work and study or who only study do with what is usually called
“spare-time”? Do they have opportunities for leisure activities and
participation in sports or cultural activities? A wide variety of studies have
pointed out that they do not have access to such opportunities and emphasize
that there is a demand for them on the part of youths.
The recent publication by IBGE of the Basic Municipal Information
Survey, 1999, provides an overview of the general state of cultural and
social facilities in Brazilian municipalities. The indicators on cultural facilities
justify and reinforce concern with the lack of areas for leisure and culture
for youths, especially for those in situations of poverty. About 19% of
Brazilian municipalities have no public library; about 73% have no museum;
about 75% have no theatre or concert hall and in 83% there is no cinema.
There is also a marked lack of school sports centers, since approximately
35% of municipalities do not have these facilities, while 64% of them have
no bookshop (IBGE, 1999). The following tables also show that in
municipalities which are state capitals and are also large cities, the number
of facilities for the young population leaves a lot to be desired.
The number of public libraries varies, in actual terms, from a maximum
of 65 in São Paulo and 51 in Curitiba to a minimum of one in Fortaleza and
three in Recife and Vitória (table 4). However, the ratio found between the
number of public libraries and the population between 15 and 24 years of
age residing in the municipalities demonstrates a more favorable situation in
Curitiba, Cuiabá, Vitória, São Luis, Belém, than in the others.
53
Table 4 – Public Libraries and Ratio between Libraries and 15 to 24-YearOld Population (%), by Selected Municipalities, 1999.
Municipality
Public
library
Population
(aged 15-24)
No. of libraries
per 1,000
young people
12
273,013
0.0439
São Luís
9
196,525
0.0457
Fortaleza
1
425,861
0.0023
Recife
3
279,978
0.0107
Camaragibe
1
25,941
0.0385
Cabo de Sto. Agostinho
1
32,944
0.0303
Salvador
5
511,281
0.0097
Cuiabá
9
98,233
0.0916
Vitória
3
54,241
0.0553
Rio de Janeiro
22
958,372
0.0229
São Paulo
65
1,908,611
0.0340
Curitiba
51
309,657
0.1646
Belém
Source: IBGE, Basic Municipal Information Survey, 1999
The five municipalities with the greatest total overall number of
museums are, in descending order: Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Fortaleza,
Recife, and Curitiba (Table 5). An examination of the ratio between this
number and the residents betweeen 15 and 24 years of age shows a different
ranking. Cuabá is in first place, followed by Rio de Janeiro, Fortaleza,
Curitiba, and Recife.
Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Fortaleza, Curitiba, and Recife are the
municipalities that show the greatest total number of theatres and concert
halls. However, it is in Vitória, Rio de Janeiro, Fortaleza, Cuiabá, and Curitiba
that we find the highest ratios between the number of establishments and
young people in the category referred to (Table 6).
54
Cultivating life, disarming violence
Table 5 – Museums and Ratio between Museums and 15 to 24 years of age
population (%), by Selected Towns and Cities, 1999.
Town
Museum
Population
(aged 15-24)
No. of museums
per 1,000
young people
Belém
6
273,013
0.0219
São Luís
5
196,525
0.0254
Fortaleza
25
425,861
0.0587
Recife
16
279,978
0.0571
Camaragibe
0
25,941
0
Cabo de Sto. Agostinho
1
32,944
0.0303
Salvador
8
511,281
0.0156
Cuiabá
8
98,233
0.0814
Vitória
3
54,241
0.0553
Rio de Janeiro
77
958,372
0.0803
São Paulo
58
1,908,611
0.0303
Curitiba
18
309,657
0.0581
Source: IBGE, Basic Municipal Information Survey, 1999
Finally, as Table seven shows, in absolute terms the greatest number
of movie theatres is found in Rio de Janeiro, followed by São Paulo, Salvador,
Recife, and Curitiba. Examination of the ratios, following the example of
the previous tables, suggests a different picture: while Rio de Janeiro remains
in first place, the second highest ratio is found in Cuiabá, followed by Recife,
Vitória, and Curitiba.
The frequency with which São Paulo appears in less prominent positions
in relation to the availability of social and cultural facilities, when contrasted
with the situation in, for example, Cuiabá and Vitória, suggests that imbalances
in demographic density and the geographical distribution of the population
have to be carefully looked at. In other words, since the data refer to
55
Table 6 – Theatres/concert halls and Ratio between Theatres/concert halls
and 15 to 24- year-olds, in Selected Municipalities, 1999
Municipality
Theatres/
concert halls
Resident
population (15
to 24 years of age)
No. of theatres
per 1,000
young people
Belém
9
273,013
0.0329
São Luís
4
196,525
0.0203
Fortaleza
35
425,861
0.0821
Recife
12
279,978
0.0428
Camaragibe
0
25,941
0
Cabo de Sto. Agostinho
1
32,944
0.0303
10
511,281
0.0195
Cuiabá
8
98,233
0.0814
Vitória
6
54,241
0.1106
102
958,372
0.1064
São Paulo
69
1,908,611
0.0361
Curitiba
20
309,657
0.0645
Salvador
Rio de Janeiro
Source: IBGE, Basic Municipal Information Survey, 1999
municipalities and not strictly speaking to towns and cities, the proportions
found may be skewed according to the level of urbanization in the respective
municipalities, so that those with greater demographic densities and levels of
urbanization will show lower ratios than those with the opposite profile.
As scarcity of provision does not occur in equal proportions, it is possible
that, when talking of the offering of activities in the areas of culture, sport
and leisure, the lack of social and cultural facilities is particularly pronounced
among those with the lowest incomes. Testimonies collected during this
research confirm the hypothesis of unequal distribution of these facilities
within urban areas. In the poor communities there are few opportunities for
young people to enjoy cultural benefits and have access to the cultural and
artistic capital accumulated by mankind, which forms part of the national
56
Cultivating life, disarming violence
heritage. Soccer is still the sport which is most widespread and accessible
to these youths:
Table 7 – Cinemas and the Ratio between Cinemas and the Population 15
to 24 Years of Age, in Selected Cities, 1999
City
Movie Theatres
Resident population
(15 to 24
years of age)
No. of cinemas
per 1,000
young people
10
273,013
0.0366
São Luís
7
196,525
0.0356
Fortaleza
7
425,861
0.0164
24
279,978
0.0857
Camaragibe
0
25,941
0
Cabo de Sto. Agostinho
0
32,944
0
Salvador
25
511,281
0.0488
Cuiabá
11
98,233
0.1119
Vitória
4
54,241
0.0737
118
958,372
0.1231
São Paulo
49
1,908,611
0.0256
Curitiba
20
309,657
0.0645
Belém
Recife
Rio de Janeiro
Source: IBGE, Basic Municipal Information Survey, 1999
Chart 4 – Out on the Streets on the Weekend
Focus group with teachers
For these youths, leisure can mean putting on your sandals and playing
soccer in the street with a squashed ball, many times because there is
no other way. They live in poverty and it’s hard for them to have access
to any other kind of leisure activity except soccer. There’s nothing,
and being out on the streets on the weekends... it’s difficult for them to
do anything else.
57
When we examine the daily lives of the youths people involved in
various projects, we find that the great majority are at school for part of the
day and go to the project during another part of the day. When asked about
leisure, they answer that they play soccer. Going to the beach and occasional
parties and games are also cited as leisure options. They entertain
themselves by listening to music - they like to listen to rap, axé, samba,
rock, and funk - playing in pagode and reggae bands, dance groups, roller
skating. They say that some drink a lot. At night some of them hang around
and stay out on the streets:
I go to the beach, and at night I play soccer if there’s a game, and if I
don’t get a game, I watch the game my brother’s playing in. When it
gets dark I take a shower and go to the pagode dance place. (Focus
group with youths)
In fact, the pagode dances are common in different communities in
different towns:
The teenage girls and boys have a lot to do with pagode, in the bars or on
the beach. Here the kids talk a lot about the weekend: ‘I went to whatever
pagode.’ Today pagode is a really good way to have fun and the forró
dances too. For the boys it’s more soccer. (Focus group with teachers)
We must bear in mind that we are talking of youths who are to some
extent privileged in the sense that the projects they are attending are cultural
areas in themselves. It is no accident that many resent it when the projects
close, like on weekends and public holidays. Many youngsters are performers
or apprentice performers; they put on shows and are learning to be spectators
as well. But the lack of facilities for leisure, sports, and culture can also
inhibit the free flow of their abilities and desires:
Our clients don’t have many options. They complain a lot about this.
When Friday comes along, they complain that the weekend is coming
and then they can’t come to the circus. So they don’t have much choice.
Look, they do have the option of going to dances but they’re not
really able to go very much. They go once in a while. Because of this
they really don’t have many options. Their option is the street. (Focus
group with educators)
Beyond experiencing a lack of facilities in their communities, the youths
move in a restricted area or are segregated in their own neighborhoods
58
Cultivating life, disarming violence
without really exercising that aspect of their social citizenship which means
having the benefit of using the city they live in.
The youths themselves see their situation as being that of the excluded,
saying ironically that leisure is scarce because slums don’t have clubs,
bathhouses or swimming pools.
The lack of activities is exploited by the drug trade, which is present in
many places, occupying spaces left open by the authorities and by the
community. This becomes a reference point for the youths.
Chart 5 – The Drug Dealers were our Heroes
Focus group with youths
[The drug dealers] brought leisure to the community. They organized
soccer, things the neighborhood loves, you know? They put on a funk
dance that people really liked then. They put on all this stuff to cheer
the people up. Man, the drug dealers were our heroes, you know? At
the time, the drug dealers were my heroes and not the police.
3.4 Discrimination
Focusing on the problem of discrimination in this sector of the population
requires a perspective that goes beyond the more common and visible forms
of unequal treatment. In reality, the causes of discrimination are numerous
and subtle.
The youths feel themselves to be victims of discrimination for various
reasons: because they are young, because they live in the outskirts or in
slums, because of their physical appearance, the way they dress, the
problems they have finding work, their race, and even because of the
impossibility of enrolling in schools in other districts. There are hostile
reactions to youths who are learning dance and music, and they themselves
are violent towards homosexuals.
To begin with, because of society’s vision of young people as
irresponsible, they suffer discrimination simply because they are young.
Adults do not trust them and do not believe in their abilities, which often
lowers their self-esteem and makes them feel they are not respected and
are being badly treated:
59
I call this discrimination too. In today’s world when it comes to
work, the young person is like, you know, irresponsible. Because
you make a mistake and they blame everybody. Everybody you see
here, everybody wants a goal in life. Yeah, I think the doors have to
be more open for young people, people should believe in them
more. You can’t judge a hundred thousand because of one. The
boss of a company thinks a lot like this, you know, like the guy is
35 and I’m 17, ‘Oh, I don’t want him, he’s going to start to take days
off, he’ll arrive late and won’t be responsible’. (Focus group with
pupils)
Another reason for discrimination is the stigma of living on the periphery,
associated with poverty, violence, and crime. So the place where young
people live is in itself a factor in exclusion from work and school, combined
with a style of dressing which is not only a characteristic of these youths:
In fact the media end up creating resistance on the part of society
towards youths from the periphery. The media themselves manage to
create a pattern in which this young person is described as a petty
criminal because he is not able to go around all dressed up. So his
little tattoo, his shorts, his earring, the fact that he is black, for example,
create a terrible discrimination from the start, which often becomes
criteria for judging if the kid is a criminal or not. (Interview with
coordinator)
The idea that certain neighborhoods are violent creates immediate
exclusions, which also restricts the chances of obtaining work. The
difference between being honest or criminal is simplified and related to
the place of residence, so that an excluding society can classify the poor
as “marginal”:
I’ve already taken my resume to stores. In one, the manager called me.
I said that I lived here in this neighborhood and that I was taking the
first year of school. One of his reasons for not giving me a job was
because I was in the first year. I knew that he didn’t want me to work
there because I’d said that I was from the neighborhood. The
discrimination is really huge, and it is not fair because there aren’t
only criminals here, there are a lot of honest people too and people
who care about the way they live. (Focus group with youths)
Testimonies of this kind are frequent:
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
Chart 6 – She Lives in the Slums
Focus group with students
OK, for example I took a traditional test, I took the company’s test, you
go there, ‘Oh, she lives I don’t know where and she got 10 out of 10
and she took the exam, the test, and she passed.’ But she was shut out
and why? Because she lives in the slum so there is this big shut out,
this discrimination.
When they are studying in school and try go to school in another district,
there is difficulty in being accepted and they have to make a huge effort to
show that they are not criminals: [...] I’ve already been through this a
lot, when I went to school in another place, they asked: where do you
live? I said I lived in [...] ah! We don’t have a place for you. That’s
really horrible!
According to the youths, racial prejudice is one of the main causes of
violence: The thing that most affects young people involved in violence
is racism; ... Like what happened to me today: I came to work and a
girl held onto her purse and I turned around and yelled at her.
Racism also shows itself in negative and arbitrary selection in job
opportunities, confirming the social stereotypes concerning black people:
Today it’s hard to get a job because they don’t look at your capability,
what you can do in the area. They judge you by how you dress, they
judge you because you’ve got long hair; they judge you because you’re
black. Racism is polite in Brazil. Racism is when the guy is nice to you,
offers you coffee while you’re talking to him. Then after you leave, he
tears up your resume. (Focus group with youths)
In fact, job opportunities do show variations according to the
individual’s race or color. As Table 8 shows, with the exception of the
states of Espírito Santo, Mato Grosso, and Paraná, in all the other localities
the percentage of employed persons is routinely higher among whites
than among blacks or those of mixed race. Among the latter groups, the
percentage of blacks employed is regularly lower than among those of
mixed race. This has no correspondence to the racial composition of the
overall population, since whites are only in a majority in the Metropolitan
Regions of São Paulo and Curitiba.
61
Table 8 – Employed Population by Race or Color, According to Federal
Units (FU) and/or Metropolitan Regions (MR), 1999 (%)
FU/MR
White
Mixed Race
Black
MR Belém
43.3 (122,758)
42.3 (232,999)
31.6 (11,600)
Maranhão
19.7 (658,196)
16.8 (1,776, 032)
11.2 (242,192)
MR Fortaleza
52.5 (357,236)
51.6 (707,561)
39.1 (22,425)
MR Recife
49.4 (438,930)
46.7 (709,172)
47.5 (45,977)
MR Salvador
53.8 (232,890)
50.1 (734,942)
46.1 (205,198)
Mato Grosso
42.0 (461,380)
41.5 (667,566)
51.6 (52,741)
Espírito Santo
40.3 (715,818)
50.8 (602,720)
52.4 (82,786)
MR Rio de Janeiro
52.6 (2,717,133)
52.9 (l,034,233)
48.8 (507,006)
MR São Paulo
59.9 (4,739,927)
63.2 (1,954,563)
56.3 (327,453)
52.5 (955,644)
55.1 (183,236)
58.7 (34,719)
MR Curitiba
Source: IBGE, Synthesis of Social Indicators, 2000
In addition to this, the employed blacks and mixed race individuals
have average salaries that are systematically lower than those of whites
and the average salaries of blacks are lower than those of mixed race.
The same is found when we look at the average number of years of
schooling for each of these groups. It is worth noting that the scale of
variation in average earnings seems to have a greater correspondence to
race or color than to the number of years of education.
Racial discrimination is also shown in the treatment of young people
by the police, which is full of cliches and prejudices:
Chart 7 – They Always Stop the Black Guy
Interview with coordinator
(…) he’s not doing anything, he’s black, he’s walking in the street without
a shirt, waving his hands around, talking a lot . . . that’s enough. There’s
nothing new in what I’m saying. Because there are police like that: if a
white guy and a black guy are just passing by, I think he’s going to stop
the black guy and let the white guy go, and that’s racism.
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
Table 9 – Employed Population by Color or Race, Years of Schooling, and
Average Earnings (in Minimum Salaries) according to Federal Units (FU)
and/or Metropolitan Region (MR), 1999
FU/MR
White
Years of
Schooling
Mixed Clour/”Race”
Average
Earnings
(MS)
Years of
Schooling
Average
Earnings
(MS)
Black
Years of
Schooling
Average
Earnings
(MS)
MR Belém
9.3
5.85
7.7
3.44
7.5
4.47
Maranhão
4.9
3.16
4.0
1.78
2.6
1.08
MR Fortaleza
8.2
4.95
6.0
2.67
4.5
1.57
MR Recife
8.7
5.56
6.6
2.62
5.9
2.48
MR Salvador
10.4
8.04
7.3
3.30
6.6
2.33
Mato Grosso
7.1
5.0
5.6
2.83
5.6
2.47
Espírito Santo
7.3
4.93
6.2
2.86
4.2
1.91
MR Rio de
Janeiro
9.1
6.53
6.9
3.62
6.4
3.27
MR São Paulo
9.0
7.69
6.5
3.90
6.7
3.81
MR Curitiba
8.4
6.07
6.0
3.08
7.0
3.54
Source: IBGE, Synthesis of Social Indicators, 2000
It is as if youths were pushed into drugs as the only alternative open
to them:
[...] there’s a statement from a young man that I think is lovely: ‘I’m
black so I already have another barrier in front of me, I know I’m never
going to have a nice house to live in, I know I’m never going to have the
kind of car I’d like to have. But in my street, teacher, there are people
who do deliveries for dealers and I think they have a better chance. It’s
because look, they have good tennis shoes, and they go around in good
clothes. And there I am, my dad saying it’s important to be honest, to be
this, to be that, and I’ve got nothing. So I’ve got to be really strong in my
63
head to not go that way, because I know that my dad’s been living in this
slum for 15 years without being able to get out. Everything we’ve got is
this one-room brick shack.’ So, for this boy the future is to have a house
to live in, a car, and a job. And he already sees that this will be impossible
with society the way it is now. It is a selective and discriminatory society,
so he feels that he will never be successful and is already looking for
alternatives. (Interview with partner school)
There is also discrimination due to the stereotypes concerning options in
exercising sexuality and the artistic activities society associates with this. Boys
in particular face prejudice because they take part in an activity traditionally
associated with girls: Some boys don’t want to come into the institution
because they say it’s all a bunch of fags and queers. When my brother
belonged to [...], he suffered a lot from prejudice. When he walked down
the street they said: ‘Look at the ballet dancer, look at the ballet dancer.’
A boy who belongs to a dance group tells how he feels himself to be
the victim of a deep prejudice: Most people think that if you dance you’re
gay. But those who play music can also suffer from discrimination and be
seen as ‘street kids, thieves’.
However, discrimination against homosexuals and transvestites can
lead to acts of extreme violence on the part of the youths themselves:
There was a time I had a gun, [...] we went into the city and some drag
queens came up and they wanted to be with us. I don’t have anything
against them, but they came on to me. I didn’t like their attitude. I took
out my gun and started to shout at them: ‘Brother, get this straight, I
don’t like chicken, I’m a man. Brother, you get out of here or else I’ll
kill you.’ I fired a shot and when I got home I felt really sorry, really,
really sorry, and the next day I sold the gun, and like everybody said
I sold it too cheap, I gave the gun away. (Focus group with youths)
Youths who are clients of some projects may also suffer discrimination
because of their past record as graffiti sprayers or gang members or because
they belong to a movement (hip-hop) which identifies them as “marginal”:
If the boy belongs to a group of graffiti sprayers or anything like that,
then I don’t want anything to do with him. Then he’s pushed aside.
Even the Church is afraid of working with him.
The mass media contribute greatly to creating a distorted picture of
society, showing models for society to follow which the young people can
never attain:
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
Another thing that’s difficult that ought to be a taken out of your
curriculum is the ‘little saying’ that looking good is everything.
Looking good in Brazil is like an actor in a TV soap opera. We’re
different. We don’t have to have blue eyes and smooth hair. We want to
be how God made us, and we have abilities. It’s not our color, our
height, or our weight that will make us stand out for being different
from anyone else. (Focus group with youths)
3.5 Violence
Data from several studies, as well as observations collected from focus
groups, suggest that, in addition to the lack of job opportunities and leisure
facilities, a distinguishing factor among young people today is their vulnerability
to violence. This results in early death for so many of them. Indeed, some
of the authorities quoted and other writers feel that if the lack of possibilities
for work and leisure is not a new distinguishing mark in the lives of lowincome youngsters in Brazil, fear, exposure to violence, and active
participation in violent acts and drug dealing are the characteristics of a
generation and of a time in which young lives are being lost to an extent
unknown in any other period in modern times except for civil or international
wars. In other words, these are signs of the present time and not
characteristics of a low-income class. It has been found in research
concerning youth and violence in Brasília among middle and upper class
youths (Waiselfisz, 1997:159) that:
There is no single type of youth. Youths from the periphery express
their dissatisfaction with aggravated social exclusion by using acts
of violence. They seek recognition and respect as citizens.
With regard to middle class youths, there are few studies on the subject.
This absence is explained by the stereotype that associates violence with
poverty. The working classes are already thought to be dangerous, and the
middle classes are now starting to enter a crisis situation. Some studies tend
to show that middle class youths feel they suffer from existential exclusion
and problems of identity. They try to find their identity by entering into
conflict with the traditional values they have received at different levels of
society, a process that can generate violence.
When we consider the total numbers of deaths by cohort, the 15 to 24
years of age group shows a greater concentration in the category of deaths
by general violence (resulting from murder, assault, and traffic accidents)
65
than in the category of deaths by internal causes (related to illness). This
tendency is considerably greater than in other age groups. For example, in
Rio de Janeiro in 1998, while deaths by general violence accounted for
55% of total deaths within the 15 to 24 years of age group, in the same city
and period, those who died for the same reasons either among the 0 to 14
years of age segment or among those over 24 did not exceed 5%. (Ministry
of Health/FNS/CENEPI/SIM and IBGE – data for 1998)
In Camaragibe, the proportions of deaths in the 15 to 24 years of age
group in 1997 were: 17% from internal causes and 83% from general
violence. The 1996 percentages are 20% and 80% respectively. In Cabo de
Table 10 – Deaths Among the 15 to 24 years of age Population, by Cause
of Death and According to Selected Cities, 1998 (%)
City
Internal
Causes (1)
General
Violence (2)
Total
Belém
50
50
100 (477)
São Luís
71
29
100 (228)
Fortaleza
50
50
100 (552)
Salvador
69
31
100 (597)
Recife
33
67
100 (1,269)
3
97
100 (29)
Cabo de Santo Agostinho (3)
20
80
100 (55)
Cuiabá
40
60
100 (296)
Vitória
36
58
100 (253)
Rio de Janeiro
31
69
100 (2,270)
São Paulo
26
74
100 (3,821)
Curitiba
48
52
100 (446)
Camaragibe (3)
Source:
Notes:
Ministry of Health /FNS/CENEPI/Information System about Mortality (SIM) and
IBGE
(1) Deaths from internal causes: illnesses of all types.
(2) Deaths from general violence: related to homicide, assault, and traffic accidents.
(3) It should be noted that the imbalance of these percentages is specific to 1998.
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
Santo Agostinho, in 1997, in the same age group, 16% of deaths were due
to internal causes and 84% to general violence. In 1996 the figures were
respectively 41% from internal causes and 59% from general violence.
In fact, as Table 10 shows, death from violence is particularly noticeable
among young people aged between 15 and 24, varying from the minimum
of 29% in São Luís and 31% in Salvador to the startling proportion of 97%
in Camaragibe.
If we compare only state capitals, the percentage of young people
who lost their lives through violence (as opposed to internal causes) varies
from the previously mentioned 29% and 31% (São Luís and Salvador). It
reaches 50% in Fortaleza and Belém, and is a little higher in Curitiba (52%)
and Rio de Janeiro (55%). It reaches 3/5 in Cuiabá (60%), increasing in
Vitória to 64% and Recife (68%) to approach ¾ in São Paulo (74%).
This marked vulnerability to violence appears clearly in the words of
the youths who were interviewed, showing the many facets of violence that
not only produce these deaths but leave long-lasting results of various kinds
on its direct and indirect victims.
Both the youths and those responsible for the projects, as well as
specialists and other participants, talk of an environment in which violence
has stopped being an exception and has spread to such a degree that it has
become a commonplace element of daily life among people with low incomes:
Chart 8 – Everybody’s Seen it: people beaten up and dying
Focus group with youths
Because this everybody’s seen: people getting beaten up and dying. I
mean, I guess you’ve seen it, because however good you are, you end up
turning bad, but you’ve got to learn in this world. I was a kid, I was different
too. But then you start to see so many things, I had to learn to be bad.
Because it’s the old story - if you don’t hit, you get hit. If the guy is wrong,
like he said the guy was wrong - if he got mixed up in it he would die too,
then you’ve got to learn what you got to do - you got to learn to run. You
don’t have a record, but when they shoot, you got to run with the dealers.
There were times when the guy had nothing to do with anything, he was in
a house full of drug dealers and the police get there and they just want to
kill everyone. Why? If you don’t run, you stay and you die. And if you run
behind the dealer the police get you and kill you, then you got to choose
what to do: either you run with the dealers and say – ‘No, I’m gonna get
away with them because these guys know the slum better than I do and
they got guns and if I stay and the police get me they’ll beat me up and kill
me.’ And nobody wants that to happen to them.
67
Indeed, several of those interviewed emphasized that violence is a
permanent part of the daily lives of these youths:
They tell you so many stories that make your hair stand on end, you
can hardly believe them. There are stories of people they’ve seen killed,
brothers killed by gangs, school friends who are prostitutes. So it’s
not difficult to imagine what life is like for those who live in Brazil, is
it? It’s just that with them it’s in their homes, in their schools, on their
streets, in their neighborhoods. (Interview with principal)
In testimonies given by mothers it is clear that they are afraid of the
criminals, which prevents them from reporting crimes that happen in the
neighborhood: [...] you can’t even open your mouth to say: ‘He did it.’
Because they’re going to say: ‘Look, that one said you did it.’ And
then the police get him and say it was you who told, so you shut up,
you know, you’re afraid.
The youths’ statements frequently repeat the most vivid descriptions
of the violence which runs through their lives:
Chart 9 – The Sound of Shooting is our Lullaby
Focus group with youths
People say that the sound of shooting is our lullaby. Because lots of
times you were in the street or at home and there was always lots of
shooting... and you saw lots of things.
In general, the youths complained about violence among gangs or groups
that control territory in the neighborhoods. They complain about the brutal
rivalry between the gangs, which directly affects their freedom to move around:
Today it’s like this, you can’t walk around the neighborhood. If a guy’s
all dressed up they want to take his stuff when he walks down the
street. There shouldn’t be this kind of gang here... if I live here in the
neighborhood and go to [...] just because I’m from the [...]
neighborhood they beat up on me. That shouldn’t happen. (Focus
group with youths)
The youths point out that in the brawls and fights between factions,
groups and gangs can kill:
[...] I got there and my brother was lying on the ground, and everybody’s
looking at him. Then two guys got there and said he deserved to die in
68
Cultivating life, disarming violence
a worse way than that, that scum like him should die in a worse way
than that, and that he had to stay thrown in the street like that for
everybody to see. Then this fight started and people picked him up so
he wouldn’t just be lying out there like nothing and we took him to the
IML, the Legal Medical Institute. (Focus group with youths)
Both the youths and their parents pointed out the restriction of
everybody’s freedom because of increased violence in residential areas:
We’ve been through that. We were young ten years ago, you were able
to go out, but you had freedom to go out, to choose, do things more in
groups like, mainly at night, parties. Today you can’t. It’s too violent,
if you want to go out and not stay home you really think about it.
(Focus group with youths)
There are many stories among the youths of their own involvement
with gangs, drug dealing, sexual violence, and prostitution. Members of several
projects among those studied have police records as a result of crimes such
as theft or physical assault:
Before coming here (the project), I spent a lot of time out on the street.
I went around with the graffiti guys. I’ve been in a gang. I went to
other parts of town to fight. You got hit, but you hit too. We really got
those guys. They got guys in my gang and we got their guys together
too. (Focus group with youths)
It must be emphasized that violence is lived and witnessed in daily life. Studying
the statements of the youths in the focus groups in the 30 projects illustrated here,
we find few cases in which one of them had not experienced situations of
embarrassment, and physical or psychological violence. Almost all of them had
been robbed at some time or other. Clothes, sandals, watches, cellular phones,
shoes, and glasses are objects of desire and are constantly being stolen:
[...] about five guys from the hood wanted to take the hat I was wearing
and I didn’t want to give it, so I got a punch in the eye and they got the
hat and I got a black eye; [...] he said hand me the watch, and I didn’t
want to give it up and then he said that his gun wasn’t a toy. (Focus
group with youths)
Violence is linked to reactions that are also violent, a system of a
vengeance in which those who have been robbed wait for an opportune
moment for revenge:
69
When the gang took my hat, a little later one of them turned up by
himself on the street where I live, so I got some friends and we beat him
up. I think then I thought it was the right thing to do, but later I saw it
was wrong, but they weren’t thinking like that when they got me.
(Focus group with youths)
For the mothers, violence is commonplace among the youths but even
so it is no less painful for them: Right away they get a gun, they kill with
a gun, everything, it’s really violent. Finding a child in the hospital or
losing one as a result of fights, or even for no reason at all, is common:
Chart 10 – They Killed Him
Focus group with mothers
It’s been two months now since he went to the pagode dance and I woke
up in the morning with the news that he was shot and was in the hospital,
I got there thinking that he wouldn’t be able to walk because they said
he’d been hit in the knee, others said that they got his hand. That was
all the news I had, I got there and he’d been shot in the ear, and it had
gone right through, I brought him straight home and that’s it.
My boy was never violent, never answered back, never got into fights,
never caused problems, never used bad language. If he was somewhere
and they said: ‘I’m going to tell your mother’, he left, without
answering back to anyone. And they killed him for no reason. When
I found out, he was already dead. It’s terrible here and you really
need a lot of luck, really.
3.5.1 Domestic Violence
A lot of the youths experienced direct contact with violence at home.
Project coordinators called attention to the fact that many children found in the
streets had left their families because they had been the victims of bad treatment
from their own parents:
Children on the street always have some kind of family story. It’s a
stepfather who beats them, a mother who beats them, it’s abuse, a
brother or a stepfather who tries to abuse them, it’s a death. Sometimes,
in the countryside, the family really falls apart. Everybody goes his or
her separate way and the child remains alone, abandoned. (Focus group
with specialists)
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
Instances of domestic violence against girls also occur repeatedly in
the reports:
There have been many cases of family violence! The girls are raped by
their stepfathers or fathers. It’s a very sad thing and many of them no
longer live with the family. They stay with an alternative family, an
uncle, grandparent, or an older relative. (Interview with coordinator)
Exposure to acts of violence in the domestic environment destroys the
youths’ self-esteem. They find themselves insecure, with no reference points
since their parents are their aggressors, their tormentors.
There are a lot of girls who start to get raped and hit at home. They
wake up in the morning already getting hit by the drunken father, by
the mother who just got home. The child goes out into the street in a
desperate state. Anything is ok for her or for him, stealing a wallet,
sniffing glue, taking drugs to forget what happened in mom’s house:
when they get up they don’t even have food, only beatings. So violence
begins at home. They get into the street and find what? More violence.
(Focus group with mothers)
Domestic violence is considered by many to be the trigger for what
might be called a chain of violences or reproduction of violences. Violent
fathers and mothers make their children their victims, making the children
violent in their turn, thus creating new victims. Warnings about the terrible
and dangerous effect of domestic violence in creating this so called chain of
violence or violent people is not necessarily restricted to blaming fathers or
mothers. Instead, it seeks to call attention to the context of the violence:
The mothers are aggressive because they have no guidance. But they’re
wild. I think it’s because they don’t have much money. I think that the
lives they lead cause it, they don’t know how to keep their house, they
don’t know how to live a dignified life. And then from there the physical
aggression and the shouting start and in the end it doesn’t solve
anything. The children react in the same way. They’re attacked and
they attack in the same way. (Focus group with the community)
In fact the young person may be the cause of domestic violence, as
a report from a mother shows: I’m crazy about my daughter, but I’m
hurt all the same whenever I remember. You see, at the end of the
year she showed up with her boyfriend, with the other one, and
they pointed a gun at me. At me, her own mother.
71
3.5.2 Institutional Violence
Reports indicate abuse by the authorities on the part of agents of the
law and the police force. Youths claim to be victims of police brutality and
as a result do not see the police as agents of their security. On the contrary,
for them, under the best circumstances, the images of policemen and criminals
are confused. When they are asked what they would change in the world,
many answer that they would do away with the police, as these statements
from the youths show:
[...] today the police are the first to give a bad example, because the
police catch drug dealers and instead of taking them to jail, they just
ask for money [...] (Focus group with youths)
The police are the first to start violence because a lot of them are
killers, so if anyone complains about them, you see if the next day, or
even the same day the killer doesn’t find out. (Focus group with youths)
The police do not appear as protectors but as one of the elements that
make up the game of violence, humiliating and even killing. The statement
of one youngster is a good illustration of the abuse of power on the part of
some policemen and the practice of violence on the part of those who should
be keeping order:
Chart 11 – I Had to Do It or Get Beaten Up
Focus group with youths
Once I was coming home from rehearsal … the police stopped me in
the street and asked for my ID card. I was a minor, I was 15, they put a
gun to my head, and made me dance the samba and I had to do it. They
asked if I played an instrument, ‘Can you sing?’ ‘Yes’, I sang for them.
‘Can you dance?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Can you clap your hands?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Clap your
hands.’ I had to do everything or get beaten up.
Police violence causes or produces violent people, turning young
people who react against it into perpetrators of violence. The testimony
of a young man living in a slum describes this kind of reaction and the
environment that encourages the growth of violence and the way in which
the law keepers stimulate this situation:
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
Man, it was like this, I was born here, I’ve always lived here in the
slum and what do I see? I see the police coming in all over the place,
climbing that overpass over there and shooting all over the place.
And anyone who was in the street could just go to hell, you know? Go
to hell, the police don’t care... I grew up watching the police beating
up my family, my friends and people in the community, I grew up with
the police hitting me in the face and punching me. Messing around
with my family, my mother and telling me to go away, you understand?
This is something that really gets to you, you know? I was a real little
rebel, really wild because of all this. (Focus group with youths)
Many people feel that the arbitrary acts of the police against the
population, especially against the youths, also arise from a set of
prejudices against black people:
I think that the police, in spite of not earning much, ought to be more
polite, because even though we live on the outskirts, we live here in...,
a neighborhood that’s 90% black. There is this discrimination when
they come here, they don’t bother to find out who is using drugs and
who isn’t [...] they start hitting people and sometimes arresting people
who haven’t done anything; you get there and they book you... It’s
something that’s very humiliating that I’ve been through. It’s something
you never forget in your life. (Focus group with youths)
In some statements, even when they are condemning police violence,
some questionable stereotypes and judgments appear, such as criticizing
police violence against ‘honest citizens’, while implying that this would be
valid if it were applied to ‘scumbags’.13
My uncle wasn’t a scumbag, he just liked to hang around with some
guys who were a little rough. [...] a woman was robbed and said that
it was my uncle who did it. They were ‘surfing’ – riding on top of a bus
– when the traffic cops tried to pick him up. He was on another bus, so
he jumped off the top of the bus into it and stayed there with all the
traffic cops telling him to give himself up and him refusing. When he
decided to give himself up, the two traffic cops shot him twice. My
grandma was a wreck. (Focus group with youths)
13
It is important to note that the 15 to 24 years of age group contains various differences when
participation in the job market is examined, especially in terms of age divisions. According to
Arias (op. cit.), while the rate of activity of 15 to 19-year-olds fell from 59.8% in 1992 to
56.6% in 1995, the rate for 20 to 24 year olds remained static in the same period, at about
75%. This authority also points out class divisions in the relationship between youth and
work. In 1995, about 39% of young Brazilians belonged to families without incomes or whose
incomes were less than ½ a minimum salary per capita.
73
Youths are not protected from institutional violence even by their artistic
and social achievements that result from working in recognized projects
within the community:
And that [...]turns into a double form of violence. You see the crisis at
the same time. It’s already happened here, somebody has just come
back from Norway, praised and respected, and gets beaten up for
nothing. To the police, his body is one to beat up, not one that is
capable of juggling or being an acrobat. It’s the body whose face they
usually hit, the body they usually beat with their sticks. And so the
wound is even deeper. And we have this all the time, kids getting
killed, which still happens, kids who have already gone through this
phase of getting beaten up in the street... It’s still very common, you
can’t stop it. (Interview with coordinators)
A statement concerning the behavior of a judge is significant in revealing
the nature of institutional violence, which brings out all the youths’ rebellious
feelings, their disillusionment, and lack of confidence in institutions:
My brother-in-law was arrested and they took him in front of the judge
...when he got there the judge said: ‘What are you doing with a scumbag
like that? If it was me I would have killed him.’ He thinks that because he’s
a judge he doesn’t have to respect people. He likes to make people look
stupid, like he did with my mom, he made her lose three jobs and we had
a real hard time because of him. When I was going to the hearing, he
grabbed me in the street like I’d killed or robbed somebody. He really
embarrassed me in front of my friends, trying to hit me. I think that because
he’s a judge, he ought to respect people. (Focus group with youths)
Some institutions offer help when they discover bad treatment or when
their workers are approached by the youths. The victims are reluctant to
complain, mainly when authorities and family members are involved. This
reluctance is compounded by the lack of training on the part of the police in
dealing with violent situations that involve the youths. They ignore the trauma
suffered, often exposing the youths when they make their statements:
When something happens they look for us. Or sometimes you see it by
the way they act or by marks on their bodies. When it’s a beating
obviously we have a talk with them in a professional and intimate
way without revealing anything, totally ethically, as gently as
possible, and usually what they say to us is: ‘Don’t say anything to
my dad, don’t say anything to mom, because if you say anything it’ll
74
Cultivating life, disarming violence
make things worse.’ So few of them want to confront and accuse
whoever has ill treated them or whatever. Another big problem we
have is when you take this to court. Even though we have this court
in […], the problem is ignored. The youth is very exposed. (Focus
group with youths)
3.6 Drugs
In Brazil, as in many other countries, the consumption of legal and
illegal drugs by youths has been growing, as may be seen in Table 11.
Table 11– Pupils in Primary and Secondary Education, Consumers of Legal
and Illegal Drugs, by Year of the Survey, in Selected Cities (%) 1987/1997
City
1987
1997
Rate of Increase
(1997-1987)
Belém
13.5
24.5
1.81
Fortaleza
17.6
28.1
1.59
Salvador
22.5
20.9
0.92
Recife
23.5
25.9
1.1
Rio de Janeiro
25.6
22
0.86
São Paulo
23.5
18.5
0.79
Curitiba
15.6
26.3
1.68
Source:
Note:
www.cebrid.drogas.nom.br/LevantamentosentreEstudantes/Levantamento I …/
síntese. 05/15/2000
Overall Number (N): 1987 = 16,149 and 1997 = 15,503
Contrary to what is generally supposed, in São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro,
and Salvador, the tendency to take drugs has fallen among the students
studied. On the other hand, it has increased by 10% in Recife; 59% in
Fortaleza; 68% in Curitiba, and 81% in Belém.
Data from CEBRID show that between 1987 and 1997, the frequent
abuse of solvents by primary and secondary pupils in state capitals in Brazil
went from 1.7% to 2%. Marijuana consumption increased from 0.4% to
1.7%. Consumption of tranquilizers rose from 0.7% to 1.4%. Amphetamine
75
use rose from 0.4% to 1.0%, while cocaine showed the most striking increase,
going from 0.1% to 0.8%.
In spite of the limitations of these data, which are restricted to the
school population and to consumption, they play an important part in providing
an approximate picture of the problem of drug abuse among schoolchildren.
However, when dealing with the theme of drugs we must make a clear
distinction between consumption and dealing, for while the two may be
connected, each of these activities has different consequences. In fact, we
must bear in mind that: (a) Consumption includes legal and illegal drugs and
both involve alterations of consciousness which may cause direct or indirect
harmful results on individuals; (b) Nevertheless, drug consumption is not
necessarily connected to violence, although drug dealing always is; (c) On
the other hand, even though drug users may be more vulnerable to violence,
it may affect - and often does affect - even those who do not use drugs and
are opposed to their use.
Based on these considerations it is possible to begin a process of
reflecting on the meaning of drugs and of drug dealing in the lives of young
people with low incomes and of their families, in light of analyzing projects
with youths in situations of poverty in the areas of art, culture, sports, and
education for citizenship.
From the point of view of consumption, the drug problem permeates
the language of the youths in the projects as well as that of their parents
and guardians. The following statements show the emphasis given to the
topic of drugs:
He hooked up with the people he shouldn’t have hooked up with and
when I found out, because the mother is always the last to know, he
was already very ... hooked on drugs. When I tried to get him off them,
it was too late. Because they think that all the mothers here have kids
who use drugs, don’t they? There’s no shame in saying so, is there?
(Focus group with fathers/ mothers/ guardians)
Because mine was so hooked he didn’t come home to sleep anymore.
He slept on the beach or in the bus station. I got tired of taking the bus
and finding him there on drugs and he yelled at me and didn’t want to
come home. The others took him out a lot of times, the group, without
me knowing, and that went on for more less eight months or a year.
(Focus group with fathers/ mothers/ guardians)
Some youths in the projects talked about how they co-existed with drug dealing
in their daily lives and admitted being users: before coming here I sniffed glue,
smoked amber, sniffed solvent.”
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
The youths indicated that drugs were one of the major and most serious
problems they faced. In their view, youths who depend on drugs are more
likely to die, as the following testimonies suggest:
Chart 12 – The Future is Death
Focus group with youths
There they are, hooked on marijuana and their future is death
because if they don’t get off it now, when the time comes there’s no
way to get off it because they start when they’re young. Sometimes
we talk to friends of ours, younger than me and I’m 17 and tell them
to stop it and they say there’s no problem because they’ve been
smoking since they were five.
My aunt had five kids and they’ve killed two of them already. Her
grandson is already dead because of this drug business, the
violence. Five cousins of mine who got mixed up in drugs are dead,
they got killed.
Right here in the neighborhood most of the kids take drugs... as for
the future, I guess most of these people will be dead; if they’re not
killed by the police when they’re stealing things, the drugs will
destroy their bodies.
It is interesting to point out that the young people spoke of both of illegal
drugs, especially marijuana, and of legal ones, especially alcoholic drinks:
I saw drugs there in the sawmill. I was up on a roof and I saw a guy
selling drugs in the street. People walk around smoking pot in the
street, in a whole bunch of places. And drinking too, there are lots of
alcoholics. If you get here on a weekend you’ll see kids drinking.
(Focus group with youths)
3.6.1 Reasons for Becoming Involved with Drugs
The consumption of legal drugs, especially alcohol, begins in some cases
within the family itself. Because it is socially acceptable, alcohol is accepted
as an element of sociability on all levels of society. Many cases of alcoholism
are found among the youths’ parents, siblings, or relatives.
77
Illegal drugs - those that are inhaled, marijuana, crack, or others - are
usually consumed first outside the family circle, because of a friend or through
belonging to a group. Indeed, the reports emphasize that the youths usually
become involved with drugs through friends:
Sometimes it’s friends. Because friends give them drugs the first and second
times and the third time they’re hooked. Then the third time, he starts to
steal because his father or mother won’t give him money to buy pot to
smoke. If he isn’t working he’s going to have to steal and when he starts to
steal it all starts, because nobody here is going to give money to their kid
to buy pot, because there are people who smoke pot, everybody knows
that, but the fathers and mothers don’t want it. (Focus group with mothers)
They also become involved with drugs because life is difficult and they
want to feel more relaxed, more content because they lack family influence:
You must have heard that the dealers adopt them. They really do adopt
them. If you don’t keep your eyes on your kids... and I don’t care if he’s
17, 18, or 20, I’ll go after him like I do today. Because I think he needs
my guidance, because if I don’t show him the way, life is going to show
him. And often, because they don’t have an education, because of
ignorance really, many mothers don’t do this. They don’t try to talk to
their kid, to sit down and ask, what did you do today? And your friend?
You’ve got to know who their friends are and what they did in school
and all that [...]. (Interview in the community)
The problem that most affects young people is drugs and lack of
understanding on the part of parents. Most parents work and do not
make time to talk to their children, to go to their school and keep track
of their children’s development, even in their spare time. Parents
nowadays don’t care about talking to their children, their problem
nowadays is money. (Interview with parents)
In the context of his life, in terms of risks and vulnerability, drugs, delinquency,
and crime are all right there beside him. When he leaves his house in the
slum, he gets to the corner, and they’re stripping cars. The person he identifies
with is the drug boss, the crime boss. This is because there are few men in the
families. Most are single-parent families or, when there is a man, he’s usually
distant and almost doesn’t count. So when they want a reference, their role
model are leaders in the illegal areas. (Interview with program motivators)
Involvement with the drug trade may be related to financing their own
habit. However, in the environment of social exclusion they undergo in the
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
communities youths live in, working with drugs is more often a way to satisfy
consumer aspirations for which society does not offer legitimate means:
A guy shows up and offers you the chance to get more money than
you’d get working. You’ve got nothing in your head, it’s not even your
fault because when you’re born you find out that nothing is how it
should be. But sometimes you’re hard up, you need money, you don’t
even think about what’s going to happen to you afterwards... it’s risky
for you to go then. And what happens here is that lot of kids with
empty heads, children, teenagers, when you see them next, they’re in
the hands of the police. (Interview with parents)
I think that violence is mainly caused by not having the chance to work,
you don’t have the chance to work, and without a job, you get desperate,
you start dealing. And dealing, from what they say, I don’t know and I
don’t want to know, gives people more opportunities, doesn’t it? The pay
seems better, in spite of you risking your life. (Focus group with students)
For these youths, dealing drugs represents the chance of gaining
some social status and obtaining respect from society. The dealer is
seen as someone who is respected, who has power and money,
something almost unreachable in a low-income community. In the minds
of some youths, it is the dealer who looks after the well being of the
community in that he provides benefits (frequently substituting the role
of the State). Above all, he is the one who respects them as citizens.
The youth, I think, is the victim and agent of this violence. Because of
the infrastructure that you have in these communities - where today
the State is absent a lot of times - unfortunately there are groups of
criminals within the communities themselves who take on the role of
the State. And this is really bad, since these young people often feel
sympathy and empathy for the actions of this group. Today you can see
it in the communities, kids 12 and 13 years old already involved in
drug dealing and with violence. (Interview with coordinator)
This isn’t a question of charity. It’s to get the kid out of the drug business.
And getting the kid away from drugs is very difficult, it’s not easy.
You’ve got things like Nike tennis shoes, like the status of carrying a
gun. You’ve got girls here who go with a boy because of his gun. If the
guy has nothing at home, how can you convince him that this is better
than the drug business? - Look... I’m here, I have a snack, do some
capoeira, and then what? How can I convince this kid that this is
better? Even though he sees that I’ve got a nice car, that I dress OK, I
don’t know. But he doesn’t have shit. (Interview with coordinator)
79
3.7 A Not Very Happy Ending –
But With Luck It’s Not Over Yet
Chart 13 – With the Brutality of an Executioner
Interview with a project coordinator in Rio de Janeiro
So he had this problem at home. At home he was one person, in the
theatre he was someone else and when he left the theatre he had a
third identity when he met these people, sat down with them, smoked
pot and was part of the group. There came a time when we noticed
that he got very different, and aggressive. We watched this change in
him and some people were already saying that they had seen him
carrying a gun.
It came to a point when there was just no way, we had to sit down and
ask him. He denied everything.
But then he came up one day and said: ‘I can’t stay here because I’ve
got to be on the other side.’ Because that’s what it is: ‘the other side’.
And it was terrible. I stayed up with that kid until four in the morning,
you know? Using every argument I knew to make him give up the idea,
saying that we had a great future, that this and that would happen,
that we were putting on a play and that this play would be great, and
that we would grow... And in the end we couldn’t stop the kid from
going over to the other side.
And he went. One month later, he was killed by the Commando.
(The Commando is a criminal death squad.)
It was a horrible, horrible, horrible death
Why? Because they just said that he was an X-9 –an informer, that he’d
been talking to some cops, he was a very sociable kid and they said
that he told on someone. They killed the kid up against a wall just like
that, like an executioner.
The testimony of chart 13 is emblematic of the daily life in many of the
projects that were studied. There is the process of trying to lure young
people into the arts, into play, and not to go to ‘the other side’, not to lose the
youths to drugs, to drug dealing and violence. But if the testimony is
emblematic of the conflicts involved in cultivating a new life and disarming
violence, it is not typical of the results of these conflicts. On the contrary, in
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
other chapters of this work, as the following profiles of projects show, we
find many successful instances of the possible impact of the projects in art,
culture, education for citizenship, and sports in changing the lives, behavior,
and ways of thinking of the youths.
This process and these endeavors take place in environments such as
those shown in this chapter, where various types of exclusion and violence
corrode self-esteem, undermine willpower, and reproduce violence, since in
many cases they enmesh young people as victims and as aggressors. It is a
silent war although it has its noisy moments, with gunfire. It doesn’t always
have a happy ending that prevents the boy or girl from going to the ‘other
side’. The value of the experiences, shown better in the following chapters,
is that they try.
By dedicating a chapter of this study to looking at populations in situations
of poverty, the aim is to avoid the risk of substituting the necessary emphasis
on the political economy and on its structural limitations - which affect physical
survival and the quality of life of these populations and within them, the
special social vulnerability of youths – for a culturalist focus as being a
sufficient method to deal with exclusion and poverty.
On the contrary, as will be seen, the very organizations that are the
subject of this study are aware of the limits of the reach of their efforts.
They are also aware of the risk that their continuity may not occur or that
they may not have a more permanent effect on the lives of the youths.
Every one of them is worried about school, the family, and the community.
They feel that government policies to help youths and to fight poverty are
important. They work so that their projects with young people with low
incomes are not just restricted and protected spaces, but that the youths
should be able to move around in many areas - both public and domestic without fearing violence or becoming part of violence. However, even though
they are doing innovative work by using art, culture, and sports to arm the
youths with values contrary to the culture of violence, the organizations
recognize the limitations of this approach.
It is evident, therefore, that the State and other social agencies should
take on the importance of the youths as individuals with rights. In addition,
areas for culture that encourage life and concrete opportunities should be
opened up in different areas in order to create social mobility and a dignified
quality of life.
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
4
Case Studies
Profile of Experiences
83
Cultivating life, disarming violence
4.1 The Field of the Research
One of the characteristics of the area of non-governmental and even
governmental organizations that deal with youths and develop artistic, cultural,
sporting, and leisure activities is the large number of differences in their
type, sizes, and resources. It is a fragmented field and, in spite of some
contacts between projects, the usual pattern is to learn by doing, which
gives the projects greater value because of the links with the community
and with their public – the youths.
In the area of this research this diversity is well represented, as will be
seen from the data displayed in Table 14.
In Table 14 the projects studied are shown according to year of
foundation, target public, areas of activity and distribution within the 10 states
in which they are located.
It should be noted that most of the projects were founded in the 1990s,
which suggests that they are relatively new, especially in terms of the
community. Just one of them has a longer tradition and that is the School of
Arts and Crafts in Bahia, dating from 1872. However, even this school has
suffered from economic problems, closing for a period.
The short life of the projects up until now might suggest a field that is
growing, as other studies have shown (Castro and Abramovay, 1998; Novaes,
Catela and Nascimento, 1996 and Abramo, 1994, among others). Various
other writers also point out that different entities working with youths is not
new, since those related to the Church and religious social activity date from
the beginning of the 20th century.
However, there are difficulties in sustaining many private projects in
the area of working with youths. In fact, if the sustainability of nongovernmental organizations working with youths, especially small and medium
sized ones, as well as public ones, is relatively weak because they depend
85
Chart 14 – Projects, by Year of Foundation, Target Public, Areas of Action
and the State in Which They are Located
Bahia
Project
Year of
Target Public
Foundation
Areas of activity
Olodum (Creative
School of Olodum)
1979
Children and adolescents Education, Art, Afro- 7 to 21 years of age (in Brazilian culture, and
professional training.
situations of social
risks).
(Bahia School of
Arts and Crafts)
1872
Adolescents from 14 to
17 years of age.
Education, art,
culture; professional
training in restoration,
for example.
(Mother City
Foundation)
1993
Children and
Adolescents between 7
and 17 years of age.
Professional artistic/
cultural and sports
training.
(Integrated Reference
Center for
Adolescents – CRIA)
1993
Youths from public
schools and from lowincome families in
general. 50 youths in its
theatre workshops.
Art and culture –
theatre and education
for citizenship.
Multipliers in
communities –
network of
organizations.
(Picolino Circus)
1985
Youths aged between 15
and 24 (the majority
living on the street).
Art and culture training of circus
performers and
trainers.
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
Ceará
Project
Year of
Target Public
Foundation
Areas of Activity
Classes in art and
dance (ballet), theatre,
fine arts and choir:
encouragement of
reading; use of libraries; and computer
training.
(School of Dance and
Social Integration for
Children and
Adolescents –
EDISCA)
1993
About 350 children and
adolescents.
(Communication and
Culture)
1988
Education and culture
Adolescents aged between 12 and 18. Work- - communication.
ing directly with 1,300
youths who act as multipliers, and indirectly
with about 160,000
youths.
(Curumins
Association)
1986
Children and adolescents Education and art aged between 6 and 18
and assistance.
(living on the street)
Maranhão
Project
Year of
Target Public
Foundation
Areas of Activity
(Circus School –
Recreating Life)
1998
Street children - about
119.
(Discovering
Knowledge Project)
1989
Art, education and
Children, adolescents,
and youths up to the age culture.
of 25.
87
Circus arts - courses
and shows. Artistic,
cultural, and educational activities integration between
youths, school, family, and community.
Workshops on
themes of citizenship.
Mato Grosso
Project
Year of
Target Public
Foundation
Areas of
Activity
(The Recorder
Orchestra)
1998
About 80 youths per
group, students and
workers - with links to
schools.
Art and education
based on the flute.
Education in the
values of ethics and
citizenship. Public
performances by the
youths.
(Citizenship, Art,
and Education
Project – CIARTE)
2000
Between 11 and 25 years “Street culture” - rap,
break-dancing,
of age.
graffiti, art, and
education.
Pará
Project
Year of
Target Public
Foundation
Areas of Activity
Radio Margarida
1992
30 places per course for
youths from poor communities.
Cores de Belém
(Colors of Belém)
1999
Adolescents and youths Art and Culture.
between 13 and 22 years
of age.
88
Popular education in
the areas of art,
health, the environment, human rights.
Professional training
for work in radio,
puppet theatre, theatre, and circus –
themes of citizenship.
Cultivating life, disarming violence
Paraná
Project
Year of
Target Public
Foundation
Areas of Activity
(M.D.E. ‘Artivists’ –
Hip Hop Expression
Movement)
1998
Children, adolescents,
and people from lowincome communities.
Lectures and community work with hip
hop; Opinion-forming
in the community.
Escola de Rodeio Erê
(Erê Rodeo School)
1991
Adolescents between 12
and 18 years of age.
Training in areas
related to horseback
riding.
Pernambuco
Project
Target Public
Year of
Foundation
Areas of Activity
(Cabo Women’s
Center)
1984
About 200 youths
(girls).
(Channel Auçuba)
1989
Cultural production:
Young students in state
schools from low-income video, fan magazines.
communities.
(Umbú Ganzá
Citizenship Center)
1998
Population between 15
and 24 years of age
Social street
education, art
education (music,
dance, and theatre),
and culture
(Care for Children
and Adolescents
Program – PACA)
1997
Adolescents aged between 14 and 17 (about
2000)
Art, culture,
education and the
environment
Coletivo Mulher Vida
(Women’s Life
Collective)
1990
Adolescents and women
aged between 12 and 18
Art and education
89
Psychotherapy, selfhelp groups for
young female victims
of violence. Activities
involving culture and
play, and training
courses. Defense of
rights; art, culture,
and citizenship workshops.
Rio de Janeiro
Project
Target audience
Year of
foundation
Areas of activity
Afro Reggae
1993
About 300 children and
teenagers (direct involvement) and 300 indirectly
involved.
Training in the area of
music and arts; workshops: circus techniques; dance, drumming, capoeira and
theatre; soccer and
education.
(The Nós do Morro
Theatre Project)
1986
About 350 (children,
youths and adults from
the Vidigal community).
700 people (estimated)
attend the weekend
shows.
Workshops: theatre,
cinema, sets, lighting,
costume making,
capoeira, English,
literature, and cooking.
(Committee for the
Democratization of
Computer Science)
1995
Youths “most vulnerable Education, commuto social risks”
nity development,
human rights, and
public safety
(Olympic Villa of
Mangueira)
1995
Adolescents and youths Education for citizenbetween 12 and 30 years ship and computer
science.
of age. About 66 per
activity.
1986
Children and adolescents Education and sports.
(between 7 and 15) from
the Mangueira area and
neighboring districts.
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Cultivating life, disarming violence
São Paulo
Project
Year of
Target Public
Foundation
Areas of Activity
(City Apprentice
School – “100 Walls”
Project)
1997
In 2000, about 2,400
Education, art, citichildren and youths from zenship, and work.
state and private schools,
living in the Vila
Madalena area. It also
includes youths from the
Tatuapé young offenders
facility
(The Children of
Morumbi)
1996
About 750 children and
adolescents in poorer
communities in the West
and South areas of the
city.
(The Letter Goal
Foundation)
1998
About 250 children aged Supplementary edubetween 7 and 18 living cation through art,
in low -income communi- culture, and sports.
ties in the Vila Albertina
district of Tremembé,
São Paulo, and in Niteroi,
R.J.
(The Travessia
Foundation)
1995
Children and adolescents
on the streets and at risk
between 9 and 17 years
of age in the historic
center of São Paulo, the
Anhangabaú Valley, and
Praça da Sé, among others.
Source:
Note:
Art culture (music)
and promotion of
rights.
Defense and promotion of rights of the
child and the adolescent.
Interviews with project leaders or members and consulting documentation.
Most of the projects are located in state capitals, with the exception of PACA
Camaragibe in Camaragibe, PE; Mulheres do Cabo Center, in Cabo Santo Agostinho,
PE and the Erê Rodeo School, in Campo Mourão, PR.
91
on external financing, it must nevertheless be emphasized that such projects
tend to demonstrate ability in finding donor partners and uniting collaborators,
even if it is usually for specific projects.
When we look at the target public served, Table 14 shows a great
variety in age range. The average age is between 15 and 21, therefore
involving adolescents, but there are projects that extend their range up to 30
years of age and others that refer to those aged 12 as ‘youths’. This variation
is the subject of much of the literature on youth and is one of the oldest
debates in the field. This debate sees the relationship between chronological
age and social constructions regarding youth as relative, and leads to the
encouragement of the use of the term “youthhoods”.14
It is difficult to quantify the number of youths being served, bearing in
mind the scope of many of the projects like those that put on public
performances. In many cases the numbers refer to one project that has
been developed in institutions that contain many. The size of a project
according to the number of youths served is quite variable. Some of them
do not serve more than 100 youths and others almost 3,000. All of them
emphasize that they cannot satisfy the demand, which suggests the need for
multiplying areas for art, culture, leisure, and sports for youths. This is
repeatedly stated in the interviews, along with the desire that public policies
in the areas of culture and sports for youths should be designed in order to
increase the scope of experiences in these areas.
In addition to age range, when projects select youths, they tend to give
priority to children from families with the lowest incomes. They also require
enrollment in state schools.
14
The debate on the concept of youth is commonplace. It tends to emphasize the diversity and
greater social accuracy of the term youths. Some authorities prefer the cultural definition, the
focus on cultures for some and subcultures for others, youth cultures. The principle of “social
creation of “youths” is also emphasized (Groppo, 2000). Concerning this debate see, among
others: Hall & Jefferson, 1975; Hebdige, 1974; Goffman, 1959. Discussion on the concept is
repeated in the already quoted Brazilian literature.
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Graph 1 – Annual Budget for the Agencies, by Group
According to Graph 1, 23.3% of the institutions studied have an annual
budget of between R$500,000 and R$1 million and can be considered to be
organizations ranging between ‘medium’ and ‘large’. While 13.3% have
budgets between R$50,000 and R$200,000, 10% of institutions have budgets
of less than R$50,000.
If we consider the monthly per capita cost – the youth cost – the low
cost of investing in educational, artistic, cultural activities or in sport and
leisure is striking, which suggests that official policies in the youth area
concerning entertainment, leisure, and education for citizenship do depend
on the allocation of financial resources, but they depend even more on the
political will to become involved in this area.
93
Graph 2 – Per Capita Monthly Cost for Youths in Projects (in Reais)
According to Graph 2, about 20% of the institutions studied spend less
than R$50.00 per youth per month. The per capita cost considering all the
projects is R$159.26 and, according to interviews with coordinators and
project motivators, the ideal would be a monthly per capita expenditure of
about R$500 and courses or workshops for a period of no less than one year
– which of course would vary according to the type of activity.
The following section shows a profile of projects, by state.
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4.2 Bahia
4.2.1 Centro de Referência Integral de Adolescentes – CRIA
– (Integrated Reference Center for Adolescents – CRIA)
1) Name of Organization
Centro de Referência Integral de Adolescentes – CRIA – (Integrated
Reference Center for Adolescents – CRIA)
2) Date of Foundation
1994
3) City/State
Salvador/BA
4) Type of Organization
Non-governmental Organization
5) Contact
a) Maria Eugênia Milet
b) Function: Coordinator
c) Telephone: (71) 322-1334
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites where activities are carried out
At CRIA headquarters in the Pelourinho area, the historic center of Salvador.
7) Funding Sources
Municipal Secretariat of Education and Culture, Solidarity Community,
Odebrecht Foundation, Ford Foundation, UNICEF, Ayrton Senna Institute,
and USAID/POMMAR.
8) Areas of Activity
Art and culture – theatre and education in citizenship
9) Objectives
To contribute to improving the quality of public services in the areas of
health and education for adolescents.
To use the arts, especially theatre, to stimulate the creative participation of
teenagers and to deal with the topics of citizenship and self-growth.
To open up areas in which the youths’ questions may be heard, stimulating
their active participation through artistic and educational programs in which
adolescents and public education teachers and public health workers
become multipliers of their educational experiences.
10) Target Public
Learners from 12 to 22 years of age coming mainly from public schools and
low-income neighborhoods.
95
11) Description and Background
CRIA was formally created in 1993, the result of the inauguration of a
proposal aimed at training youths, teachers, and health workers as multipliers
of educational experiences in participatory practices ranging from collective
discussions on the life experiences of the youths to social problems and topics
related to citizenship. Guided by the idea of collective creativity embodied in
drama activities taken into communities and schools, the organization
emphasizes creativity and creation through workshops involving readings,
debates, training, and group dynamics, which are at the heart of their activities.
CRIA involves youths of both sexes. In general they are enrolled in
public schools and are of Afro-Brazilian descent. The themes of its work
are ethnic and racial identity, the restoration of the dignity of black people
and the African historical and cultural heritage, as well as gender identity
and human rights of women. These elements are dealt with in the training
program, whose methodology highlights real situations and the subjectivity
of the youth linked to socio-critical analyzes of reality. Other themes such as
disease prevention and health and the environment are also turned into plays,
debates, and activities supported by national and international institutions.
CRIA headquarters is in the historical and cultural district of the city of
Salvador, Pelourinho, and the environment of this location is also focused
on at the creativity workshops. CRIA also maintains a relationship of
belonging, developing activities together with other artistic and cultural lowincome groups that are also based in Pelourinho and in the districts where
the CRIA youths’ schools are.
The initial proposals such as working with texts and stimulating writing
have been broadened during the course of the project. Today it also works
in training youths as multipliers of educational and artistic work in the
communities. It still monitors work in the communities and in the schools (in
clubs) that the youths are involved in.
12) Personnel
CRIA is coordinated by four women with university degrees in the
areas of humanities and with experience in art and working with youths.
The project has access to teachers in specialized areas related to theatre,
group dynamics, social psychology, and specialized areas according to the
work being done. There are various monitors (about 12), youths between 16
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and 22 years of age who are ex-members of theatre groups. The youths
took part in the Monitor Training Program, and were selected for this task.
The idea of internal training within CRIA is based on training for citizenship
and aims at teaching youths and adults to be multipliers of educational activities
(young actors, monitors, assistants, advisors and family members). This idea
involves a continuous and collective process of planning, monitoring, and
evaluation of all of the internal and external activities and putting the School
Development and Health Program into effect. The participation of the
monitors occurs in internal activities (supporting the program guides) as well
as in external activities.
The team of guides receives specialized training within the NGO in
teaching activities appropriate to CRIA and in the methodology of art
education as well as in courses and/or workshops offered in the city or in
other areas. The NGO has a training and monitoring program, but the advisors
emphasize that the axis of creation and creativity is based on the principle of
continuous training, extrapolating aspects of specific training courses.
The four coordinators, the coordinators of centers, advisors, and program
assistants (including those in the administrative area) make up the permanent
team within the organization. The type 2 monitors (those in the second year
of training) are in the process of being linked more closely to the centers.
The type 1 monitors and the young actors are committed to staying for a
minimum of one year to develop their activities. Volunteers and university
students who are doing work-study in the NGO also take part.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The Center for Social Communication and The Center for Cultural
Production: These centers publicize the cultural and artistic activities of the
institution and also act as a bridge for taking the experiment to other
organizations.
School Development Program: through this program the institution
promotes discussion of the social role of schools; the role of the youth in the
family and in school; and of the social function of language, with the youths
who belong to the theatre and health center.
Theatre Center: There are two theatre groups: “Theatre Tribe” and
“More than 1000” – the difference between them is the age of the participants.
It is through this center that the youths (actors and actresses) are enabled to
work in the fields of education for art.
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The titles of some of the plays put on by the youths in CRIA indicate
their social and political-pedagogical content, which is based in valorization
of ethnicity and the African tradition, and the exclusion which the youths in
low-income communities experience: “Freedom of Bahia” – is about the
history of Bahia based in the Liberdade district. This is where the Estrada
dos Boiadeiros ran, which was the route by which the merchandise of
colonial Brazil entered and left the country. The play was written with the
help of the historian Ubiratan de Castro; “Who Discovered Love?” deals
with relationships among teenagers. “The King of the Clay Throne” is about
the lives of those living in the historic district of Salvador, Pelourinho
(discrimination, police persecution, negotiations, and identity created in the
survival of a people linked to dance, music, street jobs, and sex, for example).
The play “The King of the Clay Throne” is based on a reading of
Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” and of texts by authors from Bahia about the
situation of boys and girls in the streets of Pelourinho. It was written by
youths and teachers in CRIA in 1998 and was produced at a youth festival
in Germany, where it won a prize.
MIAC – The Movement for Artistic and Cultural Exchange for
Citizenship: MIAC is a network of organizations working with youths in the
field of education and culture. Youths in MIAC (35 per year) come from
different institutions and take part in an exchange of experiences and abilities.
These youths have the same background as those with whom CRIA works
directly. MIAC was founded in 1997 and involves about 118 institutions.
The Training and Family Monitoring Program: CRIA attempts to
integrate youths and their families by means of this program, re-establishing
affective links and points of reference within the family in order to contribute
to the educational process.
The Education – An Exercise in Citizenship Project (1994- 1997):
this project has contributed to the consolidation of the proposal for education
for citizenship in the municipal education system and to the setting up of
preventive actions related to teenage health by means of educational activities
in the health centers of Salvador’s municipal system.
14) Methodology
The program invests in listening to the youths and in the exchange that
goes on among them. The methodology uses “Who am I” in the different
phases of the process. This is also shown in the theater plays.
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The youths confirm that the CRIA methodology emphasizes collectivity
and creativity:
The most important thing here at CRIA is that it’s a place where they
listen. I never felt so much like talking. Here there are people who
want to listen to me. Listening and making you get in some artistic
project or in a lecture or being a representative for CRIA. I feel like
I’m important here at CRIA. Who doesn’t want to feel responsible for
something? When the work is ready you know that you helped
contribute. (Focus group with youths, Salvador, BA)
The work involves improvisation and written texts, together with music,
dance, and games. After spending some time in training in the theatre and
school development centers, some youths become monitors in the center of
their choice. This might be the one for Communication and Cultural
Production, where they work in professional situations and learn about the
way NGOs work. As well as the training environments, the youths take part
in producing events, seminars, stage productions, and festivals.
In addition to training and listening to the youths in the CRIA
headquarters in Pelourinho, another activity, which gives a special character
to this experiment, is its work in public schools and health centers by means
of partnerships with government agencies. In this area the goal is to train
workers in arts and citizenship. These are teachers and health agents who
work in the area of the prevention of Aids and infectious and contagious
diseases as well as sex education, for example. In both areas (schools and
health centers) CRIA methodology gives priority to the teachers and health
agents as human beings, developing critical reflection concerning life situations
and self-esteem, professional and social roles. This is done so that they may
act as agents of social mobilization. This area of work, which also emphasizes
dialogue and constructing knowledge jointly between professionals and health
assistants in order to create work which links the public services with
education and health, has been developed since the creation of CRIA (by
developing the Education – an Exercise in Citizenship Project, 1994-1997).
It integrates the regional plan defined in the area of MIAC, developed further
in 2001 with the strategic planning of CRIA until 2003, involving the
development of joint actions and exchange of similar experiences with ECOS
and GTPOS, non-governmental organizations in São Paulo.
Monitoring of the youths in the NGO is done by means of their
testimonies, which are also the base on which training activities and the
planning and formation of artistic and cultural activities in the institution are
99
constructed. In this way, the youths’ school lives, community activities, family
lives, relationships, and plans are kept track of.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
CRIA proposed the creation of MIAC (Movement for Artistic and
Cultural Exchange for Citizenship), which includes various institutions working
in the fields of art, education, health, culture, and training with youths. MIAC
has been spreading the word on CRIA methodology and has been gathering
new knowledge and providing new energy to its socio-cultural activities,
reshaping its political role as an NGO.
There is also a wide professional investment in publications, postcards,
and material concerning projects developed by the organization, its activities,
and also on the methodology used in the institution. CRIA, in spite of its
small size, is quite well known in Salvador in the area of social projects and
working with youths, and is the point of reference for other institutions which
frequently seek its advice, as well as taking part in the organization of joint
events (through MIAC). Both CRIA and MIAC have a close relationship
with the local and national press, and news items about the events they
promote and reports on their activities appear frequently. With the help of
the youths, CRIA/MIAC produces a newsletter that circulates in the
communities and in the organizations working with youths on social projects,
universities, and areas connected to the arts.
As for the relationship of CRIA with other similar organizations, it is
common for other agencies in Salvador and also in other states and countries
to send youths that participate in their projects to spend time at CRIA. There
is much interest in the educational programs in theatre and poetry that have
taken CRIA’s theatrical shows out onto the streets since the year 2000.
An interesting aspect of CRIA’s methodology is its concern with the
multiplication of its practices and self-enrichment by means of contacts
and exchange of experiences, and also the emphasis on the relationship
with governmental and non-governmental institutions. MIAC is the proof
and result of this aspect of the work. In the sphere of preparing for
citizenship by means of art, it develops activities with a variety of other
institutions. Projects include the City Mother Project in 1999 (which works
with youths from poor families, mainly female, and is organized by the
Salvador City Hall), with the CEAO/UFBA-CEFET-BA Project, with the
Axé Project, with ILÊ AYÊ and with the OLODUM Creativity School.
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Since 1991 it has been developing activities with the Axé Project. At present,
by means of the Project called Artistic and Cultural Exchange, Leaving
the Ghettos for Mutual Influence, it periodically meets with about 121
agencies that work in the city of Salvador with children and teenagers in
the area of music, dance, or theatre. More than just organizing activities
or exchanging experiences, the idea is one of mutual fertilization.
(Interview with coordinator, Salvador BA)
With regard to the youths’ families, they are the most important public
when plays are produced or debates are organized. They participate in
meetings as well, in order to discuss how well the youths are doing at school
and to reflect on the social problems that teenagers are suffering. In 2000,
CRIA based its work with families on the development of the project
Dialogue in the Family: an Art (in partnership with UNICEF, the Ministry
of Health – UNESCO and the Municipal Secretariat of Health). By means
of this project, CRIA brought parents to the stage by way of the production
and presentation of the play Dialogues.
In relation to contact with the community, the youths are encouraged
to practice the teachings and practices in the arts that they have learned in
their communities. In this way, they become multipliers, in CRIA terminology.
They develop educational work, some of them in association with
neighborhood organizations, churches, and other organizations.
In addition, many of the young actors form new community theatre
groups which become points of reference for other youths and institutions.
In 2000 a young actor from the CRIA won an honorable mention in the
Solidarity Training Program for the project that presented his community
experience through the coordination of a theatre group.
Drama production in the communities and schools with young actors
from CRIA gives an opportunity to a lot of people. There are lots of
people who don’t even know what a theatre is. They’ve never seen a
play. There are a lot of kids and teenagers who don’t even know what
it’s like. (Focus group with fathers/mothers/guardians, Salvador/ BA)
The Education – An Exercise in Citizenship project launched a
partnership with the Municipal Secretariat of Education, the Municipal
Secretariat of Health, and the Odebrecht Foundation, also with occasional
cooperation from the MacArthur Foundation and the support of the Federal
University of Bahia and the State Cultural Foundation. This project, developed
between 1994 and 1997, aimed to start up programs of education for
citizenship in schools and health centers in the municipality. During this period
101
the project developed activities directly in schools and health centers to train:
about 170 teenagers per year; 20 directors; 15 health center managers; 40
pedagogical staff; 500 5th to 8th grade teachers in the municipal schools
system; 40 health workers; 20 workers in the core group of the Secretariats
of Education and Health in the municipality and 10 regional coordinators of
the Secretariat of Education. The project also mobilized about 2,700 people
in Salvador through presentations of the play Who Discovered Love? (by
the Theatre Tribe group). Most of them were teenagers, family members,
teachers, and members of the communities in which the plays are presented.
This all occurred in the period 1994-1997.
In 1997 the CRIA coordinator made the following statement pointing
out the emphasis given to public schools and the idea that these should take
on the Education – An Exercise in Citizenship Project:
The goal is the gradual institutionalization of the project, i.e.,
implanting the course in education for citizenship into public schools
and linking the themes of sexuality, ethnicity, education, and
citizenship to the 5th to 8th grade curriculum in municipal schools and
health centers (preventive health systems) through preventive
education programs for adolescents. (Castro and Abramovay, 1998)
The goal was to make use of cross-curricular themes from the Ministry
of Education and Culture’s “Curricular Parameters” in classrooms, involving:
a) teachers who had already gone through the project, from the 5th to the
8th grades, in monthly training groups and in-service training activities for
teachers and adolescents who had already been trained in previous project
years, and b) new teachers, in specific meetings.
In addition to the projects already mentioned, material is being developed
with the public sector about the institution’s experience in arts and teaching.
Priority distribution is being given to the school system (5th to 8th grades) and
health centers in the municipality. Examples of this are MIAC videos, the
booklet With Art, Without AIDS, the Dialogue Diary, the video Dialogues
and books that are being launched in 2001 containing scripts of the plays.
Also, schools are sending pupils to watch the CRIA shows and drama
productions.
Since the youths who participate in CRIA have to be attending school,
there is constant communication with the schools to monitor the young actors’
performance in school. This is done by means of activities planned jointly
between the young actors, their families, and representatives of the schools
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at the beginning of each school year. Beginning in 2001, these activities
have been centered in the regional field of MIAC, which hopes to consolidate
the network, as do the activities aimed at improving teaching and the links
between school and other organizations, among them the health centers.
Through this plan, developed since 1997, the CRIA School for Young Actors
emphasizes joint participation of the youth (actor-pupil) and parents and
teachers. They become cultural agents, and the school has become a center
for spreading the citizenship activities connected to other institutions that
are part of the MIAC regional center.
Among the main partnerships for the development of CRIA
activities, we may cite: institutional support or support to projects belonging
to national and/or international agencies for the encouragement of social
projects, such as the MacArthur Foundation; UNICEF; the POMMAR/
USAID Project; the Ford Foundation; the Odebrecht Foundation; the
Ayrton Senna Institute; the WCF-Brazil Institute; the Municipal
Secretariat of Education; the Municipal Secretariat of Health and the
Ministry of Health; ICAP – the Institute for Artistic and Cultural Heritage,
the Gregory de Mattos Theatre, the Miguem Santana Theatre, the Dos
Barris Public Library and other institutions linked to the Cultural
Foundation of the State of Bahia.
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
Evaluations of activities are carried out in a collective manner at
fixed periods by teams from all of the centers and programs. Planning
and evaluation meetings are held every week with representatives from
all the groups. These meetings are considered to be training meetings
since political and pedagogical aspects related to the activities being
developed are carefully examined. Meetings are held with the families
of the served youths every two months for the purposes of planning,
monitoring, and evaluating activities and also to look at other matters of
interest. From time to time, general evaluation seminars are held, during
which new activities are defined. Research is used to evaluate those
leaving the project and to monitor the activities of youths participating in
the NGO in their communities.
Using the theatre, questionnaires are distributed to representatives of
the schools concerning the results of every external activity. These results
are entered in reports written by each center and program.
103
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Scant resources and the constant risk of the failure of continuity of
the projects, according to the NGO coordinator:
The challenge is to keep on forming a critical mass that is made
up of individuals who are ready to act as agents in society,
promoting educational activities. The challenge is one of
persistence, co-existing with adverse economic, political, social,
and educational conditions. (Milet, in Castro & Abramovay, 1998)
· The physical area for activities is another item that needs attention.
CRIA functions in a headquarters administered by City Hall (like all
buildings in Pelourinho) but maintenance is a problem and the area
is already felt to be too small to serve the demand. Also, there is the
greatest problem, the fact that the leasing contract has to be renewed
periodically.
18) Why is it an innovative experience?
CRIA is a unique area for socializing. It is a place in which the unity
that develops between the youths is solidified in values stimulated by the
NGO. It is felt to be a space for discussion and a space for proposals
where the youths are protagonists.
· The success of the experience may be measured also by the high
degree of attendance of families from the communities in which the
CRIA theatre group plays are presented. In this way, the multiplication
effect of the experience stands out and what the youths learn in
CRIA reaches other areas, like the family.
The adult is very important for the youths. Thinking about the youths
is thinking about the adult, about the father who is at home. Many
times the father has not had the opportunity for growth that the child
has had and there comes a time when this becomes a point of conflict.
For example, in academic terms, the child has more knowledge than the
father, so he brings home questions that many times the father has
never thought about, like the prevention of certain diseases. The youth
has knowledge that makes the father start to think about things that
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he’s never thought about before. Sometimes this is very enriching
because an exchange takes place in which the father learns from the
son and the son learns from the father, but it can also be a time of
conflict, of reflection. (Focus group with specialists/project motivators,
Salvador/BA)
· A critical mass of youths is formed in relation to a wide variety of
themes, which can also create conflicts in the relationships between
the youths who pass through CRIA and teachers in schools, who can
be more traditional. However, this critical mass is also approved of
by teachers who are more concerned with stimulating the capacity
for argument and criticism in the youths. In particular, teachers who
have also gone through CRIA activities especially designed for
working with them are more sensitive to this aspect of teaching.
· CRIA is unique on account of the attention it gives to teachers and
health agents. This is also true on the level of considering them as
part of the solution for a culture of dialogue with the youths and
mobilization for official political social policies, respecting their
subjectivity and taking into account their means of work and life in
general. Teachers and health agents who were interviewed spoke of
gains in self-esteem and pointed out that their relationships with youths
improved after taking part in the CRIA projects: I started to have a
better understanding the single teenage mother situation. Before,
I used to cut them off. Now I encourage the criticisms the youths
have of the school. I’ve learned that they care and I tell them
about the limitations that we teachers have to contend with too,
with bad working conditions, low salaries, worries and the lack
of teaching materials. We’ve come to understand each other and
to be united on these problems and official policies, haven’t we?
Interviews with health workers and teachers in the Salvador municipal
system in 1998 – research developed with UNESCO cooperation.
(Castro and Abramovay, 1998)
· Among the factors that can contribute to the success of CRIA
projects are involvement, the participation of the youths, and the appeal
of the arts. This evaluation is legitimized across the board in reports
from professionals in various institutions in the city of Salvador.
· CRIA is also considered to be an innovating experiment by other
institutions in other dimensions.
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Guidance for political policies in the areas of health and education form
an integral part of the projects developed in the health and education systems.
This occurs with teachers and specialists in the areas of health and education,
in an attempt to make CRIA methodology repeatable and to include it in
school curricula and institutional practices.
In 1997, CRIA won an ITAÚ/UNICEF honorable mention. CRIA has
a wide network of partnerships with international, national, and governmental
agencies. In 2000, CRIA was awarded the Prêmio Criança 2000 (Child
Prize 2000) by the Abrinq Foundation.
· The success of the experience is seen in the way in which attempts
have been made to reproduce it throughout Brazil. At the beginning
of this year (January/February 2001) CRIA coordinators were invited
to Maputo in Mozambique in order to train educators and youths to
act as multipliers to work in state schools through the Schools without
HIV project and to present an educational play with youths invited by
the Community Development Foundation (FDC).
· Exposing the youths to teachers and other professionals with university
education in specialized areas is part of the role of spreading knowledge
about experiences like CRIA. The statement of the coordinator of
the Center for Afro-Oriental Studies of the Federal University of
Bahia suggests that this works against socio-cultural exclusion:
Projects like CRIA offer an alternative form for training a new lowincome elite. What I call the low-income elite are children, youths, poor
boys and girls, who have had the worst kind of teaching and the lowest
level of investment from society. Through this project, they have a chance
to experience something special and different. In other words, to throw
a party or take part in a sport or try different things. This distinguishes
them from other children who don’t have access to this. The youths that
go through these projects become different. They encounter a world
other than the world of condescension, and this is fundamental. To have
specialists, educators, and artists in school, like those you have in
CRIA, at the Liceu, these are people who are not part of the children’s
everyday life. This contact brings about great changes because the
children have exclusive contact with a sociologist, an artist, an educator,
etc. and each of these has a very participatory kind of methodology.
Sometimes it is even too much. Sometimes it is even a little too well
meaning, but it exposes these children to other ways of thinking, to
other alternatives. It offers them other models of personal development
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or professional success and that’s good. Sometimes it makes a very
strong impression on them. (Interview with the Coordinator of the Center
for Afro-Oriental Studies of the Federal University of Bahia)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· The impact on projects and on personal well being, stimulating creative
thought and being directed by social responsibility, questioning social
discrimination, contributing to new types of sociability, ways of working
together and stimulating the creation of leadership in schools and
communities. As we may see in the following report:
My main motivation for being in CRIA is the question of humanization.
Here, the first priority is to strip yourself bare, you show responsibility
through working, opening doors inside yourself, and developing the
most effective way you can of living in the world. You start to look at
the world in a different way, to see people not in terms of their social
roles but in terms of their humanity. Another thing that motivates you
is the work team and the way we develop our relationships, our contact,
our friendships. Everything is really shared, it’s different from any
other working environment. People talk a lot about total quality and
re-engineering these days. Work is a very mechanical, industrial
process nowadays, but here in CRIA what’s happening is deconstruction. You can have a much wider, more general view of work.
It’s great for your life as well. (Focus group with youths, Salvador/BA)
· Orientation for Community Work – Youths Become “Multiplying”
Agents.
Before I belonged to CRIA, I was at home or in school. Now I do
multiplication activities in my neighborhood or in other people’s
neighborhoods. (Focus group with youths, Salvador /BA)
I study at night and come to CRIA four times a week. In the afternoons
I’m free to work on activities in the community where CRIA is
developing this idea of being a multiplier, not just in the community
but in school, with my friends. So I spend my afternoons in the
community. (Focus group with youths, Salvador/BA)
My daughter’s changed since she started to take part in CRIA. She
thinks more about problems that are going on around her in the world,
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in school, problems in society, her relationship with her family and
with her friends. She cares, she has a critical eye. I think that what the
youths need in general is a critical eye. It’s not just going around
criticizing and saying it’s bad, but it’s seeing what you can do to help,
to improve the problem that exists. Also, I think that for a lot of people
what’s missing is this chance to have some agency, some organization
or school or family that guides them and shows them the way to see
these problems that exist and shows them how to have a better quality
of life. Quality of life, I mean good health, good food, getting along
with people, living together with everybody helping each other. (Focus
group with parents/guardians, Salvador/BA)
· Changes in the frame of reference with regard to values and selfesteem, increasing the youths’ power of participation.
Getting into CRIA was having other opportunities, changing my view
on life, improving, feeling like I could do it. Today I know this is really
important, this thing of believing in yourself, recognizing your mistakes
and your qualities, feeling like you’re somebody important enough to
change something, seeing that you can contribute to make something
better. In school and at home you don’t have this, this being valued as
a person thing, and so, because of CRIA, this got stronger in me,
getting self-esteem. (Focus group with youths, Salvador/BA)
Before coming into CRIA I was really shy and now I can talk in front of
other people. My parents didn’t encourage me very much. It wasn’t
just the family but school didn’t encourage me to be critical or to ask
questions either. Before, I never questioned anything and since I came
to CRIA I’ve changed. I had a very strict, very limited childhood and
so CRIA became a really special part of my life. I can see myself as a
person, as a citizen, because I’ve become a critical person and I
participate. Today my self-esteem is way up there and I’ve learned
that in CRIA. I learned to value myself, to value other cultures, respect
differences and accept the differences in others and in myself too. I’ve
grown a lot here in CRIA. (Focus group with youths, Salvador/BA)
· Increase in sociability, friendship and personal relationships
Working together for common goals, producing a play, for example,
develops practices of group solidarity. This work allows the youths to
experience techniques of interaction and dialogue with others, develops
practices of group solidarity. Many of the youths who get to know each
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other in CRIA activities go on to create relationships in other areas and on
occasions like weekends and taking part in joint social projects, in activities
in their communities, in school, and participating in school clubs.
· Talents are discovered through the exploration of potential for the
development of artistic and cultural aspects and of citizenship.
The great majority of project motivators have trained within CRIA,
many of them having taken part in theatre centers and in teaching activities
developed in the institution. In addition, the CRIA youths have planned and
produced a Fan Magazine1 6 and launched it at the party to celebrate the end
of activities in the year 2000, an indication of what they had learned and of
their initiative.
· Being together in the program awakens vocations in the world of
communications.
Some youths intend to pursue a career in radio and video. For example,
one youth entered university to study communications and another has
become established in the area of photography. Yet another youth man has
set up a community radio station using knowledge acquired in CRIA.
· A number of youths who have passed through CRIA are arts
educators in other institutions today. There are cases of ex-students
who have set up similar NGOs in another state.
· There is “empowerment” of women and black people in the
community and in the groups of youths in the project.
Within the CRIA methodology, concern with otherness, diversity, and
identity are put together, leading to discussion of gender, race, and class
relations. In the groups and in the shows, diversity and group dynamics
emphasize putting yourself in the other person’s place. This leads to
discussions on gender and sexual divisions and racial stereotyping as well as
types of exclusion.
It is common for women in general, and black men as well, to emphasize
that what they have gained by taking part in the CRIA activities is to learn
that it’s beautiful to be like me, black, the value of women, the importance
of being together, respecting each other. (Interviews and focus groups
with young monitors and students)
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4.2.2 Bahia School of Arts and Crafts
1) Name of Organization
(Bahia School of Arts and Crafts)
2) Date of Foundation
1872
3) City/State
Salvador/BA
4) Type of Organization
Non-Governmental Organization
5) Contact
a) Nelson Issa Lino
b) Title: Superintendent
c) Tel.: (71) 321-9159
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites where activities are carried out
In the headquarters of the institution, in Salvador/BA
7) Funding Sources
EMBAGE; CADCT; UNICEF; UNO (UNDCP) and the Ministry of Health;
State of Bahia Secretariat of Education; Bahiatursa; Solidarity Training
Program/ Association for the Support of the Solidarity Community.
8) Areas of Activity
Education, art, culture – heritage
9) Objectives
To create artistic and educational opportunities that encourage citizenship,
providing artistic and cultural experiences for the youths.
10) Target Public
Adolescents between 14 and 17 years of age with low incomes and in
borderline social situations. Also, they are students in state schools from
third grade of primary to first grade of secondary school.
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11) Description and Background:
The Bahia School of Arts and Crafts is a non-profit, social service
organization of the third sector working on the federal, state, and municipal
levels, registered with the Social Services Council with the aim of “educating
youths for life, through work and art.” Its educational activities are directed
towards education, through work and the languages of theatre, photography,
audiovisual productions, music, dance, and fine arts. This integrates training
and qualification of the youths from a professional point of view as well as in
terms of human and social development.
In 1988, a group of public and private institutions led by the Odebrecht
Foundation began to invest in the physical restoration of Paço do Saldanha,
in Salvador, restoring the architectural heritage of its masonry and tiling and
encouraging the reconfiguration and strengthening of management and
operations and the consolidation of the School’s educational program.
Beginning in 1993, the School has adopted a flexible model of
management based on business models, which has allowed it to become
self-sustaining. In 1995, the School began a new phase with the start of
restoration work on its historic building. This new phase had the goal of
“educating youths for life, through work and art” as part of its commitment
to culture and citizenship.
In this way, the Bahia School of Arts and Crafts stands out for its
unique quality of financing itself through the sale of goods and services. It
also counts on external support for specific projects. On sale are furniture,
printing services, and services for the restoration and maintenance of antiques,
with the State as one of its main clients.
By means of providing these services and producing goods in its
Furniture and Wood Workshops, Graphic Arts Workshops, and Maintenance
and Restoration of Buildings Workshops, the School can devote part of its
resources to providing educational activities aimed at adolescents between
the ages of 14 and 17.
12) Personnel
The teachers and collaborators contracted by the School make up
an inter-disciplinary team and have degrees in the areas of Education,
Social Services, Psychology, Theatre, Fine Arts, Business Administration,
History, Art Education, and Architecture. All have experience in working
with adolescents.
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In order to carry out specific projects, some of the permanent (internal)
School staff are used and others are contracted for specific periods as
needed. These include, for example, teachers in the areas of dance,
photography, music, and fine arts.
Different resources are employed for the selection of staff. These
include interviews and resume submission. The basic selection criteria include
certain requirements such as full-time availability, experience with youths,
talent, and experience in youth education.
The School supports training and qualification programs, sending
teachers to courses, seminars, and meetings related to educational themes
focused on adolescence. The School encourages its teachers to participate
in different areas of society as well.
A part of the teaching staff is employed by the School and works an
eight-hour day. This team makes up the body of internal collaborators who
integrate the Educational Program into the different projects. When other
staff is required to carry out a certain project, the School employs them on a
temporary basis.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The When You Love, You Keep Project: works through a wide
variety of drama-pedagogic workshops with a target public of students
and teachers in public schools both in the capital and the interior of the
state of Bahia. The initial goal was to satisfy a demand from the Bahia
State Secretariat of Education aimed at solving the problem of
vandalism in schools. The project deals with contemporary topics
involving questions such as drugs, adolescent sexuality, violence,
friendship, preservation of life and of society, etc. Within this project
the play Take Good Care of Me is one of the major results. In this
play the theatre reveals its power as an artistic product, sensitizing and
mobilizing its audience towards the discussion and construction of new
knowledge. It enables the creation of other educational activities in the
context of the school and contributes to the assimilation of values that
are vital to the youth’s development.
Video Center: This unit aims to produce educational videos and enjoys
the active participation of the youths in the entire production process. The
videos deal with themes of sexuality in adolescence, accident prevention
and safety in traffic, ecology, sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), history,
culture, ethnicity, daily life, etc. All of this content is worked into educational
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activities that make up the whole repertoire of teaching and learning. This
program resulted in the TV School, Student in the Foreground Project,
which aims at training teachers to use audio-visual language, thus contributing
towards the construction and strengthening of the school’s teaching program
and broadening reflection on the protagonists of the school community about
socio-cultural topics through critical use of the media (TV, video, and cinema).
The Getting to Know the City, Discovering How to Look Project:
This project’s objective is to promote educational opportunities for adolescents
to look at themselves in their historical and cultural context. This brings
them closer to their urban reality and establishes dialogue with history, the
city, the natural world, and their cultural heritage. This brings them closer to
their identity. The focus is on valorization of citizenship and the preservation
and conservation of the historical, artistic, cultural, and environmental heritage
of Salvador, encouraging the youths to be conscious of their role as reflective
and critical citizens committed to preserving life and all of the heritage that
surrounds them, stimulating them to observe and perceive that preserving
memory is essential to the citizen. It involves a methodology that brings
theory and practice together, with guided visits and the use of visual language
through photography. These are activities that integrate knowledge of history
and photography in an allied fashion. The methodology follows the principles
of participatory education, in which theory and practice are joined together
through activities in the classroom and through guided visits to areas in the
city that are of historical interest.
The Aesthetic Experimentation Project: In this project, art workshops
that include the languages of theatre, dance, music, and audiovisual
productions are held as a point of departure for artistic activities in which
the youths are stimulated to exercise their creativity and sensitivity through
physical, emotional, and rational methods. This creates one more area in
which to build citizenship, that is, to shape values, critical consciousness, and
social commitment. It results in a showcase of artistic results in theatre, in
music, in dance, and on video. It is an experience that has resulted in activities
being added to the School’s Educational Program and in other external
projects, such as Project LIVE: Warning Parents and Children, carried
out in partnership with the United Nations, CETAD, and the University of
Bahia School of Nursing. This resulted in more than ten productions of the
play Face to Face with Life, which reached an audience estimated at 800
people. Educational activities were carried out, which included promoting
discussions after the play was over.
The Restore and Redeem Project: Educational activities are developed
to help the training of auxiliary staff in the conservation and restoration of
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tiles, contributing to the overall training of adolescents. Theoretical and
practical activities are carried out in tile restoration workshops installed
in the School of Arts and Crafts, and other activities take place at sites
where restoration is being carried out. This happens, for example, on the
tiles of the Barra harbor and the Santa Tereza church. This activity is
part of the Solidarity Training Program and has been in development
since 1999.
14) Methodology
The School’s Educational Program emphasizes those aspects of
work that are linked to productive, creative, and artistic activity related
to reflection, feeling, and creation. Therefore, the School is developing
its teaching program, which involves integrated training in the exercise
of creativity and talent development. It is consists of a group of
educational activities aimed at mobilizing people through art and culture.
These activities are treated as paths that encourage educational and
training qualifications and the construction of values that improve the
life of the worker and the citizen. Course content focuses on basic
skills linked to reading, writing and mathematics, management skills
linked to planning, enterprise, human relations, etc., and specific skills
aimed at productive competence in work.
In order to develop the School’s Educational Program, especially
the Art, Culture and Citizenship Program, participative methodology
is utilized to create artistic and educational opportunities for developing
citizenship. Artistic and cultural experiences with drama, video, art,
photography, dance, and music take place focusing on the development
of perception in relation to the individual and the group. This occurs
taking into account their socio-political, cultural, and other implications
related to the environment. These are activities that are related to the
experience of the engaged citizen, one who is conscious of himself in
the world and conscious of the world in him.
Participatory methodology is used, in which the youth protagonist
becomes the axis of the teaching and learning process. The adolescents
participate as learners and at the same time as constructive subjects in
the possible roads to the development of the pedagogic, artistic, and
cultural project. This occurs taking the importance of suggestions and
paths for developing activities that are coherent with the demands of
the group concerned into consideration. This takes place in terms of
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content or in the way relevant and meaningful questions are dealt with.
In the course of this process, the adolescents are constantly stimulated
to provide feedback from their experiences in the project, and their
perceptions of the same.
In the Educational Program, the youths are taking part in a training
experience that is complementary to the formal school. They have to be
studying in the school system and in the School they spend four hours a day
and have the right to a scholarship worth R$50.00 (fifty reais), food,
transportation, and health care for the two years that they stay in the Program.
The institution accepts 250 teenagers a year on its internal Educational
Program. Another group is thought of as external clientele and participates
in programs developed within partnerships, which attend to a total of more
than 5,000 people. This figure includes adolescents, family members, and
neighborhood communities.
Regarding especially educational artistic and cultural activities, the
School has been developing the Art, Culture and Citizenship Project in
order to meet an educational demand of the present social situation in
which the School of Arts and Crafts belongs. This has been done taking
advantage of its century-old artistic and cultural vocation and strengthening
its mission of “educating youths for life through work and art.” In this
program projects are carried out emphasizing the exercise of creativity
and the development of entrepreneurial talents and attitudes. This is true
for When You Love, You Keep, Getting to Know the City, Discovering
How to Look, Restore and Redeem, Memory and Life, Aesthetic
Experimentation, and the Living Project.
While the youths are in the Program, they are monitored in order to
observe changes in attitudes, personal growth, and active participation in
society that occurs, for example, by joining community groups in their
neighborhoods and by leading student bodies. At the same time, means
are created so that they are able to join the job market when they leave
the Program. Some of those who leave go on to work with the staff of the
School itself, while others are directed to other institutions or firms,
according to demand. The School’s constant concern is to qualify them
for the job market.
The School has been developing the Leaver Tracking Program
in order to collect data necessary to evaluate its Educational Program.
This program is still in an initial phase, identifying critical and favorable
points according to the number of youths that found jobs or continued
studying.
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15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
In order to carry out some activities, especially courses, the School
also calls on the staff of other NGOs such as the Mestre Bimba Foundation
in the area of capoeira. The School takes part in forums debating violence,
art, and education. Many of them are organized in partnership with other
agencies working in the same area. From time to time meetings are held
with families in order to accompany the lives of the youths. Together with
FUNDAC, it works to take the youths off the streets, trying to reunite them
with their families.
It also develops partnerships with the community and neighborhood
associations for specific activities such as the protection and conservation
of schools (the When You Love, You Keep project). In this project volunteers
worked together to clean, conserve, and preserve historic school buildings.
Environmental education programs were also developed involving planting
and gardening along with community educational campaigns and artistic graffiti
projects involving people in the community.
The School also benefits from advice in the area of communication to
build and propagate the institution’s image. It produces several publications
about what the School is:
In terms of image you can only build if you have effective and multifaceted marketing. That’s the job of the social communications
department, to build the idea of the School which, in spite of being a
self-sustaining enterprise, needs partners to put into practice its major
task, which is social work. (Interview with coordinator, Salvador-BA)
The institution maintains a partnership with FUNDAC (in the case of
youths who have been in trouble with the law) for courses in masonry and
the printing and construction trades.
The institution maintains partnerships with: the Bahia General Warehouse
Company; the Superintendent of Scientific and Technological Development
Support; UNICEF; the Community Organization Movement; ONU (UNDCP)
and the Ministry of Health; CETAD; the Federal University of Bahia School
of Nursing; the Abrinq Foundation; the Salvador Municipal Secretariat of
Education; Bahiatursa; Social Volunteers; the Solidarity Training Program/
Association for the Support of the Solidarity Community; the Forum for the
Fight Against Violence and the Amaralina Northeast Community Association.
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16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
Evaluation permeates the whole process of developing artistic and
cultural activities in the world of education. It involves a strategy that
permits revisions and adjustments when necessary for subsequent stages.
It counts on the participation of all those involved in the activities, from the
adolescents to their communities, going through the following phases: a)
Initial: the period of discussion and planning, specifically involving the
staff responsible for the diagnostic evaluation process, mapping the profile
of the youths involved; b) Development: during and after carrying out
activities, teachers and coordinators meet weekly to discuss the critical
and favorable aspects of the process; c) Conclusion of the Program: a
global view of the process used by each program, through critical reflection
shared in general meetings, which are opportunities for the discussion of
various questions involving methodology, material resources, quality of
relationships and environment, time given to the tasks, and objectives and
results planned and attained.
Biweekly meetings are held between teachers and coordinators, and
students are asked for their views on the activities. There is continuous
evaluation of each youth – this is the subject of the teachers’ meetings.
It’s a rich moment. If we hadn’t applied all these techniques without
carrying out the evaluation process, the work would have been only
halfway done because it’s precisely during the evaluation that you
summarize, plan, and get an overview of the work you have to do with
them. (Focus group with specialists/teachers, Salvador-BA)
Research is carried out in the students’ communities concerning topics
related to the plays they produce, for example on the subject of drugs. For
the research on drugs, other institutions such as SESI were brought in.
Evaluations of activities are constantly referred to in order to identify
how many youths have found jobs and how many are continuing their
education.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· The directors, teachers, and youths indicated financial difficulties in
the School as the main element that caused problems related to
activities and scholarships.
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They should increase the scholarship a little because before, it wasn’t
a salary, but it was worth more, now it’s 50 reais. Before you got your
work card stamped, you got holidays, a bonus at the end of the year. I
think they still ought to have this but it’s because the School doesn’t
have money and that’s why the scholarship isn’t worth so much
anymore. (Focus group with youths, Salvador-BA)
Today, as coordinator of this process, I find that my greatest difficulty
is financial. If we had more financial comfort, the goodwill,
competence, students, and youths are all there. We know what
teenagers like, they want to be here. We know they have rights, we
know what they deserve. It’s just that we can’t offer these things any
more than we can get them. (Interview with coordinator, Salvador-BA)
· Increase ties to the family:
This year we didn’t have very many meetings with parents. Parents
ought to come here more, so that the parents can see what we’re doing
here because there are outside activities that need a parent’s
authorization, so they have to know what the School is trying to do so
that they can give permission for their children to participate or not.
So, my suggestion is that there should be more meetings with parents
during the year. It’s a way of encouraging the kid to participate in the
School. (Focus group with youths, Salvador-BA)
18) Why is it an innovative experiment?
· In the view of parents and guardians, the School’s work is different
from that of other projects since it works to train citizens.
Every day when my daughter gets home it’s like a party. Every day
there’s something new, but what really gets her is the music, the
choir, drawing. She’s learned to work with shade and perspective.
The photography course was quick and the drawing course was
something deeper. The most important thing about the School is
that they aren’t worried about professional training. They pay a lot
of attention to the citizen, the human being. They work so the human
being is really a human being. After that he will see the abilities he
discovered in the School, but the School works much more on the
human side than on professional training. I think this is very
important because you learn a profession with time. (Focus group
with parents/guardians, Salvador-BA)
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With regard to the Year 2000 Restore and Redeem Project, the School’s
senior staff feels that the project was broadened (with the help of Solidarity
Training) because of the process evaluation carried out and the external
evaluation done by financial institutions. This process touched on the positive
elements in the project, which included the taking on of some teenage students
to work for the Government as tile restoration assistants and the multiplication
of the experiment.
In four years the When You Love, You Keep project has mobilized
around 130,000 agents in the primary and secondary schools of the State of
Bahia by means of the educational show Take Good Care of Me. This
project involved 156 schools, and 400 performances took place. Extensive
community participation was achieved in volunteer work, nature walks, group
games, marches, visits to other schools and cultural institutions, sports
competitions, and cultural gatherings. The plays acted as the trigger for
other activities, incorporating a wide variety of content, uniting a wide
variety of disciplines and jumping curricular fences according to the
School’s principal. The project produced other manifestations such as Artists
of the Night, made up of “graffiti artists” inside and outside the school.
They painted murals that currently decorate the schools.
We can say that cross-curricular activity, a curricular parameter
encouraged by MEC, is found in the whole process of developing
post-play activities. (Official School statement from the homepage15 on
the activities of the Bahia School of Arts and Crafts)
The Getting to Know the City, Discovering How to Look project
has already brought about a change in the way teenagers look at history
with the production of 300 posters with registered statements on the program.
These posters were displayed in various public areas, along with photographs
taken by the youths.
19) Effects of the Experience and Change in the Lives of the Youths
· The youths begin to have a different self-image thanks to project
activities.
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www.liceu.org.br/apresentacao.html. 03/07/2001
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[…] that they can be somebody! These are kids who have had very
serious problems with low self-esteem. They think they are ugly, they
walk around with their heads down, they pay no attention to personal
hygiene. When they first get here they’re like that, with their heads
down, super aggressive. They don’t look good. Their mouths are filthy.
Over time we work on these issues. (Focus group with teachers/program
motivators, Salvador-BA)
· They learn new competency and demonstrate a new level of
performance in their activities.
Knowing that they can do something. They learn to talk, to deal
differently with people according to the context, to go up and down
stairs without making noise (in the beginning, when they first arrive,
they come downstairs so loud that you can’t work). (Interview with
coordinator, Salvador-BA)
· Learning to value themselves, a sense of social dignity and redeeming
ethnic and racial identity.
The youths change after they have spent some time in the School. The
look on the kid’s face is different. He’s not aggressive anymore, he’s
not looking at you in order to intimidate you. Today he arrives on
time. He says good morning. He lets you touch him even when he’s
stressed. These are the things that make me believe that he’ll leave
here a better person and that this change will stay with him for the
rest of his life. Teachers become reference points for them, in other
words, they start to choose. He’s not sorry for himself anymore, with
only negative models to guide him. (Focus group with specialists/
program motivators, Salvador-BA)
When people say things to them like ‘You’re dark’, they say:’ No, I’m
black. I can be a big, black girl, a ‘rasta’ and I can be pretty’.
Because there is this idea that whoever wears their hair in braids
smokes pot. They are discriminated against because of this. They
start to demand respect. (Focus group with specialists/program
motivators, Salvador-BA)
· Widening the social network
My daughter tells me how she gets along with the teachers. It’s really
good, and it’s not like teacher-student, it’s a family, the School family.
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She has singing lessons, choir lessons, and other artistic activities,
like theatre. There is this personal development, and social too. She’s
turned into a person full of ideas, with this desire to live intensely
today, right this minute. She’s got this inner happiness, this purity.
She’s always with her friends, because she ended up making a hundred
or more friends here. They’re her classmates and their mothers and
fathers. That’s a lot of people. And if I let her, I guess she would sleep
in someone’s house everyday with the group coming to her house the
next day and that’s really satisfying because today I can see that my
daughter is really happy in spite of having to get up very early, leaving
at six in the morning and getting home at eight or nine o’clock at
night. But she gets home all tired and happy, as long as I don’t make
her do anything at home. I’m really satisfied with these activities at
the School. I thank God that she was lucky enough to get into a group
of 10 to 15 people. (Focus group with parents, Salvador-BA)
· Changes in the frame of reference with regard to values, limits, and
social responsibilities.
When I came here to the School I started living a better life because it
had never entered my head that I had to let the next person speak.
Here in the School they teach us that you have to respect the rights of
the other person and we respect them. And I think that the teenagers
here are different from other ones because we’re treated well here, we
have a place to speak. They don’t. We get affection from the teachers
and we let them understand us and advise us. Those others don’t.
(Focus group with youths, Salvador-BA)
I learned to deal with differences, to understand, to wait my turn to
talk, to listen, here you have a very great freedom of expression. (Focus
group with youths, Salvador-BA)
· Discovering talents, exploring potential for artistic and cultural
development and development of the citizen.
The When You Love, You Keep project run by the School focused
on preventing acts of vandalism in school through theatre productions and
videos written and produced by the youths. Many different observers felt
that the project was successful, making its young audience conscious of
the subject and mobilizing the community. A marked drop in vandalism in
schools was found.
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Other projects stimulate knowledge of the history of the city and its
documentation through photography (the Memory and Life – Preserving
and Transforming project).
The work, photographs, and posters are presented professionally to a
wider public in exhibitions.
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4.2.3 Fundação Cidade Mãe (Mother City Foundation)
1) Name of Organization
Fundação Cidade Mãe (Mother City Foundation)
2) Date of Foundation
1993
3) City/State
Salvador, Bahia
4) Type of Organization
Foundation – Public agency
5) Contact
a) Neuza de Castro
b) Title: President
c) Tel.: (71) 382-0003
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
Neighborhoods of Saramandaia, Pau da Lima, Caltos, Roma, and Paz.
7) Funding Sources
Cidade Mãe’s Project budget comes from the Salvador Municipal Council,
with resources from the Workers’ Assistance Fund (FAT) and from the
Eradication of Child Labor Program (PET) in addition to funds coming from
international organizations such as UNICEF and UNESCO.
8) Areas of Activity
Artistic, cultural, and sports training
9) Objectives
· Helping to rescue youths involved with drugs and violence.
· Giving self-esteem back to youths involved with drugs and violence.
· Training youths to fully exercise their citizenship.
· Working on training youths to enter the job market.
10) Target Public
The target public of the Cidade Mãe Foundation in Salvador is made up of
children from seven years of age and adolescents up to 17½ years of age.
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11) Description and Background:
The Cidade Mãe Foundation is a government agency linked to the
Salvador Municipal Council by means of the Municipal Secretariat of Labor
and Social Development (SETRADS). Founded in 1993, it develops projects
with children and adolescents (7 to 17 years of age) who have been
marginalized by being abandoned, through poverty, and exclusion. This is
true according to the principles set out in the Statute for Children and
Adolescents (ECA).
It is a socio-educational program which is complementary to formal
basic education. Its strategy is the involvement of these learners in
professional training, cultural, artistic, and sporting activities together with
an extensive program of training for citizenship. These actions take place in
the educational enterprises and in the units located in several neighborhoods.
In addition to this program, the foundation runs the Shelters, located
downtown.
12) Personnel
Many of the project’s instructors have university degrees and work
experience in a wide variety of areas (art and capoeira among others).
Selection is made by resume and requires a minimum of two years
proven experience. Candidates may be studying at university or have finished
a training course such as singing, choir, and conducting. Preference is given
to professional people with experience of working with youths. The services
of these professionals are engaged by means of public bidding.
Instructors of theme centers are divided according to specialty, such
as gardening, drama, and capoeira as well as areas like computer science,
social work, and psychology.
The training process is included in the foundation’s educational plan,
which aims to integrate specific knowledge (dance, etc.) with ideas of
citizenship and understanding of practices related to youths.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The project develops its works in two areas: training and culture. This
work is divided between educational enterprises located in various
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neighborhoods in Salvador and units are developed in partnership with other
institutions: the Bank of Brazil Athletic Association Unit, the Christ is Life
Unit, the Neighborhood of Peace Unit and the Roadhouse Unit.
The project’s main focus of activity is professional training and involves
the over 16 age group. This area develops activities in the areas of circus,
photography, crafts, basic electrical work, computers, and others that are
financed by FAT funds. In this stage, a partnership is developed in which
the Social Service Committee – SESC signs on the adolescents. For youths
between 14 and 16 who want to join professional training workshops, courses
are offered in the project’s educational enterprises.
The artistic and cultural activities – capoeira, theater, dance, music,
choir, and fine arts – are developed by pedagogic groups oriented towards a
younger public, under 14 years of age. However, this age group is not fixed,
allowing the chance to enroll youths between 14 and 16 who want to
participate in the project without having to commit themselves to the process
of professional training.
There is a search for relating artistic courses to themes of citizenship.
There is an emphasis on sexuality, violence, drugs, responsible motherhood,
and family planning. For example, with the cooperation of UNESCO and
the support of the Ministry of Health, a play is being developed to be produced
in various communities as part of the citizenship and health project.
In addition to these activities the children and adolescents have access
to extra school tutoring support offered by the project.
14) Methodology
When they enroll, candidates are interviewed twice. The criteria for
selection take into account family income (per capita income of less than
R$30.00). Priority is given to children and adolescents exposed to situations
of violence such as sexual exploitation, domestic violence, child labor, and
living on the street. When they enter the project, they must be enrolled in
public schools.
In 1999 about 13,600 children and youths, with the help of partnerships,
attended courses in educational enterprises, shelters, and special projects.
Even though the courses are planned based on the particular
characteristics of knowledge in specific areas, it is clear that what they all
have in common is what is known about the reality of the youths’ lives. The
fundamental idea is the search for expressions of re-socialization.
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There is an insistence on the development of activities with a playful
spirit, which educate through games. It’s not anything really serious,
because that’s how the child or youth loses interest and also because
the school already performs that role. The project must be different
from school in the way it gives out information and knowledge about
learning. (Focus group with instructors, Salvador-BA)
The heart of citizenship training in the teaching project counts on the
advice of social workers and invited lecturers who focus on drugs, violence,
personal relationships, and valorization of the human being, ethnicity, and
differences, among other topics.
Social workers monitor the youths through interviews and family visits
as well as by accompanying the school performance of the boys and girls.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The Cidade Mãe Foundation, through its partnerships, steps in with
pedagogic work and nutrition, providing a daily meal for its clientele that
takes care of 40% of their nutritional requirements. Some partners provide
space for the project’s activities to take place.
Units are developed in partnership with various institutions. With the
Don Avelar Foundation, for example, a partnership has been formed in the
Bairro da Paz and in the Vale das Pedrinhas, neighborhoods in Salvador in
which there are large concentrations of low-income families. There is a
partnership with the Freemasons and with the Bank of Brazil Foundation,
which lends the premises of the Bank of Brazil Athletic Association, in
which there are about 300 children and youths in initial professional training
work. There are also the units that have been developed with the spiritualist
Christ is Life Agency and the Roadhouse Organization.
The Mayor’s Office of Canabrava has set up a partnership with the
foundation to rescue children who work on trash dumps. These children
lived by sorting trash and are currently enrolled in school and take part in an
educational enterprise.
Each educational enterprise has an assistant-manager who makes
contact with the community together with a social worker. The enterprise
makes space available for community events and for the youths to produce
plays, and even in areas of great violence there have been no cases recorded
of vandalism on the premises, which may be felt to be an indication of the
program’s credibility.
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The youths are multipliers in the areas of health and prevention of
AIDS within their communities. This project has been developed in
partnership with UNESCO.
As well as the partnerships cited, the Cidade Mãe Foundation maintains
a relationship with the Municipal Secretariat of Education and Culture, the
Ministry of Social Security, and UNICEF.
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
Internal evaluations of the project activities are carried out on a monthly
basis. In addition, reports are presented annually to the financing agencies.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· The length of the programs, about ten months (the school year), is
indicated by many parents as insufficient time both for training and
for internalizing other values.
The program lasts as long as the school year because it’s
complementary to school activities. During the school year the
student is in school and in the program and when vacation starts the
student doesn’t do anything because classes are over and the projects
close down. That means that for three months the children don’t have
anything to do. And they’re in contact with these other kids, and it
gets more dangerous on vacation than during the school year because
that’s when parents take advantage of the summer to go to work and
what about the children? I think it ought to be better set up so that
there are no vacations. (Focus group with parents, Salvador -BA)
· The scholarship offered to the youths could have a negative effect in
that they may only be interested in the activities because of this money.
· Access to the Saramandaia neighborhood, where one of the
educational enterprises is located. According to instructors in the
unit, public transportation does not enter this district and the
neighborhood has a high level of violence.
· The instructors report that the youths tend to reproduce artistic tastes
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that are in fashion among their age group – such as pagode music
and rap – showing resistance to lessons in theory and written music
In art, they like a painting technique called graffiti. It consists of
using spray paint either from a tin or using a compressor. That’s
something they’re really into, it’s a current fad that comes from street
culture and from hip hop as a result of the popularity of the Racionais
music group and some other groups from São Paulo that have spread
all over Brazil. It’s a language that talks about what’s going on in the
slums, about poverty, something that’s found in the context of
Saramandaia. But it’s a movement that even upper middle class youths
are fans of at the moment because it’s got a big following. Graffiti is
linked to the music of hip hop and that’s something they really enjoy.
What they don’t like is theory and geometry. I was showing them
geometrical shapes and they didn’t like that at all. They like practical
activities, but you have to approach theory slowly and try to keep the
two in balance. They are both necessary because one complements
the other. (Focus group with instructors, Salvador-BA)
18) Why is it an innovative experiment?
Indicators of the success of the Foundation projects are: testimony from
mothers about improvements in their children’s behavior when they start
attending the projects; the fact that several of them obtain jobs in areas for
which they were trained – usually as self- employed workers in, for example,
computers and electrical trades (in the case of those who are older than 16).
We work on the relationship between ethnicity, race, and self-esteem,
showing the youths, most of whom are black, that the fact that they are
black is no disadvantage. We even have workshops for manicure and
hairdressing with Mr. …, who works with the valorization of the black
race and gives them two weeks of classes on black aesthetic treatment.
He holds contests, has fashion shows, shows them how to dress and
shows them that they shouldn’t run away from their African origins.
He treats that as something positive, to fight prejudice and raise selfesteem. Children and youths who attend the activities organized with
the help of Mr.… change and we have family statements saying that
they change the way they see themselves. It’s also common for parents
to say ‘my son changed,’ ‘he stays at home more,’ ‘he doesn’t argue as
much any more,’ ‘he doesn’t answer back,’ ‘he cares more about us.’
(Interview with director, Salvador-BA)
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· The permanence and continuity of projects like the Education
Enterprise in poor neighborhoods that are considered to be “violent” is greatly
appreciated by community leaders.
Ever since I’ve lived in Saramandaia the associations and the projects
have always ended halfway through. I don’t know about anything
good that has happened. The only thing that I know to be good up to
now is Cidade Mãe. They’re developing real projects. There is only
one thing it’s doing that I don’t like and that is stopping the kids from
selling things so that they can earn 40 reais, because the kids aren’t
earning anything and they go back to the streets to sell things. But on
the whole, Cidade Mãe’s work is good. (Focus group with community
leaders, Salvador-BA)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· Changes in terms of behavior related to values, limits, and social
responsibilities.
A change in behavior begins with affection. Before they wouldn’t
even let you brush up against their arm, touch them, hold their
hand. Nowadays they go so far as to let you give them a kiss on the
cheek or a hug. Before they thought that when you did that it was
because you wanted something. They always acted distant because
of their lives on the street. Their parents must have told them at
home not to trust anyone they didn’t know because of all the bad
things that happen on the street and they had to learn to take care
of themselves. They come from a different background and when
they get to PET for example, where they have lessons in music and
art and school help in Portuguese and Math, they wonder what
these people want with them, what they want by giving them all
this. Besides, there’s also a scholarship, so he wonders again: ‘What
do these people want from me?’ When they see that we have
information about other areas of life, including sexuality, they see
that our interest really is in training and that these cultural projects
are a way to get access to that information. (Focus group with
instructors, Salvador-BA)
Through sports and art, the youths begin see the world in a different
way, with less violence. (Interview with director, Salvador-BA)
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· The teenagers are stimulated to break away from preconceived ideas
about things like AIDS, a change that happens in many other areas
including the family. Activities in the Cidade Mãe Foundation
Educational Enterprise work to help youths develop their power of
rational thinking. They learn about the community and begin to analyze
the reality they live in.
A lot of times I don’t have the time to discuss things with my children
at certain times because I’m busy working. But when they’re
encouraged by the programs, like the one where they talk about AIDS,
they start talking about these things at home, about discrimination
and about health care. They’re different from other kids who aren’t
part of the program. They know a lot more about rights and duties and
they want to learn more, even though, because they are still young,
they also get into trouble here and there. But the project kids come
out ahead, they know how to look after themselves. In the project
there is always some campaign or conference or lecture and they
invite the parents. They start to question things and that makes things
easy because I can get straight to the point. (Focus group with mothers,
Salvador-BA)
· When the youth takes part in the project, development of the
protagonist takes place and the youth starts to be a multiplier in the
community. This happens because of the stimulating discovery of
new talents. A highlight in this area is the success of the play put on
by a team of youths associated with the Cidade Mãe Foundation on
the subject of citizenship, health, and the AIDS question, which counted
on UNESCO cooperation:
The youths are being taught to be multipliers of preventive action and
they themselves took part in a hymnal concert and a drama production
that is being very well received and being taken to all the Foundation’s
units. The play has begun being taken around by the Secretariat of
Education now in the hope that next year these children will put on their
show in the municipal schools and also in the state government’s urban
social centers. Today there is a great amount of activity that has resulted
from this cooperation – UNESCO and the Ministry of Health – so that
these children and youths can present their work and pass on
information about preventing sexually transmitted diseases. That’s
how we’ve discovered talents. Who can say if in the future, because of
this, we’ll have successful actors? Today we have a girl from the choir
who is currently studying at the Music School in the Federal University
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of Bahia. (Interview with the director of the Cidade Mãe Foundation,
Salvador-BA)
· Reintegration of youths who were living in situations of risk, on the
streets, into their families.
Over the past year many of these kids have gone back home and we’re
working to get them home, to get them back into school. Some of them
have already confirmed their places in the educational enterprises for
this year. That means that they were lost on the streets and have
returned home, gone back to school and that they can already go back
to the Cidade Mãe Foundation and to the educational enterprises. This
work was done in the Roma district, in a company in Roma, in a separate
open space, in a suitable area. We managed to work with them.
(Interview with director, Salvador-BA)
· When they join the project, the youths begin to have greater
responsibility and develop a feeling of greater cooperation.
They learn to share. For example, if they are working, painting furniture,
and we don’t have enough supplies for everybody, like a tool that’s
more expensive than a brush and paint, they learn to share. And this is
also taught in all the other workshops. They learn to share, to take
responsibility for the materials and they also learn not to waste things.
This forms part of their training in citizenship and each time they finish
a class they leave the classroom clean. They finish up and leave
everything neat. In fact, everything is aimed at citizenship. (Interview
with director, Salvador-BA)
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4.2.4 Grupo Cultural Olodum (The Olodum Cultural Group)
1) Name of Organization
Grupo Cultural Olodum (The Olodum Cultural Group)
2) Date of Foundation
1991
3) City/State
Salvador, Bahia
4) Type of Organization
Non-governmental Organization
5) Contact
a) João Jorge dos Santos Rodrigues
b) Title: Executive Director
c) Tel.: (71) 322 8069
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Project Analyzed
Escola Criativa Olodum (The Olodum Creativity School)
7) Sites where Activities are Carried Out
The Olodum Creativity School operates in the historic center of Pelourinho
in the city of Salvador.
8) Funding Sources
The projects for the restoration of citizenship and black culture and the
Solidarity Training project are supported by the Salvador City Council. The
Olodum Cultural Group finances the students of the Olodum Creativity
School.
9) Areas of Activity
Education, art, Afro-Brazilian culture, and job training.
10) Objectives
· Preserving the black culture through art
· Reinforcing black identity in the boys and girls
· Complementing formal education with knowledge that demands the
exercise of citizenship.
· Encouraging the professional technical training of the boys and girls in
the project in terms of work.
11) Target Public
The Olodum Creativity School’s public is made up of children and adolescents
in situations of social risk and youths with few qualifications for the job
market. The age group varies between 7 and 21 years.
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12) Description and Background:
Olodum endeavors to develop different activities that strengthen
community alliances and a social perspective in the same way as Bahia’s
other traditional Carnival associations (Ilê Aiyê and Gandhi’s Children).
This is accomplished by placing a special emphasis on self-esteem and
redeeming the history of the black people. Another common purpose is
finding jobs for youths and this takes place by selling products and images
such as CDs, videos, T-shirts, and shows. This aspect of the project goes
beyond the area of art education and citizenship into the area of training
without necessarily restricting itself to an instrumental culture aimed at
the market place.
The proposal to construct a black identity and combat racism is revealed
in the musical compositions, plays, and active participation of Olodum in the
daily life of the community, together with other organizations of the black
movement. For some time these principles have coexisted with educational
projects in the sense of developing an education which fills existing gaps in
formal education in a wide variety of ways. This includes redeeming the
history of African descendants in Brazil, of African culture, and of the cosmic
vision of the so called “saint’s people”, candomblé (a religion with roots in
West Africa, introduced in Brazil by slaves). For the children and youths,
these are instances of cultural resistance and bases for building self-esteem.
In this area, other organizations are also involved, such as Ilê Aiyê. Ilê was
the first cultural group to offer an education linked to the roots of black
people, starting with the Mãe Hilda School, named after an important figure
in the candomblé movement in Bahia. This idea of a greater investment in
values based on resistance is linked to a preoccupation with the social
exclusion of the black population, especially the youths. The professional
training segment in the fields of art and culture is also a highlight in the
Olodum Creativity School’s methodological proposal.
In spite of having been founded in 1979, the Olodum Creativity School
managed to maintain public recognition only in 1984. The idea of the
Creativity School working with the youth and using art as a means of
communication came from the percussion group of the Olodum Cultural
Group. The Olodum Creativity School was conceived based on the Drum
Roll project, which was a response to a request from the Maciel/Pelourinho
community to form a percussion band made up of children and adolescents
from the neighborhood with the aim advanced training in music. It was
founded in 1991 and has been operating with interruptions resulting from the
lack of stable financial resources. Today the Olodum Creativity School has
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six classrooms, eight groups during the two periods of the day, for a total of
236 students. The fact that the community is a reference is an element that
stands out in the following deposition:
A group of black men and women got together because they wanted to
take part in the Bahia Carnival. It started with the Olodum Block.
Then these men and women’s children wanted to be drummers too, so
they started a project called Drum Roll that the community had asked
for. The community asked to form a band of children and teenagers
from the neighborhood so that they could improve their musical
abilities and get to know about the origin of capissura—a musical
instrument of African origin. Then the teachers said that getting to
know about the origin of the instrument wasn’t enough and they
suggested mixing in elements of formal schooling, the basic subjects,
Portuguese, Math, History and Geography, and introducing values to
guide the project. But everything started from the drumming lessons
that went on in the middle of the street, there in Pelourinho. (Interview
with management, Salvador-BA)
13) Personnel
The Olodum Cultural Group consists of 14 people working on different
projects with an average of five to eight teachers for each project. The
training of these teachers is in many different areas. Most of them have
completed secondary education and the rest are university graduates.
However, they all have experience in working with children and adolescents
in the area of art and culture.
Some of the teachers who have been employed started working with
Olodum on a work-study basis, and others are ex-participants. All the
facilitators are contracted and have ties with the agencies that support the
experiment or with the City Council, which also works with the institution.
All the employees take an active part in the management of the project,
that is, they all work in the field of gathering resources and planning projects
in order to provide continuity for the work.
14) Ongoing Programs and Projects
In the educational area and linked to the Olodum Creativity School, the
Olodum Cultural Group has developed three other projects: the Olodum
Social Project, the Job Training Project, and the Educational
Development Project.
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In addition to these, it also works with the project for redeeming
citizenship and black culture supported by the City Council, with the Solidarity
Training Program and with the Children’s Band project, which are aimed at
children.
The Olodum Creativity School develops courses in jewelry making,
computers, dance, singing, theatre, and drumming. These courses are in
addition to the presentation of educational conferences and lectures about
responsible sexuality, drugs, adolescence, the environment, and black culture.
We are always concerned with emphasizing the construction of an
identity, that is, bringing out the whole historicity of black people so
they can value their self-esteem because the system takes care not to
show the relevance of the black person, the contribution black people
have made to the construction of Brazil. (Interview with management,
Salvador-BA)
The area of art education and citizenship, which involves the abovementioned projects, is indirectly related to other areas of Olodum (band,
theatre, and choir). Many youths who come in for the educational projects
go on to join the art education area as artists. This opportunity is an
encouragement for the youths, bearing in mind the social recognition of
Olodum and the fame of its shows and performances. The activity the
youths like most is drumming, but other areas in the sphere of the arts are
also offered, such as drama, in which the teaching involves diversifying the
fields of interest of these youths.
The Olodum Creativity School is also extremely active on the level of
giving shows, public exhibitions, and external activities. Parades are common,
in which the Children’s Band plays the drums. Children and youths from the
School take part in lectures in other locations and in marches. They attend
plays, act, and play at parties and rallies organized by social organizations.
Olodum Creativity School students attended the Latin American Conference
of Students of Architecture, Language and Literature, and Law and have
taken part in lectures at the Brazilian Agency for the Support of Small
Businesses – SEBRAE. These youths have participated in cultural exchange
programs such as that organized by the Center for Oriental and African
Studies – CEAO of the University of Bahia, for example. International
schools visit the Olodum Creativity School, spending some time in the
institution, which allows the youths in the project to experience other cultures.
The Olodum Cultural School organizes conferences, campaigns, soccer
championships, and music festivals. The Creativity School’s activities are
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carried out in two periods of the day, with eight groups in each period. Each
group contains on average of 40 students and lasts about five months.
15) Methodology
The methodological background consists primarily of attracting and
persuading the youths. The project does not demand that its students be
enrolled in the formal education system since many of the boys and girls
living in the low-income districts of Salvador do not go to school. However,
as they become involved in the project, educational activities are used in
order to emphasize the importance of formal education, and many of the
youths automatically try to enroll.
The activities developed by the Olodum Creativity School are based on
constructivist theory with emphasis on participating and mixing the content
related to daily life to what is known, with a subtle introduction of the discipline
being taught:
The teacher’s position can’t be the guy who’s just passing on knowledge.
The teacher has to be the one who’s sharing and who, in a strategic
and intelligent way, stimulates the student to think that what he’s
proposing is more interesting. This is a great strategy and a difficult
one because you have to spend all your time in front of them without
them realizing that you’re there. But, because we want to create
autonomous and enterprising citizens, we have to have an attitude
that’s not authoritarian, an authority that is on the same level as
theirs, of a person who’s there and who has to be respected. The
educational aspect has to be carried out in a very subjective way…
They have to be directed in the artistic event so that they feel pleasure
in making music and at the same time learn musical theory […]. (Focus
group with teachers, Salvador-BA)
Methodological innovations are guided towards offering responses to
the requirements of low-income youths with the goal of going against the
history of discrimination against black people, including their relationship
with the job market. The practical classes are based on the exchange of
experiences between boys and girls. To encourage discussion the teachers
give the students information about specific topics. This content is dealt
with based on the conditions of life of the youths themselves. This is
accomplished through improvisations on themes of daily life involving the
situations and environments in which they live. The students often take note
of what has been discussed and by means of theatrical techniques give
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shows to their groups. According to statements, history is mixed with
contemporary situations, dramatizing relationships and discrimination.
The struggle against violence and discrimination is a high priority on
the Olodum Creativity School’s agenda. The question of violence is
approached indirectly with an insistence on the positive aspects of “nonviolence” and on solidarity. It relies also on desire and pleasure as ways of
attracting youths and even facilitators and teachers:
We question problems without talking about violence. We talk
about love, peace, unity, and solidarity and about how it’s good to
contribute to someone else’s knowledge. (Interview with
management, Salvador-BA)
16) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The Solidarity Training project has a stage called “Practical
Awareness”, which lasts 180 hours. During this stage, which has not yet
been carried out, the idea will be to take the work Olodum does to other
institutions, onto the street, to give presentations in public, in theatres and
also to other projects, agencies, municipal schools, etc.
Carrying out activities that will start people playing musical instruments
is anticipated with other agencies such as the Ilê Aiyê, Araketu, and Ilha.
The Olodum project will have an exchange with a jewelry making project
called “Fantasilhas”, so that the youths can learn this activity.
The Olodum Creativity School was born out of demand from the area
where it actively participates. In its plays and music it is common to see
complaints, accusations, and ways of life the poorer communities portrayed.
These are the communities of Central Salvador, of the peripheral
neighborhoods, and of the black population.
The Olodum Cultural Group is a good illustration of the scope of the
concept of community and its multiple points of reference. It has spread
over a wide social area of Salvador, as is demonstrated in its participation in
the celebrations of the 20th of November. The Creativity School takes part
in the organization of the Zumbi dos Palmares (a hero of black liberation in
Brazil) Grand March and in the Black Consciousness Day shows, along
with Malê de Balê, Ilê Aiyê, Olodum, Didá, and the City Council’s Master
Pastinha educational project.
The Olodum Creativity School has direct contact with the schools in
the Pelourinho district. It monitors the educational progress of its youths,
since good performance in school is a prerequisite of joining the project and
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taking part in its drumming, dance, music, and computer courses. In the
same way, school support activities are developed such as calligraphy and
math. Several mothers point out that one of the changes in the lives of their
children who are part of the project is the stimulation to improve their
performance in school. The project keeps in contact with the youths’ parents
by informing them of all the details of the children’s progress in school and
of their whole development.
At present the Olodum Creativity School has as its main partners: The
City Council and the Association for the Support of the Solidarity Community
Program (AAPCS). This partnership takes the form of financing the Olodum
Creativity School’s activities, courses, and shows as well as providing licenses
for producing shows in public areas such as Pelourinho Square. These
activities have become a great tourist attraction and part of the leisure and
entertainment activities of the whole population of Salvador.
17) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
Individual evaluations of students and activities are regularly carried out.
18) Specific Problems in the Experience
· One of the problems pointed out is the relationship between the project
and some of the financing agencies, which often impose certain
demands in relation to the project when they approve financing, trying
to interfere even in its educational methodology.
The partnership is the planning of the project that we send to the
financing source, and when it’s approved they send the funds and we
take the students who attend the school and try to satisfy all the
demands of the financial agency because they give the money, but they
give us a list of details of what they want and so we try to adapt the
school’s profile to fit what the sponsor demands, which is kind of
European in a way. Because of the program content that the sponsor
wants to see developed, there is going to be a big struggle on the part
of the funded organizations to make the partners and the financing
agencies understand that this is not really what the client wants.
(Interview with management, Salvador-BA)
· The length of the courses (five months) is felt to be too short by the
families, and the fact that the project closes during vacations is also
pointed out as a problem, especially by the mothers who work. They
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are worried about their children not having a secure place to be with
attractive activities to entertain them.
It would be good if the government gave these funds to stretch
things out a little more, because if our project stops now on the
vacation, it drives me crazy thinking about it! I don’t want to think
about how I’m going to leave the house to go to work and leave
those two at home. Because when one is at school the other is here.
One studies in the morning, the other in the afternoon, and they
take turns doing the housework. (Focus group with mothers,
Salvador-BA)
· The lack of funds is reflected in the lack of personnel
We need a teacher, a psychologist and, for this to be a more complete
project, we are going to need an educational psychologist, a dentist,
and a doctor. (Interview with management, Salvador-BA)
19) Why is it an innovative experiment?
· The project’s innovation lies in the fact that working with art
and education gives the youths a new way of seeing and
experiencing the world they are living in. Art, like dance and
music, is seen as a way of achieving citizenship and as one of
the most important elements in the struggle against violence, in
the sense that it allows the youths another form of expression,
not only in terms of professional training but also as spectators
and citizens.
Our goal is to complement the knowledge gained in the formal
education system with information that exercises the practice of
democracy and the rights of the citizen, using their life
experiences, their rhythm, and their own interests as reference
points. These elements contribute to the formation of social and
moral values that will permit them to live without discrimination
alongside all the social groups they might come in contact with.
We want the black youth to be able to live with dignity,
exercising his skills with competence. We take the experience
he brings with him and we try to give it a professional shape so
that he can go after a job in a competent manner. (Interview
with management, Salvador-BA)
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· The importance of the project consists in its methodology.
The excitement runs from the start to the finish of each course because
they are doing what they like. We don’t take the pleasure of playing
music, singing and dancing away from them. Now, together with this,
we teach them lessons in citizenship, citizens’ math, practical
Portuguese and functional reading skills necessary for their daily
lives. Olodum music deals with topics that reflect violence and also
reflect ways out of violence. (Interview with the director, Salvador-BA)
20) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
There have been many different changes in terms of behavior, resulting
in new views of responsibility and solidarity, better relationships with parents,
and improvement in discipline and being on time. In addition, a distancing
from situations involving violence and drugs has been observed on account
of the incompatibility the project demonstrates between the desire to be an
artist and involvement with this kind of situation. These youths begin to
develop another relationship with their bodies. Until now their bodies have
been given over to the pleasures of drugs. Now, they’re pointed in another
direction, to the producer-body, the artist-body.
We have testimonies here from mothers whose children were at social
risk and began to occupy themselves in a productive way in the Olodum
Creativity School, changing their behavior. We have testimonies from
a mother who found her son sleeping when she came home. She got
scared and woke him up: ‘What’s the matter with you?’ and he
answered: ‘Nothing, it’s just that today I went to dance and drumming
at the Creativity School and I’m tired!’ This mother would get home
and find her son in the street at 11 o’clock, midnight, two in the
morning. So when she got home from work she was surprised to find
her boy sleeping. I mean, it’s gratifying to know that there was one
day he didn’t go out on the street thanks to the work that’s done here.
(Interview with director, Salvador-BA)
The youths come in here one way and leave another way. Because the
goal isn’t just to train an artist. In the Olodum projects we also want to
train people who can appreciate the arts, opinion makers. We would also
like this art to help them in life and turn them into citizens. By coming
here they are complementing the time they would spend on the street
learning what they shouldn’t learn, and they are getting a view of
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citizenship through art. In two years you can see a teenager’s
transformation. With this project they want to make their mark. They
leave here and get home wanting to know what things are like. So this
work is a great incentive for them to have a worldview later on, to be able
to talk and have discussions. (Focus group with teachers, Salvador-BA)
· Through its activities, the project enables the youths to discover talents
and explore their potential to develop artistically, culturally and as
citizens. This creates a more favorable atmosphere for school
performance, making them qualified for the job market.
I have a daughter who is here in this project. Before coming here to the
project she was already at school and I felt like she wanted to do some
sort of activity. She liked singing and dancing and that’s when I got the
proposal from the school. She started here and I noticed that she
developed a lot with her dance class, her drama class, that’s what she
liked a lot more, her drumming and the other things they have in the
project. When she’s at home she imitates the singers and the actors and
that’s something that’s really her own thing. I can see that this is what
she really likes to do, even though she’s also doing well in school. What
she likes doing best is acting and this project has made that possible. It
developed this in her and I’m very happy. (Focus group with mothers,
Salvador-BA)
My daughters’ lives before they came to the Creativity School project
meant sitting at home watching television. Now, I’ve got one who I
know when I get home she’ll be sitting on the floor with a piece of
paper that the teacher here gave her to make her handwriting better,
because it’s terrible. When she isn’t doing anything, she’s sitting on
the floor practicing, because she said that when she goes back she
wants to show the teacher that she’s got good handwriting. (Focus
group with mothers, Salvador-BA)
· Recently a young man who was in an Olodum project was accepted
at the University Music Department. Several teachers and facilitators
are ex-students of the Olodum Creativity School. This is felt to be
important from the point of view of giving an example to new students.
My training started with a training workshop offered by Olodum
in1990, and that’s when I began to develop the techniques that I learned
in this professional training workshop, making it part of my day-today work. (Focus group with teachers, Salvador-BA)
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Many of the youths who have gone through the Creativity School’s
courses are invited to play in bands, to take part in parades, to work
and produce events, which we did last year. Now I’m seeing the fruits
of our labor, because they’re earning 50 reais for birthdays and for
children’s parties in their neighborhoods. What I mean is that in some
way we have contributed to generating an income for these kids. In
some way we are helping them to be part of the job market, to be
independent, to fight for what they want, to be happy and cooperative.
(Interview with management, Salvador-BA)
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4.2.5 Circo Picolino (Picolino Circus)
1) Name of Organization
Associação Picolino de Artes do Circo (Picolino Circus Arts Association)
2) Date of Foundation
1985
3) City/State
Salvador-BA
4) Type of Organization
Non-Governmental Organization
5) Contact
e) Anselmo Serrat
f) Title: Director
g) Tel.: (71) 285 0340
h) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites where Activities are Carried Out
Pituassu Neighborhood
7) Funding Sources
The Picolino Circus Arts School seeks to be self-financing by means of
presenting shows in schools. It relies on the financial cooperation of agencies
linked to the state government and the Salvador City Council on a regular
basis (this was used more at the start of the school’s activities, when
UNICEF’s financial collaboration played a major role). In 2000 the school
received 60,000 reais from the state government. Today a group is being
formed using external financing.
8) Areas of Activity
Culture and art – training of circus performers and instructors.
9) Objectives
· Training instructors in circus arts and youth monitors as well as providing
accompaniment of school progress and extra school tutoring.
· Relating the knowledge offered by formal education to circus activities
and the sense of freedom that these offer.
· Offering possible chances for the future, an element that is often missing
at home.
10) Target Public
The target public is made up of adolescents and youths aged between 15
and 24. About 90% of them have lived on the streets.
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11) Description and Background:
The Picolino Circus Arts School began its activities in 1985, when the
professional training course emerged in response to demand from youths
between 15 and 24 years of age who wanted to train for the circus. The
pedagogical plan was drawn up in partnership with the Axé Project in regard
to staff for classes in theory and lectures. The project counted on assistance
from UNICEF, this being the first of three stages of the course. The project
is considered socially legitimate, being extremely well known in the city of
Salvador and other peripheral communities.
The investment effort at that time was to outline work-study opportunities
that would train artists. However, these also had to include support for formal
education, as in literacy classes. The Picolino Circus Arts School emerged
in its second phase using its own resources during a six-month period with
the collaboration of the Salvador City Council.
The courses were planned first of all from an academic point of view
by means of curricula constructed according to classroom hours based on
20 lectures. The evaluation of this structure led the school principals to
abandon this format since the young clientele was not accustomed to this
type of timetable.
The coordination began to call the school Picolino City because of a
tendency of the youths to spend a great part of their time there. This
occurred of their own volition. An additional high school equivalency course
is being installed, adapted to the youths’ situation, as they tend to travel
when they become artists. The circus is felt to be the embryo of the
Picolino City project.
12) Personnel
Some staff members have been trained as artists, others as psychologists
and teachers. Today the School has a permanent staff that coordinates circus
activities. It has 100 full-time employees for the area of circus education. In
addition to a part-time educational psychologist, there are also teachers with
experience in the arts, first aid, and physical education. The program also
includes subcontractors, and visiting speakers are called in as well. With
regard to circus arts, the project has a ringmaster with 25 years of experience
in the field. Pedagogical coordination in the school is carried out by a
psychologist who is also trained in dance and who initiated the professional
training of the youths. Instructors are ex-members of the Picolino Circus
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Company. They work as circus artists, with signed working documents.
The company does not use volunteer help.
There is no formal selection for the basic team through the theme
centers. There are those who come in by way of work-study programs
who become intensely involved with the project and join it on a more permanent
basis. The Picolino Circus Arts School is a project that trains its own team
of young instructors during the whole process.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The Picolino Circus Arts School develops courses with practical and
theoretical classes. These include circus arts and professional training in
other areas like commercial activities connected to attending to the public
and dealing with store inventory. It also offers courses in specific areas of
training related to the world of show business like costume design, for
example. Activities are structured in specific modules such as dance, music,
and circus arts, totaling four modules in two years, each of them lasting
approximately six months.
14) Methodology
The methodology implanted by the Picolino Circus Arts School combines
the acquisition of artistic content with literacy training, as well as formal
learning. This is based on the cognitive world of the youths in situations of
social exclusion. A basic form of training is utilized which relates to the
effort made to reduce the age/grade displacement of the students in primary
school. This is linked to the question of citizenship. Another line adopted is
to combine technique to theory and to specific information on art, culture,
circus history, physiology, etc. Specialists are called in when there is a need
for classes on specific topics. Also, educational psychology is part of the
methodological program, encompassing learning difficulties, with a focus
on individual stimulation and collective production. During the whole time
various forms of language are worked with. For example, this includes the
combination of drama, a mural, and a text in which the youths have organized
a circus dictionary.
The project invests in “employability” by providing work-study positions
for the youths in the Circus, in the store warehouses, as assistants to the
coordination, as secretaries and carpenters. The Picolino Circus Arts School
trains instructors in circus arts and the production of shows.
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Courses are developed in areas specifically related to the integration
of formal and specialized education with citizenship themes together with
the production of shows. There is also investment in the youths who will be
instructors to future groups. Scholarships are given to students in the program
to help with transportation and meals.
Using the Paulo Freire method, a unique program has been initiated
which revolves around the students’ daily world. This approach uses specialist
advice from educational psychologists directed at a special clientele in
situations of social exclusion, with no socialization and with an educationally
deprived background and precarious school history.
School performance is monitored. In general the Circus is considered
a family where there is a sharing of experiences that occur in other
places.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
Partnerships are established on a regular basis with the Mayor’s Office,
also dealing with children and youths. The project has a high profile in the
city and in the media. Shows are produced regularly and essentially depend
on the partnerships. The Picolino Circus Company is part of the life of the
city and is present at public celebrations and activities.
The partnership work with families is extremely important for the whole
process. Whenever a child has problems, the parents are called in to be
present at the discussion, which is carried out together with the family.
16) The place of evaluation and research in the experiment
There is no formal system of evaluation. According to the project
motivators, evaluation is performed during the process of activity
development. The Picolino Circus Arts School receives children and youths
from other similar projects and uses these projects in order to present lectures.
In this way it has relationships with organizations such as the Axé Project
and Ágata Esmeralda.
Partnerships are regularly established in order to put on shows in other
institutions and also to serve specific areas for training directed by the Circus.
An example of this is the partnership with the environmental group Gambá
on environmental education.
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17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Lack of resources to guarantee facilities (such as equipment and
sufficient time) is one of the main difficulties faced by the institution.
The school pays for the area which the Circus uses and the site for
the courses.
· The sudden departure of the professional artists affects the quality
of the work. There was, for example, the case of a professional who
left for three months but who later returned and because his colleagues
felt that his work was extremely important for the institution.
· The institution also lacks institutional support from both the government
and private sectors.
18) Why is it an innovative experiment?
· The experiment developed by the Picolino Circus Arts School has
managed to awaken the interest of other Mayor’s Offices to repeat
the experiment based on recognition of the success of this work.
The Circus has received visitors from several states who are
interested in developing the project.
There is nothing else like the Picolino Circus devoted to full-time
training for youths in situations of risk. This courage to take risks
and entertain people demands determination. It’s nothing official,
so it takes courage. Other centers are coming to see how we do it,
based on the experiments we’ve carried out in giving professional
training to youths who live in situations of risk. Now there is a
second generation of youths who are learning from instructors who
were trained by the Circus. The project is multiplying. (Interview
with management, Salvador-BA)
· The work carried out by the Picolino Circus Arts School has the power to
influence the whole process of the youths’ cultural formation. The school
has also managed to provide alternative leisure spaces for the youths. The
school is considered legitimate in Salvador. Salvador recognizes the important
role the School’s shows play in spreading messages of culture and peace.
· An extremely strong identity is formed, a feeling of belonging to the
Picolino Circus Company. The Circus is seen as an area apart from
the environment of violence, both because of the nature of its activities
and because of the demands it makes.
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You live inside this place and when you get home there’s just
time to take a shower and go to school. (Focus group with youths,
Salvador-BA)
I can see myself as different from some of my buddies. They’re on the street,
dirty, smoking pot, and if I didn’t find the project I would still be on the street.
I learned to live, to have love. (Focus group with youths, Salvador-BA)
· The project has given the youths a chance to discover talents and
explore their potential to develop artistically, culturally, and as citizens.
The project gives the children and youths another space in their lives and
that is why it’s different. (Focus group with specialists, Salvador-BA)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· In general, the effects of the experiment on the youths have been
demonstrated in several ways, especially in the construction of a
new view of their place in the world. For example, there is a visible
change in terms of behavior, in that many of them move away from
violent behavior.
The kids in the Circus have already worked the traffic lights, all of them
sold newspapers, some stole, others were arrested. Today some of
them have their own families and houses. (Interview with management,
Salvador-BA)
· The family recognizes the project as being important in their children’s
lives and the results are plain to see.
The project is excellent because you can see a result, it’s excellent! The
daily routine is tough. The kids are there all day and they stay there.
The end result is marvelous! (Interview with families, Salvador-BA)
· What is also clear is the transformation in self-esteem and sociability
of these boys and girls. Today many of them feel able to communicate
better and because of this they can build better relationships.
Each of them lives in a poor neighborhood. They co-exist with other
kids, with the community. They pass on this knowledge they have in
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the community where they live. So they end up having an effect on
the community, not transforming it but discussing how serious life is,
discussing the importance of organization on their street. For example,
many of them take pride in their street being the best in the
neighborhood. And they live in poor, working class neighborhoods
and their home is the neatest one and that has an influence on the
community and they’re aware of that. They’re aware of the improvement
in their lives and that they can improve the situation of other people
who are instructors and they have an influence in their communities
by their actions, even if these are not direct actions. The fact that their
actions are not direct is what gets them down the most. (Interview
with management, Salvador-BA)
Communication. Going up to a person and saying what I feel, to my
brothers and sisters, my mother, my father. I’ve changed and I changed
a lot in this sense. I went through a fantastic change in the way I talk
when I’m with people, the way I relate to people, aggressiveness… I
definitely changed. (Focus group with youths, Salvador-BA)
The Circus stayed with her her whole life. What she grew most in was
socializing, in feeling more at ease with other kids, making new friends.
I think she felt more secure in the Circus. (Interview with families,
Salvador-BA)
· The youths have constructed a new perception of their social situation,
acting in a more decisive, responsible way in order to obtain better
chances to enter society.
There is a noticeable change in their relationships with other youths in
their daily lives and in the organizational capacity they have now. They
can organize projects involving 40 or 50 children and they direct these
activities. The main thing is that today they are very much aware of
their importance the development of their own country. That is, they
use their training, they know that they are working on the transformation
of their country. They feel like the real leaders, defending their brothers
and sisters, defending their people, defending their culture. (Interview
with management, Salvador-BA)
· For the family, many results become visible, especially in relation to
responsibility. Parents and teachers point out that the children and
youths connected to the Circus now give more importance to their
studies and seek guidance when they have problems in class or in
relationships in school. In order for them to stay in the Circus, it
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requires both the student public and the instructor public to be linked
to school.
She’s improved 100% in school because the Circus keeps an eye on
her school progress. She’s changed 100% because she says that without
the Circus she’s nothing and she doesn’t want to leave the Circus.
(Interview with families, Salvador-BA)
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4.3 Ceará
4.3.1 Associação Curumins (The Curumins Association)
1) Name of Organization
Associação Curumins (The Curumins Association)
2) Date of Foundation
1986
3) City/State
Fortaleza, Ceará
4) Type of Organization
Non-Governmental Organization
5) Contact
a) Raimundo Coelho de Almeida Filho
b) Title: Coordinator
c) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
The Center for Education and Professional Training, located in the Mucuripe
Neighborhood in Fortaleza, and the New Life Farm Temporary Accommodation
Unit, located in Souza Lake, 74km from Salvador.
7) Funding Sources
The majority of the funding comes from Terre des Hommes, Lausanne.
8) Areas of Activity
Education and art – attending to children and youths living on the street.
9) Objectives
· Enabling children/adolescents in situations of risk (social, personal, street)
to move off the streets
· Preventing the brothers and sisters of the youths at risk from going onto
the streets
· Allowing the youths to re-join society in a positive way (at school, in their
families, in jobs)
10) Target Public
The project’s target public is made up of children and teenagers from six to 18
years of age who are at risk (from drugs, gangs, or sexual exploitation), most of
them coming from the overcrowded districts of Fortaleza such as the districts
of Serviluz, Beira-Mar, Mucuripe, Praia do Futuro I and II, Vicente Pizon, Castelo
Encantado, and the City Center.
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11) Description and Background:
The Curumins Association is a non-profit non-governmental agency
created with the aim of attending to children and adolescents, enabling them
to move off the streets of Fortaleza. Its target public is made up of children
and adolescents who hang around the bay area and who are the victims of
sexual exploitation, child labor, and involvement with drugs and gangs.
The work began in 1986 together with Terre des Hommes, an
international organization whose main goal is to support projects in developing
countries. In 1996 the project ceased to be associated with Terre des Hommes
and established itself as a local organization (in accordance with the principles
laid down by the funding organization). The new organization adopted the
name The Curumins Association and has gone on to establish local
partnerships but is still supported by Terre des Hommes.
12) Personnel
The make-up of the group is varied and multi-disciplinary. It includes
teachers, psychologists, a nurse, a businessman, an engineer, and an economist.
As well as these professionals, one of the on-the-street teachers was once
a child at risk who attended the Curumins Association. Some education
students from the University of Fortaleza have work-study positions.
Everyone who works in the institution has already had previous
experience in working with children and adolescents who live on the street.
The educators receive specific training to work on the project.
According to the organization’s coordinators, the educator must sense the
child’s mood, to see if he is receptive. This concern, which is common
among many of the agencies that work with street children, forms part of
the “learning love” methodology between the institution and the youth (a
method used by the Axé Project in Salvador).
During the selection process, the institution’s coordinators carry out
classroom observation of the candidate for the post of teacher. Besides
this, staff members are trained to deal with problems like drugs, STDs/
AIDS, and sexuality.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
Foundations for the Future: This project offers the youths in situations
of risk an opportunity to have a future through professional training and
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qualification in the area of civil construction. The course is offered in
educational workshops that teach the work techniques (theory and practice)
that are linked to the development of awareness of citizenship. The project
is developed with partner support.
New Life Farm: The New Life Farm is a rehabilitation center that shelters
children from six to 14 years of age who have been victims of violence (drugs,
gangs, sexual exploitation). They are sheltered for a period of six to nine
months with the goal of contributing to the process of socializing these youths
and reconstructing ties to their families. On the farm the youths go back to
living in a family environment under the guidance of teachers and psychologists.
The Colored Can Steel Band: This project teaches percussion to
children and youths both sexes from seven to 14 years of age. According to
the organizers, the band awakens in the youths the ability to create and
to value themselves through art and through recognizing that the band
is an instrument of human transformation.
Choir for Life: The Choir is made up of children and adolescents from
7 to 11 years old for boys, and 7 to 14 for girls. As well as using singing, the
choir encourages group social contact and offers the youths the opportunity
to develop their feelings.
14) Methodology
In order to get the children and adolescents off the streets, the teaching
instrument used by the team of teachers in the organization is “learning love”.
This process is illustrated in the words of the Director of the Curumins Association:
A cliché used is learning love. This is what we try to do with the kids,
getting to the point where they feel comfortable talking to the teachers,
because this is an evolution. Until they get to the point where they feel
interested in coming here to get to know what we are doing here. So it’s
a process of getting here, talking, getting close, without a lot of formality,
so that the child doesn’t feel he’s in a formal situation. (Interview with
director, Fortaleza-CE)
This approach is based on trust. This trust must be developed between
the teacher and the street child.
From the moment this contact is established, this trust, this link with
them, that’s when the teachers show them, invite them to get to know
what the project is about. At first they just come, it’s a visit, an invitation we
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offer them. Then they come here and we introduce them and then
through the workshops we keep them… (Focus group with staff/
project motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
The children who have spent less time on the streets and those who
live on the periphery of the cities are more open to the street teacher’s
approach than those who live in the City Center:
When we go to a neighborhood that’s farther away from the City Center
the kid who is on the street is more permeable, if I can put it like that,
to the work of the teacher. He accepts the work of the teacher more. He
gets closer, he listens more, he’s more open than the kid who has spent
more time on the street. So this is something, when we analyze a
graph of this subject, we can see that the longer they’ve spent on the
street, the more resistant they are to this approach. The greater the
resistance, the harder our work is in creating strategies to deal with
him. (Interview with director, Fortaleza-CE)
In the Curumins Association, the approach between the street child
and the family is made gradually. According to the organizers, it is necessary
first of all to learn the child’s history and that of his family, in order to later
start the process of bringing the two together.
In the following statement, a Curumins teacher describes the so-called
“street child system”, which is the pedagogical method used to encourage
the youth to return home:
The greatest motivator in Curumins today is the so-called ‘street child
system’. We have a team of teachers who use a methodology to work
with these children. They get close to this street child. They understand
and comprehend the whole process of that child on the street. Based
on this work, they look to instigate questions, getting the kids to ask
questions, to ask themselves why they’re on the street and not with
their family and why they don’t start working on getting back together
with their family. […] And from there, from this knowledge of the
child, in its various aspects, the team can understand that child and
start to rescue him or her. The child is brought here and begins a
whole process of socialization and re-integration in the family with
us. (Focus group with staff/project motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
Another instrument utilized in working with the youths is socialization. This
consists of offering the youths activities so that, little by little, they may be reintegrated
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into their families, school, and community. In this process of socialization they are
offered playful activities such as a workshop in making and handling puppets.
The puppets are teaching instruments used in this street process and the
socialization process. (Interview with director, Fortaleza-CE)
Art, education, sports, and culture function as a counterpoint to the
existential situation of violence for these youths. These elements appear in
the organization’s work as it holds educational workshops, as we can see
from the following statement:
It’s berimbau [an artesenal musical instrument], tom-tom, tambourine and
when the circle is ready is when the teacher gets there and starts to play
and another listens, writing something down on the form, the system form,
and the workshop organizer who is responsible for the work is there,
organizing and encouraging us and we manage to work like that. So you
have to have these strategies. (Interview with director, Fortaleza-CE)
A “system form” is used to monitor the youths, recording his or her
entire history in the institution: the first approach of the teacher, the first
conversations, the courses taken, family visits, etc. This is the main instrument
utilized by the Curumins Association to monitor the youth’s progress and
consequently, their return home.
In the following testimony the director of Curumins talks about the
system form and its use in working with the youths.
We have an instrument called the “system form”, where we try to
develop a kind of reading of the kind of life the child is demonstrating
and this is a result of observations by the teacher in the street. The
teacher observes, listens, and talks to the kid. The result of this
observation work, observing, listening and talking is recorded on a
card, which is what we call the system form, where we try to connect
what the kid has said and what’s done here with this card. It’s a constant
reappraisal. As long as the kids present new data, we observe new
situations. When a boy comes into the Curumins Association system
this card is filled in. It gets up-dated and we make an effort to get his
commitment in terms of a wider routine, which is a procedure that
today we share with a working group. His life story is always entered
on this form. (Interview with director, Fortaleza-CE)
According to staff members, the card lets them make a “map” of the
child or youth who is a client. The card shows elements like energy,
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development, and ability to coexist with the group, all of which permit them
to get to know the child better and attempt to build a life plan with him or her.
In other words, by means of the life history of the child or youth the institution’s
educators are able to perform positive intervention in the child’s life,
guaranteeing their return to society.
Activities are initiated with direct contact with the child or
adolescent in the areas where they stay. In order to get close to them,
toys, teaching games, and other materials are taken onto the streets in
order to attract the youths. Another way of approaching them is to
take food to strategic points. After the children and adolescents’
confidence has been gained, they are invited to take part in activities
at the Association’s headquarters. Later, contact is maintained with
the boys and girls’ families.
According to one educator’s report, the activities are planned in a
participatory way, that is, listening to the youths and adding to the project in
accordance with the demands presented by them, with professional training
appearing as an essential requirement:
This is the whole process of constructing the project, so the whole
project is built up from the needs of the kids. So we started with the
street approach, food and games, then we saw that they needed shelter,
so we gave them shelter, and after the shelter we saw where these kids
went to after a certain age. What would they do then, they had to
have a trade, so from that sprang the job training. We’re always
focusing on their needs to respond to a demand that they indicated.
(Focus group with staff/project motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
In spite of the institution offering initial professional training courses to
the adolescents, it is not possible to give a definite guarantee that they will
get a job. It is felt, however, that there is the possibility for the youths to set
themselves up independently.
There’s socialization, with the teenagers it’s mainly in the afternoon
period. There’s preparation for professional training and there is
specific training for teenagers, which means 16 years old […] and
in this professional training where everyone participates, we also
arrange an integration day once a month. Everyone takes part,
children, teenagers, staff members, everyone gets together just to
get this sense of getting to know everything and of leisure. Because
it’s a day taken for leisure. (Focus group with staff/project
motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
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Activities are defined according to the specific objectives of each stage
in the work. The first stage is developed by the social educators in the
streets with play, sporting, and cultural activities. With time, this group is
invited to take part in socialization activities where the rules are determined.
Socialization, as it is called in the Curumins Association, is carried out in a
building near the seafront. At this stage the children contacted on the street
share activities with the children in the neighborhood, with no differentiation.
Activities begin punctually at 7:30 a.m., with 15 minutes of tolerance. This
already demands a disciplined attitude from the youth in terms of punctuality.
This is a teenage practice.
The institution teaches the youths notions of hygiene. While the
neighborhood children all arrive having taken a shower, the street children
take their showers in the center before starting their activities. They remain
there for half a day, receiving two meals a day (breakfast and lunch or a
snack and supper). During socialization they remain in the institution for
seven months.
For each shift in the Curumins Association there’s a different group of
children and youths that come to the activities. In the morning, some of
those who are still living on the streets are commonly present. In the afternoon
there are more of those who have already begun to return home but who
still spend occasional periods on the street. Specific activities are planned
for each of these groups.
Because of the lack of financial resources, systematized monitoring of
the youths is not done once they have left the project. However, the institution
offers some activities for ex-members and keeps a daily eye on children and
teenagers who are on the street.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The Curumins Association recognizes the importance of exchanging
experiences between organizations that work with street children and
teenagers. Beyond this, Curumins supports the creation of a network of
attendance among similar institutions so that they can provide integrated
attendance to youths who live on the street. For example, if it isn’t possible
to arrange the return of the youth to his or her family, he or she is directed to
a shelter or other institution that can offer a place to spend the night.
We also have this worry, we can’t work alone. We can’t take care of
everything. We need help, we need to get together. There are so many
institutions in Fortaleza working with kids in this situation. So we are
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going to join together, sitting down at a table, we’re going to see what
we’re really doing. So that we can take steps forward. So this is also
something we’re worried about, it’s not just doing a good job here in the
Association, with the kids and all. That’s great, but to do this we have to
have help from outside. Because if not, our work is isolated, it stays
something sort of like ‘I’ve got to solve the problem’ of my kids, of the
Curumins kids. You solve the problems of kids from anywhere else. That’s
it. (Focus group with staff/project motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
Some partnerships are formed in order to carry out specific activities
or training courses. The institution organizers tell about already having offered
courses in sewing, bread baking, fashion, tourism, and English. Projects
have been developed in tourism and to train waiters.
Curumins sets up these contacts with the objective of guaranteeing a
process of professional training and even of qualification, because we
know that these teenagers are working on the street, but without
qualifications. (Interview with director, Salvador-CE)
Together with seven other institutions, both governmental and nongovernmental, the Curumins Association makes up the Inter-institution Team
(a group of governmental and non-governmental organizations that work in
the area of street children and adolescents in the city of Fortaleza)/Alliance
Center (an offshoot of the inter-institutional team that works mainly on a
street approach, being made up of social educators). This has the objective
of establishing the necessary alliances to plan and carry out actions that will
guarantee that the rights of children and adolescents are respected. The
coordination of this alliance follows an annual rotation system. In this center
information is exchanged, and work is planned with vacation camps and the
creation of an association. A course for social educators is set up as well.
Perhaps the most relevant of the achievements coming from the center has
been the organizing strength of the groups.
It is extremely important that the institution work with the youths’
families, since it seeks to re-integrate the youths with their families.
The manner [of working with parents] itself and the methodology is
much more intense. Before it was a visit, making contact and getting
things going. Today there is the contact, getting things going, and
this internal work with rounds of conversation. It’s a structure that’s
not therapeutic because it is made up of educators. It’s for listening.
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So the youth is already identifying himself through this. (Focus group
with staff/project motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
An attempt has already been made to replicate the Curumins
Association experiment. By means of the partnership with Terre des
Hommes, it is hoped to set up the “Street Child System” in the city of São
Luís in Maranhão together with 30 non-governmental and two governmental
organizations.
Among the main partners in the Curumins Association are: Senac, Senai,
UNICEF, Terre des Hommes (Switzerland), the Secretariat of Labor and
Social Action, Fortalnet, Minors’ Church Group, City Foundation for the
Child and Family and Citizen, BID (Inter-American Development Bank),
Fortaleza Municipal Council for the Defense of the Rights of the Child and
Adolescent, State of Ceará Council for the Rights of the Child and
Adolescent, and the Congregation of the Servants of Charity Sisters.
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
The Curumins Association is part of a project for institutional strengthening
of activities through a partnership with the Swiss government, in which trimonthly analyses (of accounts and procedures) are performed. In addition,
the teaching process is monitored by the Fondation Terre des Hommes.
The specialists and the director of the Curumins Association frequently
speak of the importance of increasing the number of activities and projects in
order to improve the way they are carried out. According to them, it is by
means of evaluation that elements are built to support judgements concerning
the way things are done and with regard to the processes involved in the
work. In the following reports, those interviewed talk about evaluation within
the institution.
There is continuous evaluation because they look at the request, the
report, the kids’ cards, there is this monthly evaluation which is performed
every three months and every year. The whole team always sits down
and this is when it evaluates and re-directs the activity. (Focus group
with staff/project motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
Within the qualitative process you see this: that these goals, these
evaluations that are based on planning done by the center, are based
on a theme, and that this theme is worked on. It’s inside the center, that
is, the family, the child. We hold a workshop for everyone to work at
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the same time, and from that you really start on an evaluation. It’s also
interesting for that reason, that the family sees what the child sees in
relation to the theme. It’s not an isolated thing. (Focus group with
staff/project motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
The children and youths served by the Curumins Association live the
effects of poverty and social exclusion on a daily basis. In addition to this,
they are often victims of violence and ill treatment. Almost all of them have
run away from their families. This picture reveals how difficult it is for the
institution to intervene on the part of a youth in this situation. This being the
case, the very situation of the youths is one of the greatest problems for the
work of the institution.
· The educators report that they have to establish strategic alliances
with the characters on the streets to manage to get close to the youths.
They cite the figures of the street father and mother, as examples:
The street father is that adult who exploits the teenager or the child
financially, sometimes sexually. So he is one more complicating factor.
You already have to establish this alliance process on a tactical level
for him to let you work, for him to let you go there without a direct
conflict. So all of these circumstances that can happen make us adapt
more and more. (Interview with director, Fortaleza-CE)
· The children and youths who are potential beneficiaries of the project live
in areas where drug traffic and violence are common in their daily lives.
My neighbors got rich in this drugs thing. They’ve got money in the bank,
cell phones. They’ve got a bunch of brothers and sisters who didn’t even
have ten cents in their pocket, and now they’ve got money, cell phones,
they’ve got it all. (Focus group with youths, Fortaleza-CE)
The children and the youths suffer from violence and abuse even within
their own families: I mean, it’s the family itself sometimes who make
them beg. So this project helps a lot, it guides them, it recuperates
these kids. And the kid on the street learns everything that’s no good.
· Domestic violence is one of the major reasons for the child running
away from home:
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hyMy son sold candy to help out. I don’t have a husband, my husband
died. He helped me sell candy and without me knowing it, he was
sniffing glue. Then I hit him, I hit him a lot and he left, he left home for
a week. After that he was sad the whole day, just sad. He took a
shower because he’s very clean. Just sad, watching TV. I gave him his
lunch and he didn’t want it. ‘What’s happening?’ He didn’t say
anything. Then after a while he got up and went out and stayed away
for eight days. I nearly went crazy. I even lost my job. I went around
looking for him, then he went for lunch there [the Curumins
Association], and it looks like he’s all involved there, doesn’t it? He
went for lunch, liked it, and stayed there to sleep. When I went to look
for him he ran away because he was scared I would take him home.
(Focus group with mothers/guardians, Fortaleza-CE)
· When they really go onto the street, the children and the youths live
in a very cruel situation of abandonment and social exclusion. The
street, in the minds of the mothers, is the place where the youth
comes into contact with drugs and prostitution.
My youngest lost his father because I was widowed, OK? So things
got over on me because I had lots of young kids, and then I started to
go out of the house to work. Then he and the oldest one, who was […]
started to go out on the street. He was on the street, begging, cleaning
cars. You know, one of those kids at traffic lights who ask for change.
He got together with people he shouldn’t have gone around with and
when it got back to me, because the mother is always the last to know,
he was already hooked bad on drugs. When I went to get him back,
there was no way anymore. (Focus group with mothers/guardians,
Fortaleza-CE)
· As well as problems with the youths, the institution has financial
difficulties and some problems with project management.
The educators recognize that the activities have to be planned so as to
awaken the youth’s interest. Often, when the youth has been on the street
for a long time, it is difficult for him or her to adapt to a rigid routine or
structure.
At times, a kid who has already taken seven courses gets here and still
doesn’t know what he wants to do. His weakness is human
development. In human growth, in what is called the professional
question, we have to know if that kid is doing this because he wants to
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or not. I’m wasting my time, deceiving that kid too. So, the first thing
you have to do is listen, I want to know what it is that the kid wants.
(Focus group with staff/project motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
· The discipline the project demands for certain activities is spoken of
by the educators as an obstacle to some youths joining in.
Where they have the most difficulty is with the rules. The timetable,
taking a shower, sitting down, taking turns, respecting when their friend
is talking. So these rules of daily life, which are the easiest thing in the
world for us, like I’m talking, you’re listening, it doesn’t come naturally
for them. (Focus group with staff/project motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
18) Why is it an Innovative Experience?
All the individuals interviewed make a positive evaluation of the project.
According to them, the project has a series of strategic facilities that contribute
to the development of the activities.
· In the following report, the director reveals a pragmatic vision in
regard to the agency’s work. In spite of recognizing some unsuccessful
cases, he says that the work is successful within their goals.
We know that we’ve had unsuccessful cases, but we have this success
today with the kids who have managed to get over this street business.
We’re doing it. The victories happen. Now they’re going back to their
families, now they’ve got jobs and are fine. Even when they haven’t
managed to get to this level and all, and they’re not working, but the
fact is that they’re going back to school, going back to their families,
that’s our guarantee. (Interview with director, Fortaleza-CE)
· The youths themselves who have gone on to other projects have a
very good opinion of Curumins. According to them, because it’s a
non-governmental organization, even the food is better, the activities
are better, etc.
Because there [in the other project] the teachers there were rotten,
they threw you out for any little thing, the food was bad, and they
didn’t have many games. You were locked up a lot of the time and there
was this thing of after school tutoring that I hate, and homework.
Here [in Curumins] there’s none of that, here you’ve got stuff that’s
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great. They’ve got things people like, like capoeira and theatre. (Focus
group with youths, Fortaleza-CE)
None of the projects I was in I liked, because there everything was
from the government and here there’s nothing from the government.
There you were supposed to have something better than here, it was
worse there, if you ate the food there you got sick because it was so
bad. They didn’t have theatre games like they have here, just
woodwork. (Focus group with youths, Fortaleza-CE)
· The mothers give good opinions as well concerning the Curumins
Association, mainly in terms of the New Life Farm, which carries out
drug detoxification and educational immersion to re-socialize the youth.
I think that this Curumins project is very good and I think also that
the farm was a real good solution for the mothers, as much for the
mothers as for them because it’s way out there and they get far away
from drugs. Here they can run around free because they have to spend
two or three months to be able to forget, because being here they can
get it together. (Focus group with mothers/guardians, Fortaleza-CE)
· One of the mothers makes extremely positive observations about
the work of the teachers. She concludes that the teachers were
“real parents” for her child.
My son has changed completely. Thank God! Thank God and these
people here, you know, who helped my son. They helped him a lot, a
whole lot. After God, I thank these teachers. I was really suffering and
they helped me tremendously, I really thank God and them, they did
more than a father could because I’m separated and his father never
did anything for him. That’s why I feel that the teachers are more than
his father. (Focus group with mothers/guardians, Fortaleza-CE)
In the work of the Curumins Association, art, sports, culture, and leisure
are used as strategic instruments for social inclusion and re-socialization of
the youth who is living on the street.
· The instructors report that it is the arts workshops that are most
attractive to the project’s target public.
What I see that they like most, what attracts them most at first and is
most inviting for this clientele are those areas where we work more
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with action, with dynamics, with movement. So you use sports, art,
you use playful activities with them, leisure is very attractive. When
you start an activity that demands more concentration, sitting down
to look at an activity, attend a talk or a conference, then you come
across more resistance. It’s really understandable when you think of
the way they live. (Interview with manager, Fortaleza-CE)
· The lack of space is a problem for the youths. According to the
teachers, in some Fortaleza neighborhoods not even the traditional
soccer field has survived the disorganization of the occupation of
urban areas.
They complain about not having an open space, they don’t have anything.
There isn’t even a little square, there’s no soccer field. That’s something you ought
to have everywhere. So the kid comes and says that there’s no soccer field in his
neighborhood. It’s absurd. In the Sossego slum, over by Antonio Bezerra, there’s
nothing. (Focus group with staff/project motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
According to the organization, targets are set every year for numbers
of street children and youths to be attended to. For 1999:
· The institution dealt directly with 779 children and adolescents living
on the streets of Fortaleza, 643 being contacted on the street, 79 sent
to the social area of the project and 75 through partner institutions.
· Of the 643 children and teenagers contacted on the street, 414 chose
to leave the streets, 239 signed on for socio-educational and
professional training activities, 158 were sent to partner institutions
and 17 returned to their families.
· The project contacted 151 families. These contacts and guidance
foster better family development and cause the child to return to the
family or to stay within it.
The changes occur at various levels. They range from simple daily
hygiene to returning a street child to his or her family.
Among some of the important effects on the lives of the youths we can cite:
· In the project, the adolescent who comes of legal age with the skills
necessary to obtain work may be employed by the Curumins team
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when there is a demand for his/her services.
· Literacy classes and guidance with regard to drugs.
It helps you learn how to read and write, it helps, you know, because
it helps. Because lots of street kids didn’t have a program that
encouraged them not to use drugs, because most of the kids use drugs.
There they give more help to those kids who use drugs. After they
started helping these kids, there are some that even stopped using
drugs. (Focus group with youths, Fortaleza-CE)
· A feeling of belonging: the Curumins youths feel themselves to be
different from the others, they feel that they are part of a group that
is learning “good things”.
There’s a difference [between a Curumins client and others], instead
of being out on the street with them, we are in here, and out there
they’re learning bad stuff and in here we’re learning good stuff. (Focus
group with youths, Fortaleza-CE)
· Increase in self-esteem and change in behavior.
There was a kid when he first came here, who never took his cap off.
Then I started thinking what it must be like to be a child living
underneath a cap, like that, a kid who was completely closed, hidden
under his cap. When you talked to him and lifted his cap up, he didn’t
even look at you, the cap was there, he was hiding from you, living
under his cap, today this kid doesn’t wear a cap, if he puts it on, he
wears it differently, so a lot has changed in that boy’s life. (Focus
group with staff/project motivators, Fortaleza-CE)
Because I never did capoeira, theatre, steel band, nothing, when the
teacher asked me to show my posters I was embarrassed, but now that
I’m taking theatre I feel fine, I’m not embarrassed anymore about
showing my posters. I used to die of embarrassment and just laugh.
(Focus group with youths, Fortaleza-CE)
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4.3.2 Comunicação e Cultura (Communication and
Culture)
1)
Name of Organization
Comunicação e Cultura (Communication and Culture)
2)
Date of Foundation
1987
3)
City/State
Fortaleza/CE
4)
Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5)
Name of the Analyzed Project
Projeto Clube do Jornal (Newspaper Club Project)
6)
a)
b)
c)
d)
Contact
Daniel Gerardo Raviolo
Function: Executive President
Telephone: (85) 231-6092
e-mail: [email protected]
7)
Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
Municipal and state public schools in 24 municipalities in the
State of Ceará.
8)
Funding Sources
In accordance with the 2000 budget, 41.3% of the resources
received by Communication and Culture come from
international cooperation agencies, 38.8% from national
institutions, and 14.7% from Brazilian government agencies.
The remaining 5.3% come from individual donations.
9)
Areas of Activity
Education and culture – communication
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10) Objectives
The project aims at producing information (creating and producing
school newspapers), with four clearly marked finalities:
Critically analyze communication media and act to transform its
social reality;
Complement school activities;
Prepare for work,
Broaden opportunities for personal growth based on experiences
with education for values and the exercise of citizenship.
11) Target Public
The target public of the project is adolescents, with the majority in
the 12 to 18 –year-old age group. The project directly benefits
1,300 youths that act as multipliers, and indirectly serves 160
thousand youths. The student editors belong to clubs in the schools
and they remain in the project for some time. Generally, they
begin to participate when they are in sixth or seventh grade and
they spend between three to five years in the project.
12) Description and Background
The Newspaper Club trains youths and adolescents for the publication
of newspapers in the schools and in other learning environments they attend.
The interested youths form clubs. The youth newspapers are printed by
Communication and Culture, with offset quality. The agency also coordinates
fundraising activities for the school newspaper pool.
At the end of the year 2000, there were 111 clubs operating in the State
of Ceará, with over 1,300 youths participating. That year they published 311
editions of newspapers with over 350 thousand printed.
Communication and Culture is an NGO that was founded in 1987, with
the mission of making possible the publication of popular newspapers in
Fortaleza and the Metropolitan Region (State of Ceará). After a participatory
survey, the agency created the Associated Community Newspapers Project.
Methodologies that are still applied today were initially rehearsed in this
project. A good portion of these publications, if not most of them , are edited
by the youths.
The NGO receives many requests for support from the public schools.
These requests come from the teachers and the students. In 1994,
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partnerships were formed that allowed for the creation of the Newspaper
Club Project, which originated with the goal of benefiting the entire public
school network.
The project’s principal objective is to train youths to be critical and
conscious of their citizenship in order for them to instigate actions that
contribute to social and political development, beginning in their schools and
communities and reaching society as a whole.
The main idea is to create an activity in the schools and other learning
spaces where the youths can realize that their social participation signifies a
change in their set of cultural references and their vision of the world. By
participating as a protagonist, the youth has the chance to exercise his or her
citizenship through using communication. This also serves as a way to raise
their self-esteem and their school performance.
In addition to this, the project allows the youths to adopt a critical attitude
in relation to the media, which is mainly responsible for the training of their
mentalities and for the consensus that exists in contemporary society.
13) Personnel
The Communication and Culture team is multidisciplinary (sociologists,
psychologists, social assistants, sexologists, journalists, and administrators).
Preferably, people with training within the human sciences areas work in
the project. The staff is responsible for the management of a wide variety of
projects carried out by the agency, in addition to training a team of workstudy individuals that act directly with the schools.
There is a “teacher-facilitator” in the schools. This professional has
the role of serving as a liaison between the school and Communication and
Culture. In addition to this, the teacher-facilitator deals with the problems
faced by the newspapers in each school on a daily basis. Generally, the
teacher-facilitator is the Portuguese teacher in the school. This teacher is
paid nothing extra for the work and has no formal job connection with
Communication and Culture.
The agency works with some work-study participants that are
preferably from the psychology department. In the project they receive
the name “pedagogical assistants”. These work-study individuals are
responsible for attending the clubs regularly in order to make a diagnosis
of the project’s development in each school. In addition to these individuals,
there is a group of youths that participate in the project by acting in the
institution as scholarship students or apprentices, developing secretarial,
editing, and data input activities.
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The selection of new professionals to work in Communication and
Culture is performed through announcements in newspapers and in the NGOs
of Fortaleza. The profile of the candidate is analyzed based on professional
curriculum vitae and a personal interview.
For the work-study individuals, an announcement is made at the
universities and the candidates are interviewed in the Communication and
Culture headquarters. New work-study groups are opened each year. The
scholarship students or apprentices are selected by a specialist team, based
on the wide knowledge that the institution has on the profile of the youths.
In terms of training, the work-study individuals that accompany the
newspapers in the schools receive specific training in order to carry out
their work. According to the coordinators, the training of the work study
individuals is performed in an intensive way and counts on the accompaniment
of the coordinator of this team, a psychologist.
In terms of ties professionals have with the institution, the specialists,
the middle staff, work-study individuals, and scholarship students receive
payment from Communication and Culture. Specialists and middle staff work
40 hours a week. Work-study individuals work 20 hours, and scholarship
students or apprentices work 30 hours. This last group dedicates part of
their time to specific training and qualification.
14) Ongoing Programs and Projects
Newspaper Club Project: This project promotes youth organization
through the Newspaper Club created in each school. The clubs are open for
participation by all interested adolescents. Each club publishes its own
newspaper, with offset quality and monthly circulation. The youths are
autonomous in terms of choosing and editing stories, the visual format of the
newspaper, forms of distribution, number of pages, etc. The student
newspapers are printed at the print shop of the Communication and Culture
project. To reinforce the autonomy of the youths and to improve the quality
of the newspapers, the agency holds courses in a wide variety of areas
(communication, leadership, gender and reproductive health, human rights,
and electronic editing) and Exchange of Experiences Encounters among the
editors of the publications.
First Letters Project: In 1995, teachers from a community school in
Fortaleza solicited the agency’s support to edit a newspaper based on activities
developed in the classroom with students from the first to fourth grades.
This was the beginning of the experience that became the First Letters
Project. The project allows for the publication of newspapers edited by
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teachers from the first to sixth grades and accelerated classes with texts
and drawings from students. The newspapers, which circulate within and
outside of the school, serve as tools to make classes dynamic and to socially
valorize the written word. The publications are prepared in the school and
are sent to the Communication and Culture headquarters, where they are
then printed. Each school pays a symbolic contribution for the printing costs
(R$10 for 500 four-page newspapers).
Equal to Equal Project: The Equal to Equal project has the aim of
promoting a new view of gender in addition to the adoption of safe sex
practices in order to prevent teenage pregnancy, STDs, and AIDS. The
youths that take part in the project participate in the development of student
and community newspapers, writing on these themes that are so pertinent
for the adolescent. The project participants also participate in events, hold
workshops for their classmates, and make campaigns with posters, video
productions, etc. This “social mobilization for education among peers” uses
the basic principle of youth protagonism and autonomy.
Due to the broad reach of the work developed by Communication and
Culture, and in order to guarantee an in-depth characterization of one among
many activities, this survey used the experience of the Newspaper Club
project as its main tool.
15) Methodology
Initially 20 schools took part in the project. Today there are 111.
According to the coordinators, there is no extensive announcement of the
project and most of the advertising occurs from one school to another.
The project is implanted only in elementary or secondary schools that
are dependents of the Secretariat of Basic Education of Ceará through a
partnership signed with CREDES (Regional Centers for Teaching
Development). The second requirement is that the school should have a
sufficient number of students for the development of the club (at least 300
students above the age of 12). At times the project is also implanted in other
learning spaces (NGOs, Community Centers, etc.) Each year, the
Communication and Culture coordinators receive new requests for
membership. However, only schools that meet the selection requirements
may join.
Since its beginning, the Newspaper Club has undergone modifications.
According to the coordinators, these changes have had the aim of improving
the project and refining the way the activities are carried out. In the beginning
of the project, agency contact with the school took place through systematic
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visits. However, beginning in 1999, Communication and Culture has trained
the student-editors through the implantation of the Communication and Social Mobilization course.
Another change is in regard to the teacher who accompanies the
newspaper students within the schools. At first, this teacher, or facilitator,
acted alone. Today, there are numerous teachers that take on the role of
facilitators within the school. Generally, the teacher-facilitators are the
Portuguese teachers at the schools, although there are some exceptions.
Specifically in relation to the Newspaper Club, the project functions in
the following way: a club is organized in each school with students interested
in producing a school newspaper. All students are invited to collaborate on
the newspaper, whether by writing stories, sending drawings, or messages.
The participation is free, but before joining as effective members, the youths
must take place in training that consists of four workshops of introduction to
youth journalism. The members of the club are entirely responsible for the
publication of the newspaper.
The clubs have two positions that must be fulfilled: treasurer and ethics
moderator. The person responsible for this last function is the one that sees
to it that all newspaper stories respect the Ethics Code of the project.
The students hold a story meeting where the content that should be
part of the next edition is established. After this meeting, the youths begin to
produce the stories. After a sufficient number of stories are ready, a new
meeting is held where a selection process is made. At this time, other
“collaborations” made by non-member students or teachers are considered.
This selection is based on content criteria established in the story meeting
and should be a consensus among the club participants. This is when drawings
and illustrations are chosen as well.
In some schools, the teacher-facilitators help organize the stories, in
addition to correcting grammar before definitive input. The newspaper is
then input (computer or typewriter), set in layout (on special paper supplied
by Communication and Culture; some clubs supply the newspaper in already
electronically edited form), and sent to the NGO print shop.
According to the coordinators, the Communication and Social
Mobilization Course offered multidisciplinary training to 801 youth newspaper
editors in 2000. The course offered a total of 736 workshops and has a
flexible format with “free” activities that the youths attend in the rhythm
that they set up themselves. The youths can receive up to a total of 150
class hours per year. The course changed the way it accompanies the project.
Before, this accompaniment focused on directly serving the clubs in the
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schools. This process was developed in the Communication and Culture
headquarters and five classrooms were set up there.
In addition to the class, Communication and Culture offered training in
the areas of visual programming, electronic editing, and illustration for 51
youths. The project also developed a course in leadership for 149 youths.
During the year 2000, nine Exchange of Experiences Encounters were
organized among the editors with the participation of over 400 students in
each one.
In relation to monitoring the youths that go through the project, the
adolescents that conclude their studies and finish school are invited to
participate in the Those that Leave the Program Project. This allows the
youth to stay involved with the project without being a part of any club.
Currently, this program has six youths. For the year 2001, the expectation is
to serve 18 youths in this program.
16) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
Communication and Culture was the winner of the 1999 Itau-UNICEF
prize in the Education and Participation category. This prize is awarded to
non-governmental organizations that reach high distinction in their area of
activity.
In addition to this, Communication and Culture participates in various
regional and national alliances through participation in forums and Third Sector
organizations.
Sharing of methodology has not yet taken place with other institutions.
According to coordinators, this is because the methodology and content are
still in a process of systematization.
Communication and Culture establishes partnerships and experience
exchanges with other similar organizations. It is an effective member of
ABONG and participates in the following alliances: the Cearense Forum
for the Rights of the Child and the Adolescent (DCA Forum), the
Cearense Forum of NGOS that work on the prevention of AIDS (AIDS
Forum), the Education Network for Communication, and the Professional
Training Network.
As in the community, contact is made through the circulation of the
school newspapers. In addition to this, the youths are encouraged to seek
partnerships with local shops and businesses in the area surrounding the
schools in order to increase distribution of the newspaper. According to the
coordinators, the newspapers are read by the parents and are also distributed
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by the supporters that advertise their companies. This publicity has a very
low cost, as the contribution that must be given by the youths for printing
costs is merely symbolic.
The project maintains a firm partnership with CREDES. The
schools where the Newspaper Club will be implanted are selected
through this partnership. The coordinators state that this partnership is
extremely important for the success of the project, as it makes the
clubs possible and counts on the support of the principles and the
teachers.
In addition to this, Communication and Culture works with the
Secretariat of Health of Ceará in a specific program on STD and AIDS.
Among the principal partners of Communication and Culture, the
following are cited: UNICEF; Secretariat of Basic Education of Ceará;
Secretariat of Health of Ceará (STD/AIDS Coordination); Secretariat of
Culture and Sports of Ceará; Municipal Secretariat of Social Development
(STD/AIDS Coordination); Ayrton Senna Institute; C&A Institute for Social Development; Abrinq Foundation for the Rights of the Child; Pommar/
Partners of America (USAID); MacArthur Foundation; COMDICA;
AVINA; Natura Cosmetics; BNDES; Banco do Nordeste; Tintas Hidracor;
Lojas Americanas; Coelce; Ashoka; Alternative College Entrance Exam
Preparation Course (PVA), and the State Law to Encourage Culture
(PRONAC).
17) Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
The NGO Communication and Culture headquarters are located in the
center of the city of Fortaleza. The agency occupies two floors of the building
and the workshops and project activities are developed in this space. The
print shop is installed in an annex.
According to the coordinators, the NGO evaluates its activities and
projects in a participatory fashion. A survey was developed to this end in
1999 and the youths and the educators answered 1,170 questionnaires. This
survey sought to evaluate the effects of the projects on the youths, within
the schools, and on the communities.
For the students who participated in the training administered by the
agency, an annual qualitative survey is performed that monitors the following
indicators: sociability, group participation, oral performance, written expression,
and the capacity to develop a social program.
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18) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Although it is performed within the school, generally the newspaper
work is not taken advantage of by the teachers. The project counts on
the teacher-facilitators but has not yet managed to develop a pedagogical
tool capable of working with the completed newspaper with the other
students. This is demonstrated in the following testimony:
I’m the Portuguese teacher, and whenever the newspaper arrives in
the classroom, they read it, but I’m really going to be sincere here
because I’ve never used one story and I know they all read it. There
are a lot of little messages in there and they pour over those messages
to see who sent what to whom, but I’ve never used one story from the
newspaper. But next time I’m going to work with the newspaper better
because sometimes it just doesn’t even occur to me. It’s there, and
that’s it. (Focus group with community, Fortaleza/CE)
· The content of some of the stories can cause a certain discomfort
among the school principals or teachers. In order to turn this situation
around, the agency created an ethics code that is distributed to the
editors of the school newspapers. However, many times this ethics
code is not respected by the students or the school administration is
intolerant of the criticism that it receives from the students:
There’s this problem on my newspaper too. Our newspaper spent a
week and a half in the principal’s office because of one story. It didn’t
completely criticize the principal’s office, it was just because the
teachers really bugged us. For example, the guy has a complaint, and
so they say: ‘You’re a newspaper kid. You just got an average grade,
you’re a newspaper kid, you have to be an example for the others.’ I
think that when you’re on the newspaper you have to do your job. It’s
not because you’re on the newspaper that you have to be a brain and
get good grades all the time. I think that the teachers are wrong too.
I’m not against them, but even though the newspaper doesn’t teach
school subjects, I think that they should just leave us alone a little and
talk to us in another way. The principal’s office really watches us. Our
newspaper was stopped because of this story, this type of thing
happening. (Focus group with youths, Fortaleza/CE)
· Some newspapers print poor material. This means that instead of
offering space to informative stories and editorials, they give space
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to the personal ads and gossip. This causes a problem between the
club, students, and teachers:
The majority of the kids that study in school send these little
messages. The message page is always full. Stories, just one or two.
We don’t really know what messages to put in. We put them on the
newspaper bulletin board, we put them in the graphic newspaper
and there are still messages leftover. We get a lot of criticism for
this, that we don’t put in all the little messages. But what are we
supposed to do? Put the whole newspaper just full of messages? So
we’ve got to put in some stories. And then they complain that it’s
only our stuff that comes out in the newspaper. I really don’t know
what they want! They’ve already torn up the newspaper right in my
face because of this and I don’t understand what it is they want.
(Focus group with youths, Fortaleza/CE)
Some teachers take a position against the newspaper. This generally
happens when the students make some complaint or criticism of the teacher’s
action in the classroom or of the way they present the subject. This creates
an uncomfortable situation where the youths are humiliated and intimidated.
This can be seen in the following statements:
This issue of them demanding more of us because we’re part of the
newspaper is really huge. One time I got a low grade and my teacher
threatened me. If I didn’t get a good grade, she was going to show it to
the pedagogical director and she was going to take me off the
newspaper. She threatened me twice. Because when you’re on the
newspaper, you’re like this public person in the school, you know?
Everyone knows who’s on the paper, at least it’s like that at my school.
So she wants to stick it in your face, you know? When you get a low
grade. I think it’s horrible, so I try to study. I think she’s doing what she
has to, but she shouldn’t have said it like that, ok? That she was going
to get me taken off the newspaper? Take my dream away from me?
Even if she had gotten me taken off, I wasn’t going to give up, I was
going to keep on going right to the end. (Focus group with youths,
Fortaleza/CE)
A lot of teachers think that just because you’re participating in an extra
activity, you have to know everything about everything! One time this
Math teacher got the school newspaper and he said there was this
mistake in the Portuguese. One mistake! So he tore up the newspaper,
right there in my class, in front of all the students. We were there working
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on this project and he tore up the newspaper and said it was a piece of
junk! When the next newspaper came out, I wrote a story about it. He
said he was going to sue me. So I said ‘Go ahead and sue me!’ But he
didn’t have any rights. Because it’s like this, like all the teachers do
when there’s something wrong, something they don’t like, they come
up to us and say ‘Hey, you guys can do a better job on this.’ But not
him, no way. He had this completely bad attitude, unethical really. Why
can’t he just come up to the students and explain how it is? No way! I
think the easiest way he found to criticize was in this destructive way.
It didn’t do a thing to improve student development. (Focus group with
youths, Fortaleza/CE)
19) Why is it an innovative experience?
In general, the evaluations of the project are positive among those
interviewed. This can be seen in the following reports.
I think [the Newspaper Club] is excellent. I really encourage my kid
because he learns a lot. The people at Communication and Culture
are really cool, they’re dedicated people that know how to deal with
teenagers. My son learned a lot with them. He comes home saying
really good things about Communication and Culture. He never
complained about anything. They always treated him well. I know
that something’s going to stay with him for his future, these leadership
classes, these classes that they have there. (Focus group with mothers,
Fortaleza/CE)
· The teachers that are partners in the project think that the Newspaper
Club is positive for learning extracurricular subjects and also believe
that the club contributes to improving the youths’ language and
expression.
When you do a project in class, it’s really well received. The kids
always like to use some of the articles to work with. They like it
when the paper’s delivered in the classroom and I always get an
article to work with. First, some pages, and there are so many
things to choose from, there’s so much productivity, that I give
them some time to really look at the newspaper. Now, for example,
when I tell them that they just write any old way, and this isn’t just
for the newspaper, this is a lack of valuing things that they have.
Because they could really get a lot more out of this work and I
always tell them to take it home and show their parents that
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they’ve got this quality newspaper made by the kids at the school.
It’s like a newspaper you could buy at a newsstand. It’s a cool
newspaper and they like to see their little personals, their
messages, the articles they write. It’s interesting. We even talk
about the financial part. They’re responsible, they collect the
money and they have to account for how it’s used. (Focus group
with community, Fortaleza/CE)
· Communication and Culture uses the power of communication as a
way of improving self-esteem and allowing the youth to feel socially
included. In the following report, some of those interviewed express
their opinion on the use of art, culture, and communication as a tool
for including the youths.
Art and sports, because sometimes in a needy community, the child has
talent and doesn’t even know it. Sometimes it’s painting, sometimes
it’s theatre, and with encouragement like this they can get those talents
out there. At least for my kids, they play flute and we just start to cry
when they’re playing. (Focus group with mothers, Fortaleza/CE)
20) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
The project works with language (oral and written), with personal
expression, and with basic concepts (education, citizenship, sexuality) that
are present in the youths’ lives. Due to the fact that the project functions
within the school, the project makes it possible for the youths to position
themselves in a critical position in school, in society, and in the family
(reference points for the youths’ values).
· According to the report of the pedagogical director, the project
presents an opportunity for the youth to do something different inside
the school.
I think Communication and Culture comes to them as an opportunity.
We’re not the solution, we’re not doing anything miraculous, but we
come in as an opportunity and the teenager that realizes this gets the
opportunity. I think it’s really cool to open up this window of access
for the future. We work with information, with citizenship, we work on
these key issues so they can find a little affirmation and later on they
can accomplish something in their lives. (Interview with Monitoring
Director, Fortaleza/CE)
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· The principal changes observed in the youths by all those interviewed
are in respect to posture and behavior. The youths take on a different
attitude. They start to valorize school and learning. They become
more aware of themes of debate on society. Finally, they possess
more tools for their actualization as citizens.
I’ve noticed that they start being more aware, because the stories they
get together are really good stories. They talk about everything, about
religion, politics, sex, health, those little messages, everything. And
even when they’re typing it in, they start to be more aware. It changes
them, it does. They are great kids, excellent. They’re well behaved. I’m
really proud of them! (Focus group with mothers/fathers/guardians,
Fortaleza/CE)
· In the following report, a mother compares the youths that are part
of the Newspaper Club with those that are not. According to her,
there is a clear difference between them.
For example, most of the kids that were part of the newspaper group
and gave up on it, they gave up the classes too, and today they don’t
do anything. They just hang around on the sidewalk, making a mess,
up to no good for themselves or anyone else. My kids don’t like that.
They don’t hang around with those kids because of things like that,
getting into trouble, just to play ball. After my kids got on the
newspaper they improved a lot, they really did. (Focus group with
mothers/fathers/guardians, Fortaleza/CE)
· Many teachers recognize the work done in the club and they notice
that the youths that participate change their attitude and become
more disciplined in the classroom.
You see the difference. They get involved with the newspaper and you
notice the change in the students. I’m a seventh grade teacher and
when the kids in the eighth grade are part of the project you can see
the difference. They’re more responsible. They’re better in class. They
participate more. They talk better. They’re more creative. They’re really
more responsible. You can tell just by looking at them. Imagine, for
those of us that see them everyday, for the teachers, you can really tell.
(Focus group with female community, Fortaleza/CE)
· The youths that participate in the Newspaper Club see themselves
as different from their classmates. They become “celebrities” in their
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schools. They begin to see themselves as a leadership group that is
responsible for showing an example to others. This can be confirmed
in the following report:
Why are we seen as an example? Because we are not unknown. We’re
different in the school, because not every student puts out a newspaper.
This is still a new thing. So, it’s like this, you’re in there working for
things, you’re a leader, you’re putting out a newspaper, and a lot more
is usually asked of you. So, whoever is on the newspaper has to know
how to deal with these responsibilities. When you realize that people
are saying ‘Oh, you’re on the newspaper? You’ve got to be the best
student. You’ve got to be the most intelligent, the most interested.’ It’s
not because we do something extra or different or more interesting that
makes us different from the other students. Nobody’s perfect. Everyone
has the right to do something wrong, to get a bad grade. Not that this is
anything good, but it happens. It’s something that happens one way or
another. You can’t just say that you’ll be a good student, an example,
forever! One day you’re going to fall, but then you’re going to get up
and show that you can do it. The newspaper is really good for this. It
gives you character. You don’t just work with questions, you work with
responsibility too. (Focus group with youths, Fortaleza/CE)
· The project contributed to expanding the youths’ perceptions of their
own lives. It gave them a new viewpoint and a new world.
It changed everything! I think that the only thing I was interested in
was my schoolwork. Nothing else mattered to me. I think that the only
thing that was important to me was school and that was it. Then, after
I started working on the newspaper I started to realize that life wasn’t
like that. You can learn a lot in other courses, in other places. It’s not
just school. I got really involved with this and I’ve been on the
newspaper for almost a year and three months now. (Focus group with
youths, Fortaleza/CE)
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4.3.3 Escola de Dança e de Integração Social para a
Criança e Adolescente - EDISCA
(School of Dance and Social Integration for the Child
and Adolescent – EDISCA)
1)
Name of Organization
Escola de Dança e de Integração Social para a Criança e Adolescente EDISCA
(School of Dance and Social Integration for the Child and Adolescent –
EDISCA)
2)
Date of Foundation
1993
3)
City/State
Fortaleza/CE
4)
Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5)
a)
b)
c)
d)
Contact
Dora Andrade
Function: General Director
telephone: (85) 278-1515
e-mail: [email protected]
6)
Sites Where Activities Are Carried Out
All of the activities are carried out in EDISCA headquarters, in the
neighborhood of Água Fria, in Fortaleza.
7)
Funding Sources
Ayrton Senna Institute, UNESCO, POMMAR/PARTNERS/USAID,
BNDES, C&A Institute of Social Development, COMDICA, and the State
Government of Ceara.
8)
Areas of Activity
Art and Culture – ballet and dance
9)
Objectives
To place art in the center of an educational action for life, focusing on
creating new opportunities for children and adolescents in low-income
areas.
To make access to a wide variety of artistic languages available to the
target public in an educational process, in the search of transforming their
perspectives on life, their families, and their communities.
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To prepare low-income youths for the working world, creating
opportunities for them to begin to dominate the codes of modernity and
to develop their wide-ranging intelligence in a harmonious fashion.
To develop programs on nutrition and health integrated in a broad action
of fortifying the formal school, with the intention of providing the necessary
means for the total development of the served children and adolescents.
To utilize dance and other artistic languages as tools to solidify and
spread their consciousness of citizenship, especially with the public that
their project is directed at.
10) Target Public
Children and adolescents of both sexes in the 7 to 18 years of age group
from the most problematic peripheries of Fortaleza (areas with violence,
drugs, and prostitution).
11) Description and Background
EDISCA is a non-governmental organization that works with children
and youths from low-income areas. Art, dance in particular, is utilized as a
privileged pedagogic means for education for life, searching to redeem the
dignity of those involved and to construct citizenship.
In terms of internal organization, EDISCA is divided into four director’s
parts (administration, artistic, heritage, and activities), with one general
director. In addition to this, there is also a consulting board composed of five
members that meet at irregular intervals.
Before EDISCA became an NGO, the individual who created the
project worked with a semi-professional dance group that had the
opportunity of running for a project of national scope titled “Consolidation
of Permanent Groups”. After this project was approved, the financing
agency was closed. The same proposal was then taken to the State
Government of Ceara and was accepted. In addition to maintaining the
dance group’s production, another project with 50 children from the Morro Sta. Terezinha neighborhood was initiated in a complementary action.
According to a government survey, this neighborhood was indicated as
one of the main areas of risk in Fortaleza.
With the passage of time, the project became completely directed at
children and youths. In February 1993, EDISCA became a non-governmental
organization.
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The initial proposal of the agency was to resolve low self-esteem
problems in children from low-income areas, in addition to problems of school
age/grade displacement. As secondary objectives, EDISCA sought to act in
the prevention of malnutrition and illnesses that result from lack of basic
sanitation and hygiene, going even further to combat the stunted height that
occurs in youths from the region.
In its ten years of operation, EDISCA has already served 900 children
and adolescents. This number includes the current total (approximately
344). According to the coordinators, this public has a very low turnover
and the average stay in the agency is three or four years. Currently, the
agency attends 344 children and adolescents with work in the following
areas: nutrition and health, art education, and strengthening the formal
school/working world.
12) Personnel
EDISCA staff members include the widest variety of training. What
they have in common is that they all share a deep commitment to working
with the children and youths. In the artistic area, the project motivators are
people with experience in dance, theatre, singing, and other similar artistic
activities. Currently, some students and ex-students from EDISCA are
monitors and give dance classes.
There is a selection process for hiring new staff members. After a
work-study period, the staff person moves on to become a fixed part of the
organization. All professionals are required to have a huge social commitment
along with a desire to work with children and youths. Another characteristic
of the EDISCA staff is that they have multiple talents, and they act as
volunteers in different areas of the agency’s work.
No specific training or qualification is made to work with the youths.
The educators state that they learn from their day to day on- the-job
experience. However, the selection process favors people with experience
in the area. This brings the consequence of allowing all of the educators to
contribute in some way to the training of the others.
EDISCA is preoccupied with training of the technical team. In order to
accomplish this, frequent lectures with specialists and training courses take
place. It can be seen that EDISCA is structured with a methodology
constructed through daily experience. Lessons learned are incorporated into
the working style of the project. In this way the institution remains in a
constant refinement process.
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The entire EDISCA professional team is hired, but there is volunteer
work as well. The volunteers have a wide range of training, from librarians
to psychologists. In addition to this, the C&A Institute (EDISCA’s partner)
sends store employees to act as volunteers in the agency. These volunteers
receive incentive from their workplace (the store) to become linked to the
social project. These incentives range from more flexible working hours to
counting hours spent at EDISCA as working hours.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
EDISCA offers the youths a large number of activities linked to art
and culture. Ballet is the most sought after activity, followed by choir, fine
arts, and theatre.
Aside from dance, EDISCA works on education that complements
formal schooling. According to the coordinators, it is important that the
students and their families understand the importance of instruction as a
base for any kind of artistic expression.
The activities are developed at times that are complementary to school
hours. Besides the truly artistic activities (dance, theatre, fine arts, choir),
activities with a complementary educational nature are also offered (afterschool tutoring, reading programs, library) in addition to training activities
(computer lab, English and Spanish classes).
There is no time limit for how long the youth can stay at EDISCA.
Generally, the children join at 7 or 8 years of age and there are students over
18 who still participate. Within ballet, there is the Formal Dance Group,
where youths are trained for presentations. These youths have the largest
number of activities, including rehearsals on Saturdays. They receive a grant
for participating in the group.
Other activities accompany the formal school calendar. The average
duration of each course varies from between six months to a year.
14) Methodology
EDISCA only accepts students that are enrolled in the formal school
system. Report cards are checked periodically to verify that students are
attending classes regularly.
As the dance project developed, the EDISCA founders felt it necessary
to create other programs to continue the project of development of the
beneficiaries. The first program complementary to dance was nutrition. This
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program took a long time to develop, as there were difficulties in finding a
financial partner when the program was only on paper.
With the evolution of artistic products (dance presentations), the agency
began to take on fundraising. This, in addition to other positive results, made
negotiations with possible supporters easier.
EDISCA works in three large areas: health, education, and art.
In the health area, attending to the children takes place in the following
areas: pediatrics, psychology-pedagogy, gynecology, trauma, orthopedics,
ophthalmology, and dentistry. A pediatrician works in the agency along with
a psychologist and a nursing aide. This program takes place in partnership
with the State Secretariat of Health, the Albert Sabin Hospital, universities,
and some private clinics in Fortaleza. Medical service also includes some
exams, surgery, and medication when necessary. In addition to attending,
the professionals also develop work on sexual education involving the
adolescents and their family members.
In the area of education, the agency executes a program of fortifying
formal schooling. This program ranges from literacy training to preparation
courses for the college entrance exam. A computer lab, educational computer
science, and a library with over four thousand titles strengthen these actions.
The principal area of the work developed by EDISCA is art. At the
heart of this project is the belief that education for life through art is the most
innovative and efficient way of awakening the children and youths’ potential.
The presentations (ballet) that EDISCA produces were presented in the
main Brazilian capitals and in Europe (Italy and France).
In teaching dance, the EDISCA professionals use a wide variety of
methodologies. The combination of classical ballet and contemporary dance
gives a wider perspective of training to the dancers.
Games and playful activities are also utilized, above all in the classes
for the younger children (7 to 9 years old). This is done with the intention of
broadening the assimilation of the necessary techniques through playful
activities. EDISCA always seeks a more informal way of passing on the
learning, believing this to be the way that the students are able to get the
technique within their own world of references.
EDISCA works with a limited number of vacancies and the selection
process for new children is very competitive. Each year 50 spaces are open
and over 700 children participate in the selection process. The criteria of the
school are based on artistic talent. This means that children who demonstrate
a predisposition for art, particularly for dance, are given preference for
acceptance in EDISCA. Another selection criterion is the socio-economic
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situation of the family. The worse it is on the distribution of wealth scale, the
greater the chances are of the child entering EDISCA.
For the selection of new students, EDISCA created an outline of the
social profile of the most appropriate students for participation in the project.
This occurred taking the student’s socio-economic situation into account.
There are four pre-requisites: a) proven need of material resources; b)
belonging to one of the four attended communities; c) being between 6 and
12 years of age, and d) proven enrollment in the formal school system.
After fulfilling these requirements, the children audition and the following
items are tested: musicality, flexibility, motor coordination, and discipline. Children
that are approved in the audition then take part in an experience within the
project. At this time, the project motivators make a home visit and interview the
family. A survey on the living conditions of the family is filled out.
A series of reports describing the selection process and the excitement
of entering EDISCA follows:
I had to do the audition three times to pass, because it was really
hard. I didn’t cry, I just got nervous. One time I even gave up, I’m not
going to do the audition, I’m not going to pass. And then when it was
time my friends came and I just went along and went with them. And
then I got in, but my friends didn’t. (Focus group with youths, Fortaleza/
CE)
[...] her dream was to get into EDISCA here. It was all she talked
about. We would come on the bus and she would get all silly, looking
at those girls who were all neat. Then she started asking when the test
was going to be, what it was like, she kept approaching the girls and
asking, asking questions. Then she went to do the audition, she stayed
in line, it was really raining that day and I put her underneath the
umbrella, I held the umbrella over her there, that little girl on my arm,
and that was the day she got in, us standing in that line [...] When she
came down the stairs she did this and smiled, and I just knew that she
got in, that’s when she came down, and she grabbed me: Mom, I got in.
I said: Thank God! And everybody was around, some were crying,
some were really happy. That’s how she got into EDISCA. (Focus group
with mothers/fathers/guardians, Fortaleza/CE):
[...] Today EDISCA is so well known, everybody’s paying attention,
the minute the news is out, everyone spreads it, the whole neighborhood
know, so it’s really common for us to hold auditions for 50 spaces and
have 700 children show up. It’s just crazy for us to have to choose, to
select, if we could we would take all of them, but we can’t take them all
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because we don’t have the physical space or the economic means to
absorb this demand. So we make our selection based on artistic talent
demonstrated in small workshops because the central element is art,
so the selection is based on art, artistic talents and the other parameter
is the socio-economic situation of the families. (Interview with artistic
director, Fortaleza/CE).
Currently, EDISCA does not have a program that tracks the youths
that leave the project. There is a process of temporary leave, allowing the
youth to rejoin the institution.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
EDISCA has links on a wide variety of levels with other NGOs, the
community, the government, and with international organizations. EDISCA
also takes part in networks of organizations from the third sector such as the
Brazilian Association of Non-governmental Organizations – ABONG and
the Ceara Network of Art Educators.
According to its directors, EDISCA does not propose the reproduction
of its model. Instead, it proposes the exchange of experiences, pedagogical
methods, and produced material. They argue that each institution should
work within the reality that it is part of, in accordance with the necessities of
its clientele. It does not need to be attached to a pre-established model.
With the support of POMMAR, one of its partners, EDISCA launched
a kit to pass on their methodology with a brochure and a video as well as
workshops that were carried out by its members. The written material was
didactic and beautifully illustrated. It is an effective tool for organizations
that are beginning to work with youths.
In the program Education for Family Life, interaction with the served
communities is promoted through periodic meetings at EDISCA with the
students’ families. These meetings can be of two types: a monthly macromeeting for all parents and smaller meetings where some groups emerge,
for example Life Wise. The main characteristic of this group is the high level
of resilience among its members, who serve as examples for the entire
community. There are also groups for exchanging knowledge that end up
extending new abilities to the families. In addition to the meetings, it is not
uncommon for circle meetings to occur among women of a wide range of
ages, talking about EDISCA’s presence in the community, the possibilities of
increasing service, questions related to education for family life, neighborhood
problems, and the importance of political consciousness.
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The organization seeks to establish links with the communities where it
acts as well. This is accomplished through the schools and resident
associations. According to the project motivators’ report, it’s common for
EDISCA to lend costumes from their performances so that the youths can
use them in community and school events that the EDISCA students usually
organize and choreograph themselves.
The schools also try to be flexible when one of the girls has to travel
for a presentation. According to the report of one school principal, the
EDISCA girls are good students and they have a different bearing than the
others. The principal also recognizes the work that EDISCA does in
complementary learning for formal education. The principal gives support to
this kind of initiative.
Among the principal partners of the institution are: Ayrton Senna
Institute, Embratel, POMMAR/PARTNERS/USAID, BNDES, UNESCO,
C&A Institute for Social Development, COMDICA, ASHOKA, The
Trevisan Global Solution, Fonteles & Associates S/C, and the State
Government of Ceara.
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
In addition to weekly meetings, the EDISCA team performs an in-depth
evaluation at the end of the year. This is an internal evaluation where specialists
and project motivators discuss results and propose actions for the following
year. These actions may undergo modifications during the project.
Occasionally, consultants are contracted to perform external evaluations.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
The following is a summary of the main problems brought up by the
individuals who provided information on the experience.
· Lack of resources to broaden current projects and initiate new
programs. According to the coordinators, there is a necessity for
increasing the service of some EDISCA programs owing to the huge
request for places. This would only be possible through direct
investments from a supporter. Currently, the organization cannot take
on the expenses that are generated in the opening of new classes.
· Insufficient number of staff members. According to the coordinators,
EDISCA suffers from a lack of staff members. The team is
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overburdened, as they must generally perform multiple functions and
work on the weekends. EDISCA contacted the Ceara Volunteer
Organization, but states that it is difficult to find qualified staff to
work within the project description.
· Working with the parents. According to the EDISCA coordination, it
is very difficult to mobilize the youths’ families. In spite of some
initiatives having already taken place, they have not yet had the
expected result.
In an evaluation with one of EDISCA’s partners, the experience
demonstrated positive results that can be quantified based on external
indicators. However, as in every large social project, there are obstacles to
be faced. In the words of one partner:
These are obstacles that are common in most, if not all social projects.
The biggest one is probably the question of sustainability of the
projects and the organizations themselves. Today, because of the lack
of external resources and the necessity maybe they’re going to have to
work more. This relationship between the State and civil society a lot
of times assumes power really soon, partly because of financial
capacity, or without a doubt it’s what I consider more in this area
today, because from the technical point of view you can see that the
institution is totally available. There’s an exchange of experience and
growth in technical contributions that are focused on the institution.
At every moment this perceptive group, we’ve got an extremely
respectful relationship, and there’s nothing subservient about it, there’s
really a lot of respect because this institution belongs to this level, the
partnership that we develop is of such a high level that it can really be
more and more improved all the time, allowing us to develop a project
that’s really very ethical in our relationships. Fortunately, with
EDISCA and the great majority of institutions we work with, this level
has been maintained. Now, the obstacles that exist, we try to look for
a solution with the institutions in the realm of what’s possible, or by
making other links and partnerships available, or by contributing
technically with work to minimize these difficulties, these obstacles.
(Interview with a partner institution, Fortaleza/CE)
· Prejudice on the part of the boys. Working with dance, particularly
with ballet, EDISCA is more attended by girls than by boys. However,
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the youths that attend talk about a lot of prejudice that surrounds their
taking part in a ballet project. The project motivators seek to work with
the boys especially, reinforcing their self-esteem even more. The
following are some youths’ reports about the prejudice concerning ballet.
When the boys start putting me down or when I put them down, they
start calling me: look at the ballerina, look at the EDISCA ballerina.
(Focus group with youths, Fortaleza/CE).
I ask [the boys], you want to get in or not, and they say: ‘but I’m not a
fag.’ (Focus group with youths, Fortaleza/CE)
My brother, when he was in EDISCA, he suffered from a lot of prejudice,
when he went by in the street they would all say: look at the ballerina,
look at the ballerina. (Focus group with youths, Fortaleza/CE)
18) Why is it an innovative experience?
In a general manner, the artistic activities developed in EDISCA are
very attractive to the target public and demonstrate themselves to be efficient
tools of education, using playful methods. In this way, the evaluations on
EDISCA’s work are extremely positive in all analyzed reports.
The project offers a broad range of activities such as cultural activities,
activities linked to formal schooling, and medical assistance. This is
considered extremely positive by all of the surveyed individuals.
· The management and methodology of the project greatly please the
investors. The transparent manner of the project and the care taken
in documenting everything indicates that the EDISCA organization is
creating an exemplary experience.
EDISCA’s work for us today is a reference work for being a project
within our framework of action. EDISCA fits perfectly, not just because
of the organizational question, it’s maybe one of the few nongovernmental organizations that have managed to develop an
administrative management model that is exemplary in terms of
technical and professional competence of the people that make up the
institution today. It’s a pedagogical model. (Interview with the partner
institution, Fortaleza/CE)
· EDISCA’s positive agenda is extremely efficient in working with the
youths’ self-esteem and developing youth protagonists.
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For the project motivators and for the director, art is the focal point
of EDISCA’s work. Art is seen as a means for transforming the lives of
the youths and a way of putting them on track for a change in the quality
of their lives.
The mothers and the youths also take on this discussion. They all
incorporate the idea that “art transforms.” This is a very interesting
characteristic of the project.
The following reports express this discussion in a very clear fashion.
I think it’s like this, if they get into a project like EDISCA they won’t
have time to do those things, then they aren’t going to care about that
stuff [drugs and prostitution] anymore. (Focus group with youths,
Fortaleza/CE).
I think [EDISCA] fights idleness. (Focus group with EDISCA specialists/
project motivators, Fortaleza/CE)
We believe you can only fight violence if you show the other side, it’s
good to be good. (Focus group with specialists/project motivators,
Fortaleza/CE)
There’s nothing better than teaching a child through dance. [...] So,
you get a glimpse of this enormous potential in this child and then you
start opening this child up to a whole new vision of this great big
world outside and you’re giving them this opportunity, beyond what
they’ve already experienced. For example, to keep studying and enroll
in a university, you’re giving them the opportunity to be a ballerina
someday. You’ve giving them the opportunity of being a ballet teacher
in the future. (Interview with partner institution, Fortaleza/CE)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
In all of the analyzed reports, we noticed that the youths who went through
EDISCA modified their behavior, their bearing, and their attitude. Beyond
these, other effects and perceptions make EDISCA a fascinating experience.
· Recognition on the part of the community in relation to the work
developed by EDISCA.
[...] you observe that the students who are from the project, you can
see that their behavior is different, they have this way of being different,
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more polite, so I think the project is a very positive project because
they work on something beyond the artistic part, the dance part. They
develop an ability but they work on education as well. The students
sometimes give presentations here. They take it on themselves, we just
give them an idea, they rehearse all by themselves without a teacher
nearby, they do the rehearsal, they put it on, they do the choreography,
so you can see that the ones at EDISCA, they’re getting this really
good training in the sense that they’re preparing this leadership spirit.
They have this instinctive dedication to what they’re doing, I see this.
You can see their behavior, they’re students who are more polite, more
dedicated to what they’re doing, they’re more attentive. (Interview
with community member, Fortaleza/CE)
· Lower rate of teenage pregnancy, according to the coordinator’s
report: in a universe of 800 students in the Project, only seven cases
were identified (0.88%). This proportion is lower than the verified
rate for youths that do not participate in the project (13.63%). It’s
noticeable in the data from PNAD 1999 that in a young female
population of 165,871 there were 22,612 young women between 15
and 19 years of age in the city of Fortaleza that had children.
· Reduction of cavities and anemia through the weekly application of
iron supplements and vitamins for the children and the youths.
· Training of dance teachers, leading to at least ten teenagers teaching
dance in dance academies or schools.
· Quality dance performances recognized and receiving prizes on a
national level. This brings the agency income through ticket sales,
with an average public of 827 people per performance and
approximately two presentations per month.
· According to the coordinators, there was a reduction in the rate of
repeating a grade in school, going from 12.2% to 1.7% among the
youths involved with EDISCA. Consequently, this brought about a
reduction in school age/grade displacement.
The rate of repeating a grade here at EDISCA is minimal. We’ve reached
zero on this for quite a few years. This doesn’t happen anywhere else,
does it? Not even in the private schools. We’ve managed a zero rate for
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repeating a grade. When it happens, we give the child a chance to
rehabilitate. And we’re really going to rehabilitate them good! If the
child doesn’t manage, they lose their place. (Interview with artistic
director, Fortaleza/CE).
· Increase in self-esteem. As a consequence, a change in relation to
the bearing and behavior of the child occurs, principally when the
child puts EDISCA in contrast with their own home.
Because here at EDISCA we get an education we don’t get at home. A
lot of people here don’t have a home. So there are a lot of street kids,
our friends really, they’re like really rude. It’s so different. You learn
such cool things here, you get such good manners, even if you get this
at home, at EDISCA you’re always learning to be polite and your
friends are all bad mannered, it’s really different. (Focus group with
youths, Fortaleza/CE).
When you get in EDISCA, you get this basic class that you don’t get at
home. At least I never got it. For my first class, I didn’t have dance
class. She started teaching discipline, how I should act when I was
visiting, how I should be when I was eating, how I should pick up my
fork, my knife. I learned all this here at EDISCA, stuff my mom never
taught me at home. (Focus group with youths, Fortaleza/CE).
[...] the little things they start asking from their family, one asked for
a soap that could just be hers, we give them this stuff, but they start
really requesting more assistance from the family in order to present
themselves more properly. (Focus group with specialists/project
motivators, Fortaleza/CE)
·
Improvement in school performance and greater interest in school.
[...]one time we had this party here, this talent show, and we went
around the classrooms asking who wanted to show off their talent.
This kid: Teacher, I want to show my talent, I’m going to say up there
on the stage that when I got here – he was learning how to read, in the
middle of the year when classes start up again – so, he said, teacher
let me read. The teacher: You can read. And she didn’t even pay
attention, thinking, sure, you can read. She was so used to the fact
that he didn’t know how to read, and then he started to read, and the
teacher’s crying, the teacher’s crying, and I thought that she had some
sort of problem. Teacher, what’s wrong? There’s nothing wrong, honey,
you’re reading. I’m going to take you to the principal. She got all
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emotional, because he was really proud saying this to everyone. (Focus
group with specialists/project motivators, Fortaleza/CE)
When I went to school, I really got into a lot of trouble. I was always
getting warnings, and then I got suspended because I broke a fan and
then I quieted down after that. Then I got here and I learned something.
(Focus group with youths, Fortaleza/CE)
I had a lot of trouble in school when I was going from fifth to sixth
grade, I spent the whole day at school. The teacher was always
pressuring me, because if I didn’t have anyone pressuring me I wasn’t
interested in school, doing homework, nothing. I was super
uninterested. I’m still that way a little bit in math, I’m not doing so
well, but in the other subjects I’m doing ok. (Focus group with youths,
Fortaleza/CE)
· According to the perception of those interviewed, the EDISCA
students are different from other children and youths in the community.
This perception is based on the responsibility (as a value) of the
youths.
If you make this comparison with the reality of the other kids who are
in the same formal school as she is, from the same neighborhood and
everything else and you talk with her teachers for example, you’re
going to see that they are going to say that the EDISCA people are
more dedicated, they’re more conscious, they have a higher
performance rate, they’re polite, they’re affectionate, they don’t cause
trouble. It just goes on from there. (Interview with artistic director,
Fortaleza/CE).
· Better family income for around 70 children and adolescents, through
the scholarship offered to the members of the Formal Dance Group.
According to the coordinators, this scholarship has added to the
acquisition power of the families.
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4.4 Maranhão
4.4.1 Circus School (Circo-Escola)
1)
Name of Organization
Fundação Municipal de Crianças e Assistência Social - FUMCAS
(Municipal Children’s and Social Assistance Foundation – FUMCAS)
2)
Date of Foundation
1998
3)
City/State
São Luis, MA
4)
Type of Organization
Public Municipal
5)
Name of the Analyzed Project
Circus School – Recreating Life (Circo Escola – Recriando a Vida)
6)
Contact
a) Margarete Cutrim Vieira
b) Function: Municipal Secretary
c) telephone: (98) 231-5662
d) e-mail: [email protected]
7)
Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
In São Luis, Maranhão
8)
Funding Sources
The Circus School project is almost completely financed with public
resources. The responsible foundation obtains resources from the
Federal Government through the National Social Assistance Fund;
the State of Maranhão through the State Fund for the Rights of the
Child and Adolescent; and from the Municipality of São Luis through
the Municipal Fund for the Rights of the Child and Adolescent.
In addition to this, part of the resources for the implantation of the
Circus School project originated with UNICEF through the Child
Hope project.
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9) Areas of Activity
Circus arts, embroidery, garment making, dance, sports education,
percussion, and capoeira.
10) Objectives
Reinforce self-esteem as a basic condition for access to and successful
permanence in basic education.
Organization of boys and girls that make the street their place of
existence and survival, focusing on the construction of citizenship.
Training of a critical consciousness in respect to man and the
environment as an essential factor in improving the quality of life.
11) Target Public
The Circus School project is an initiative directed at children and
adolescents in a solidified street situation, that is, the child or youth who has
already cut ties with his or her family. The age of the girls and boys served
varies from 7 to 16 years old. The majority are boys.
12) Description and Background
The Circus School project is coordinated by the Municipal Children’s
and Social Assistance Foundation – FUMCAS, whose objective is to develop
policies for social assistance, giving priority to the child and adolescent in a
situation of risk. The objective is to allow these children to have the
opportunity for healthy social and personal development. The idea of the
Circus School project emerges from the necessity to attend to children and
adolescents that demonstrate a series of difficulties in developing their
potential. Above all, this is due to the condition they find themselves in surviving
on the streets. These youths are at times more demanding, more savage,
more astute, and even feel the need for challenges.
For these reasons, conventional school is not attractive enough to
take a kid off the streets to participate in and develop routine activities,
where many times the teacher only uses their voice and some chalk.
The Circus, however, offers a place where the children are sheltered
and have the opportunity to develop, create, learn, and dream with
other people. They themselves then feel the necessity of getting off
the street.
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The Circus School does not have the specific objective of developing
professional training activities. The exclusive focus is getting the youths off
the street and subsequently getting them back into their families and school.
There is the search for making a new relationship with life possible through
artistic, cultural, and educational activities.
There are requirements for joining the Circus School project: a solidified
street situation, difficulty in getting and staying in school and the family, and
belonging to a low-income family. These youths coexist in close contact
with violence, both as victims and as agents.
Currently 119 children are served. The great majority of them are already
in school and have returned to living with their families.
The Circus School project is quite old. It was created because of a
proposal that requested that FUMCAS develop it. However, the inauguration
of the Circus School was only made possible with UNICEF investment in
1998 through the Child Hope campaign.
[..] In 1999, with the resources collected in Child Hope in 98, the
opportunity to support projects that were complementary to school as
the main focus opened up. The Mayor’s Office already had the desire
to have the Circus School as an activity that would complement the
children’s activities and that could also serve as a transitory space
from the street, where the kids could meet and go back to school and
to living with their families. So the idea of FUMCAS fit perfectly with
the resource idea. Because it is a resource collected from one donor,
in this case the GLOBO TV Network, they practically defined what the
type of project that they would like to support that year would be.
(Interview with partners, São Luis/MA)
13) Personnel
The team is based on FUMCAS professionals. Large portions of the educators
have undergraduate degrees, mainly in the areas of pedagogy, psychology, and
social assistance. Another part is made up of artists or workshop staff, but all have
received training and courses in education for the street. The educators generally
have previous experience with education for street kids. The staff is composed of
six workshop members, the specialist team, and the coordination.
There is a training plan in FUMCAS that consists of monthly training
sessions that occur with themes focused on the reality of the children and
adolescents in a street situation. These are training sessions that focus on
refining the team’s work. Meetings and evaluation meetings also take place
in an effort to overcome the difficulties that might appear.
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The professionals have taken an entrance examination and there is no
volunteer work. Some work full time and others work part time, depending
on the workshop area they work in and the need. The coordination works
full time.
14) Ongoing Programs and Projects
Following are some of the Foundation’s main programs that work with
children and adolescents:
Support Centers of the Central Market and Joao Paulo
Neighborhood: Spaces where pedagogical, recreational, cultural, play, and
sports activities take place. Children and adolescents that work in the fairs
and markets are served, in addition to residents of peripheral neighborhoods.
The Centers’ activities encompass 1,019 children and adolescents, with school
tutoring classes, art workshops, karate school, soccer school, and dance and
theatre classes.
Constructing Citizens: This is a program that serves children and
adolescents in a street situation, in the search to contribute to their getting
off the streets. Currently, an average of 80 children and adolescents has
been tracked in the areas of major concentration. The educators identify the
personal and family situation, interests, needs, and the perspectives on life
of each girl and boy with the objective of getting them into the programs
according to their need.
Project Hope: This is an initiative of the Mayor’s Office and the Army
through FUMCAS and SEMED that attends to children in situations of
personal and social risk. In the barracks of the 24th Battalion, 20 boys from
14 to 15 years of age participate in the educational program. In the morning
they attend classes in the municipal public school network and in the afternoon
they are fed and helped with their schoolwork. They also receive classes in
music, mechanics, carpentry, physical activities and medical and dental
treatment.
Owing to the wide reach of the project developed by FUMCAS and in
order to guarantee the most in-depth description of one among many activities,
the survey utilized the Circus School project as its principal instrument.
15) Methodology
In order to perform a consistent intervention in the problem of boys
and girls on the street, it was necessary to obtain data on the reality of these
children and adolescents in a street situation in the city of São Luis. The
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educators of Constructing Citizens, another FUMCAS project, carried out a
count of children and adolescents on the streets. In this manner the Circus
School team obtained a necessary tool, as the data of the reality served as a
parameter for the development and implementation of the project.
The minute the child arrives at the Circus, he or she is directed to the
technical personnel (social assistant, coordinator) that show the child around
the school, visiting all of the workshops. Based on this visit, sometimes
participating a little, the child chooses the workshop that he or she identifies
with the most. The adopted methodology is described like this:
Our methodology is to guarantee the educational presence of the kids
in the day-to-day life of the Circus. We develop rules of coexistence
with them that must be taken into consideration. The objective is to
awaken self-esteem, to see that the company of the family and the
community is important. It’s the group feeling they have among
themselves there. Getting back into school, getting back and staying
in school. (Focus group with specialists/project motivators)
The workshops are in the majority circus arts, but there are also
workshops in embroidery, garment making, dance, sports education, hygiene
and health, citizenship, psychological pedagogy, and drugs.
The time the child stays in the activities depends a lot on how much
time they take to “learn how to walk on their own.” Learning to walk requires
time and is a process that varies from one child to another. The time the
children then take to break away depends on their own process of
development.
Because breaking away is something that happens more slowly, so
it doesn’t become one more cut in their lives. Because you see that
the kids here, in a certain way, are being privileged, because there
are others who are completely outside of the service system. And
you see that they need the services we provide here so much. So,
they need a little time to take it all in, to interrupt this street
pattern. So, we respect this process in the teenager. It’s not like
today you’re 16, you’ve got to break away from the program. Of
course, we always look towards directing them as much inside
the institution itself as outside it. As much on the State level, the
municipal level, the NGO level, we always look for a way for the
kid to keep getting support so he can walk. (Focus group with
specialists/project motivators, São Luis/MA)
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There are practically no dropouts and the turnover for each child depends
on their adaptation to their new life with their family. Few children go back
to living on the street.
Some of them, because they go back to their families, because they’re
going to school, they leave the Circus. Now we’ve got this strategy as
much as possible to include them in other programs. Leave the Circus
and make room for new people. But look for other programs. Until this
becomes something more mature, something more solid in their heads
and it’s getting even more solid for them to not go back to the streets.
(Interview with coordinator, São Luis/MA)
The lives of the children and adolescents that become part of the Circus
School project are followed step by step. This is part of the original concept
and the fundamental project idea. However, after these youths detach from
the program, there is no way yet to track this process. What has been done
is to direct some of the youths to other similar projects. The ones who are
not directed, however, do not receive any kind of departure tracking.
The Circus School is from 7 to 16 years old. When they get to this age
limit, they can be directed towards a professional training program
or any other FUMCAS program, they’re all connected. (Focus group
with specialists/project motivators, São Luis/MA)
Some of them have already managed to develop really well and they’re
getting to be 16 and we make it possible for them to join another
Foundation program and that’s the Job Training program. This is
where the teenager, let’s just say, gets their first job. It’s not really a job,
it’s a work- study kind of thing for one year in a governmental or nongovernmental organization. Mostly these are public agencies from
the municipal administration itself and that’s where they learn to relate
with people in the working world. (Interview with coordinator, São
Luis/MA)
16) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The Circus School Project is extremely linked, as much to other actions
of the Foundation as well as to actions of partner organizations. Generally,
the youths are directed to other projects when they reach the age to leave
the Circus School. The FUMCAS Work Training Program is one such
example. In addition to this, the kids that arrive at the program are in the
majority of cases guided by partner organizations like The Friend of the
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Children Network and the Title Council Boards, Conselhos Tutelares.
This is a governmental agency in the judicial area that deals with local
institutions in the guardianship and supervision of children and adolescents
legally considered delinquents. Their re-education is commonly developed
with the Conselho Tutelar, local agencies, and NGOs and this is the case
with FUMCAS. These agencies that have already been working with the
kids join together in order to direct the kids to the project that will be most
beneficial to them.
Initially, the Circus School project was not very well accepted by the
community. People thought that the project was going to bring marginals,
street kids into their lives. However, after operations began, the Circus
demonstrated that it was nothing offensive and the community began to
accept it, but without effective participation in the project.
The community didn’t accept it. They got signatures saying take the
Circus out of here because it’s going to cost us, but I think it didn’t
cost anything for any of the residents here. They thought the street
kids were going to come here, they were going to do all sorts of things,
but I myself at least was never bothered by one of those kids. (Interview
with community members, São Luis/MA)
The project works closely with the family, through monitoring and holding
systematic meetings. It is necessary for the family to win their child back
for day to day coexistence. To aid in this, families receive guidance and
psychological, social, and legal assistance. In addition to this, the family is
monitored in terms of how they make themselves present in the school life
of the children and adolescents.
In order to guarantee the participation of the family and assure that the
child will not be induced into returning to the streets to work, the Circus
School project encourages the inclusion of the family in the School Scholarship
program. Through this program, the family receives one minimum salary
per month so that the family can give the necessary support when it’s time
for the youth to return to school.
Although the Circus School program is developed by the Municipal
Children’s and Social Assistance Foundation, it was developed by a network
of partnerships. The project was developed in a more intense way with
some of the NGOs that even helped in training educators and ended up
taking on the follow up and evaluation of many of the projects. These are:
The Black Culture Center, the National Movement of Street Kids, and the
Father Marcos Passerini Center for Defense, in alliance with the National
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Movement of Street Kids, which contributed in the sense of training the
Circus School educators.
We have a very healthy relationship with the other agencies that work
with youths. We have a lot of partners, we’ve got CCN, the Movement,
we have some partners who are a lot bigger than others, the Center for
Defense, the advisory boards that are always with us and the other
agencies. We’ve got the Friend of the Child Network, it’s all linked.
(Focus group with specialists/project motivators, São Luis/MA)
In addition to these NGOs, the program depends on the decisive
technical and financial support of UNICEF, which is assisting in the purchase
of three more small circus tents where other workshops are being developed.
It’s through this technical assistance, from the discussion of the project
to the development and monitoring of the project to the monitoring of
the financial operations of the project that UNICEF keeps track of it
financially. (Interview with partners, São Luis/MA)
The public municipal agency is responsible for the Circus School
project’s maintenance and operations and maintains partnerships with other
municipal and state administrative agencies.
[...] we have the Secretariat of Education, because they give the school
scholarship to the families and the school scholarship is the
Secretariat’s, so there’s this whole connection. We have the Secretariat
of Health, that does all the monitoring of their health, the flouride
applications, anyway, the whole health question is approached in the
Circus School. (Interview with coordinator, São Luis/MA)
17) Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
Formal evaluation of the Circus School project is annual, but some
“informal” evaluations take place with great frequency. The educators are
encouraged to have weekly discussions on what happened in the workshops,
in order to coordinate them. There are also bi-semester evaluations, where
upcoming activities are planned.
In addition to these internal evaluations, evaluations with the children
and adolescents in the Circus School project take place, as well as with their
families. The participation of the partners in these evaluations is quite intense
in that, in addition to participating in all of the meetings previously cited, they
also take part in the exclusive meetings.
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We have the evaluations, the time for evaluations. And the evaluations
are carried out with them [the youths]. They’re all going to say the
good things and the bad things. It’s like that, they evaluate themselves,
they evaluate the team, and they evaluate the means that are being
provided for the project. (Interview with coordinator, São Luis/MA)
And the level of evaluation is with them, with their relatives, their
families, and the specialists. Then later it’s with the partners on a wide
variety of levels. The partners take part there with all the others, the
child, the teenager, the family, the specialists. Then afterwards they
have a special one. This evaluation is important because it’s built
collectively. (Interview with coordinator, São Luis/MA).
18) Specific Problems of the Experience
· The majority of problems stem from financial difficulties, so much so
that the lack of funds for enlarging the Circus School project on the
whole deserves mention.
Ok, these obstacles, these difficulties are always really restricted, really
focused on the financial questions. If we had sufficient funds, we could
have already implanted the program in its totality. We would really be
serving a lot more children and adolescents. (Interview with coordinator,
São Luis/MA)
· The lack of infrastructure on the Circus School project is exhibited
by everyone involved as a problem that needs to be overcome. The
Circus School currently has only one tent. That is a very limited
amount of space for developing the activities. There is also a lack
of supplies for the workshops, a sound system for example. The
students complain a lot about the lack of a cleaner, larger bathroom.
In addition to this, the available staff seems insufficient for the
large quantity of students.
The negative point, I think, is that there should be more educators.
And should be another place, because there are so many kids here at
the circus, and I think it’s too small. Over there, for example, all the
teachers take them over to one place and some of them start talking
and it really messes things up. If we had divided classrooms it would
be much better. And I think a really negative point here is the
bathroom. (Focus group with youths, São Luis/MA)
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We’ve already managed to get some tents... But the biggest obstacle
now, currently, is the question of physical space. They’re already
providing more land. We were going to put the other tents in this
space over here, but what we’re really getting is a piece of land
there, over there. (Focus group with specialists/project motivators,
São Luis/MA)
· There is no directing of the youths that demonstrate above average
potential, who stand out in the circus activities.
We don’t have anywhere to send these kids. Ok, the Foundation is
there, I’m not going to say it’s a problem, because it’s a really cool
thing, but we’ve got this tremendous challenge on our hands. (Focus
group with supervisors/project motivators, São Luis/MA)
· One of the difficulties faced by the educators is in respect to
the specificity of the situation experienced by the street children
and adolescents. The approach to working with these questions
makes the professionals very sensitive. At times, this
discourages them.
You really go through some rough stuff here too, you understand?
You get this kid who’s all doped up and living on the street, you get
this kid with guns, you get this kid with every frustration there is.
You get this stuff and it really bothers you, and it’s that feeling of
powerlessness, you know? Because you’re talking about this kid,
but when the kid comes in here, he’s already carrying so much
weight on his back, you know? Because this is the common element,
the family factor is this horrible thing. So, sometimes, you just get
completely wiped out. (Focus group with specialists/project
motivators, São Luis/MA)
[...]All of a sudden this revolt comes out from some teenager in
the circus. There are 60, 70 other teenagers and one turns on
some educator. This really gets to the team. It affects all the kids.
These are the day- to -day problems. (Interview with coordinator,
São Luis/MA)
19) Why is it an innovative experience?
In general, the child or adolescent in a crystallized street situation doesn’t
manage to adapt to the school system by himself. This occurs because they
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experience an extremely high level of freedom living on the street. The
project represents an intermediate space between the street, the family,
and the school.
Through circus art and the magic that the circus represents in the child’s
life, the objective is to win them over by bringing them to the circus space.
The circus offers an immense variety of workshops, but the most significant
are the circus arts under the circus tent.
The team has an extremely positive perception that focusing on the
local culture and art is the surest way to redeem their value. For the
team, these activities are fundamental in the youths’ growth. Through
this schedule of activities they manage to show results, proving that art
and culture are “inside all of us, and when encouraged and given potential
to grow, they are capable of transforming realities.” The Circus School
project team also believes in and invests in sports as a way of working
with the health and minds of the youths. These activities are developed
under the orientation of an educator, making it possible for the youths to
go back to school.
Here, we develop the circus arts activities in the morning. Circus
arts and embroidery, garment making, dance, and sports education.
And some of the workshops are for hygiene and health, citizenship,
psychological pedagogy, drugs. In the afternoon we have activities.
We repeat circus arts, sports education, percussion, and capoeira.
Sports education, at this time, we’re dividing up like this – three
times a week in the morning because the number of children and
teenagers is bigger in the morning, and two times a week in the
afternoon. So we’re hiring one more staff member for sports
education. (Focus group with supervisors/project motivators, São
Luis/MA)
The youths show themselves to be very satisfied with the Circus School
project. Their concrete results confirm this positive evaluation. Out of 119
youths, 96% returned to attending school, 44 families were included in the
school scholarship program, and 85% of the youths remain in a family living
situation. The health programs attend to 100% of the boys and girls with
preventive and curative treatment.
What they like is the activities, at least that’s what they tell us. And
they don’t like the weekends because they’re not in the circus then.
That’s what they’re always telling us. (Focus group with specialists/
project motivators, São Luis/MA)
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I see it this way. I think like this, ok, there was this evaluation that the
kids did on the circus. And they said there that the circus is 100%,
that it’s great, that’s it’s marvelous. So, even when you listen to what
they’re saying themselves, they never say that they don’t like something,
something here in the circus. (Focus group with specialists/project
motivators, São Luis/MA)
I consider it an innovative project for São Luis, Maranhão. Maranhão
is a state with this fantastic cultural wealth and it’s really explored
very little, including for this type of activity that could be linked to
these cultural activities like the construction of citizenship and the
project for rights. So, besides having this quality of redeeming the
family connection for the majority of these youths, to assure the right
to school, or education, the project also has this visibility, this
innovative component. (Interview with partners, São Luis/MA)
20) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Youths’ Lives
The impact of the Circus School project on the lives of the children and
adolescents served is extremely significant, as it represents changes in the
lives of every one of them. These changes allow for the construction of a
more just and egalitarian society.
· The youths are taken off the streets and return to family life and school
in a sustainable way. This includes stopping drug consumption. The
love and affection of the educators and the family, which is guided
closely, are decisive in this process. Today, 96% of the youths in the
Circus School project are already studying and have excellent school
performance. The behavior of these youths experienced modifications
in relation to family living. They become tamer and friendlier, treating
the family with a lot more respect. More than anything, these youths
acquire the sense of living a dignified and safe life.
I think it’s really good, because it takes kids off the street, those market
kids, those kids who beg at stoplights. So they won’t just hang around,
because sometimes the person is working and the others have sex, kill,
rob, they do what they want. But not here. It’s better not to have violence
here, it’s better inside the circus. For the one on the street, taking big
chances, you don’t know if they’re going to be on the street that day
and then you get the news. They’re dead. Not here though. (Focus
group with youths, São Luis/MA)
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We see concrete results in the lives of many of them. Just the fact that
these kids don’t go back to the street is a lot. They’re living with their
families. The fact that they’re going to school with all the problems
that these traditional schools in this country impose on our children
and adolescents. But, on the other hand, they have these concrete
perspectives, the possibility for creativity, for flight as we say. For us
here at the school, it’s a flight. The kid gets out of that stagnation, if
that’s what you can call it, and starts to create based on this feeling.
The kid starts to create, to develop. And from there it’s possible to
adapt to the subjects of formal school. (Interview with coordinator,
São Luis/MA)
Before, I used to go to the street. I slept there all the time, right in the
street. I stayed on the street using drugs, smelling glue, solvent. I got
arrested, sometimes I went to a shelter. But after the Circus School I
don’t even go on the street anymore. (Focus group with youths, São
Luis/MA)
I think that things with me and my mom changed so much. My house
was almost all mud. Today it’s almost all brick. And from now on it’s
going to be even better. Oh, because my mom gets the salary from the
school scholarship and it’s really good for us. Because before my dad
was out of a job and he started making the house, and he was
unemployed and that school money really helps. (Focus group with
youths, São Luis/MA)
I think so because that there are so many out in the street, getting
high, stealing. If those kids were here they wouldn’t be doing all
that, because all the kids that are here aren’t doing that anymore.
Because the kids come in here and they change completely,
because they’re not going to steal anymore, they don’t go out on
the street anymore. They come here and they go home, then they
come back here. The ones who aren’t in the project hang around
on the street and do those kind of things. (Focus group with youths,
São Luis/MA).
· The Circus School project invests in the process of awakening potential
and increasing the youths’ self confidence and self-esteem. The project
gives them the opportunity to develop a project of life and increase
their perspectives for the future, allowing them to dream. The boys
and girls begin to develop their creativity and demonstrate that they
can develop productive and innovative activities like any other kid
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their age. Beyond this, the project has had a huge multiplying effect
among the youths themselves.
We always thought that in the streets they don’t have any
expectations, no desires, no dreams. And that was really foolish on
our part, society in general. There is a very distorted view of the
situation of these children and adolescents who are at risk and
who live in the street. Not that they’re angels. Not that they’re
angels who have fallen from heaven. They have their elements too,
if only because their whole experience there is extremely close to
violence. But they have desires and dreams too. They have a lot of
potential. I believe that if this project meets expectations, you’re
going to see a really radical change, even in the aspect of caring
for physical appearance. The kids begin to see themselves through
different eyes. Their self-esteem increases and all of a sudden they
discover this important person, this beautiful person. This is a
radical change because they begin to redeem themselves, to build
connections that were all torn to pieces, if they had ever been
made at all. (Interview with partners, São Luis/MA)
What do they get? My God, I think it’s life itself. Their projects of
life are all reconsidered, even if it’s not this formal structured thing
that we present in the project of life. But the youth begins to think
that you can live like this. They want to get to this, though, if they
want to do this then they have to find some way that’s different from
the way they did it before. This is a really significant alteration in
their lives. (Interview with coordinator, São Luis/MA)
· It is interesting to note the testimony of a mother affirming a global
behavioral change in her daughter’s life.
I want to say that before my daughter got in this Circus School, I
really suffered a lot too. Because she was really a little rebel. She
was 12 years old and she pulled a knife on me. I always worked in
people’s houses, I worked from Monday to Friday, sleeping there.
So she stayed with my sisters the whole time, it’s not the same as a
mother. When you’re not able to keep track of your kid, well she
almost got to be a street kid, she was a rebel girl, all revolted.
[...] But ever since my daughter set her foot down in that gate
there, her life changed so much. It’s totally restored. From the
worst student in the class, she’s now the best student in the class.
She didn’t pass for four years and now she’s the leader. I even
brought some photos of her to show. She’s this grown up girl, she
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listens to me now, she pays attention. Now she asks before she
goes somewhere, she asks me. Before she didn’t even talk. She
would just look at me with rage, all angry like that. She was a
girl that only God, only God really knew. This project has to be
recognized because there’s no money in the world that could pay
for the work that these people do for our kids [...] (Focus group
with mothers/fathers/guardians, São Luis/MA)
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4.4.2 Projeto Descobrindo o Saber (Discovering
Knowledge Project)
1)
Name of Organization
Projeto de Educação Alternativo Descobrindo o Saber (The
Discovering Knowledge Alternative Education Project)
2)
Date of Foundation
1989
3)
City/State
São Luis, MA
4)
Type of Organization
Philanthropic
5)
a)
b)
c)
Contact
Maria Gregorio
Function: General Coordinator
telephone: (98) 223-2113
6)
Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
In agency headquarters, in São Luis, Maranhao.
7)
Funding Sources
Currently, the Descobrindo o Saber Project is exclusively maintained
by a single partner. Specifically, the Solidarity Training Program
financed the Audio Operator course.
8)
Areas of Activity
Art, education, and culture
9)
Objectives
The Descobrindo o Saber Project offers an alternative space for
children and youths to spend their time, realize their artistic-cultural
potential, and develop it, providing an alternative for the future.
Beyond this, questions of citizenship are discussed. The participants
explore ethnic-cultural themes deeply, focusing on a better
understanding of the origins of our people. The principal objectives
of the program are the strengthening of a cultural identify and of the
self-esteem and integration/reintegration of children and youths in
the public schools.
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10) Target Public
Approximately 100 children and adolescents are served daily. These
are children from the working class, whether their parents are employed or
unemployed. The age group varies from 5 to 20 years, being distributed in a
wide variety of mixed pedagogical workshops (boys and girls, with girls
predominating). The majority are in formal school. The project is taking on
providing the registration of those who are not yet in school. Very few of the
participants work, and those that do are generally part of some kind of informal work.
11) Description and Background
The Descobrindo o Saber Project is a philanthropic agency founded on
September 19, 1989, by a group of people who were active in the Our Lady
of Penha Church. The founder and main collaborator was the ex-director of
the National Movement of Streetchildren.
The process of creating the Descobrindo o Saber Project occurred
based on the observation of the presence of many youths with no leisure
options. In this way, it was decided to create an alternative for these youths
to occupy their time and encourage them to take advantage of their artistic
and cultural potential.
The Descobrindo o Saber Project went through serious difficulties,
reaching the point of remaining closed for four years because of the lack of
operating conditions. Because of this, the project suffered a type of retrograde
process.
The project emerged in 1989 and in 1992 this headquarters here was
already under construction. We already had this other property over
there close to the house where we wanted to put the community library.
The project, based on a survey, became a reference for us because we
had already participated frequently in the external activities and
movements. UNICEF was the sponsor in the beginning of the project
here. Then what happened was what happens in all human
relationships, we had our limits. At the end of 1991, besides the
headquarters going full steam, the construction, we had another
building and an enviable equipment structure, like resources through
the middle of the following year. We had anticipated resources to
come and all that and it created this internal ambition. It created this
whole compromising story that involved the judicial system and we
had to sell the other site. The project had to close for almost four years
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because there was no way to touch it. The bottom of the building
flooded, we lost all of our equipment, typewriters, a guitar, chairs, etc.
So the agency ended up getting weak because of that situation. (Focus
group with specialists/project motivators, São Luis/MA)
12) Personnel
It is not required that all of the professionals have attended college.
There are those that have only completed high school. They are professional
teachers that help in project motivation or support groups. Many of them
have specific abilities like dance, theatre, music, etc.
The project coordination team is not the same as the team that executes the project, but the level of the directors varies a lot as well. Although it
is not a requirement to work on the project, the coordination states that a
larger participation of professionals with college degrees is currently desired,
especially psychologists, pedagogical staff, and social assistants.
The majority of the professionals began their activities in the Descobrindo o Saber Project at the time of its foundation. They participated in the
original concept and in the foundation of the project and they were
incorporated as staff members. Currently, there is no systematized selection
process. What happens is voluntary links of professional individuals to the
project professionals.
Training and qualification takes place with other agencies, principally
with FUMCAS, in addition to a few training sessions with the staff members
themselves. These training sessions do not take place in a systematic or
specific fashion.
Salaried staff performs a good part of the work. They receive one
minimum salary per month. In addition, there are volunteers as well. These
are people who offer a little bit of their work. They are social assistants,
psychologists, doctors, and dentists and mainly develop educational activities
like seminars and direct consulting activities like fluoride applications and
dental treatment for the children and adolescents.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The project offers the following workshops: Choir singing, dance,
cooking, classical ballet, reading, bumba-meu-boi, theatre, communication,
and percussion. Percussion and theatre are offered specifically for the
youths in the 15 to 20 year old age group. There is also a course for
audio operator.
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In addition to the formal activities in the areas of theater, music, and
dance, important questions such as drugs, sexuality, citizenship, and human
relations are dealt with. Activities that deal with the youths’ need for affection
and companionship are also offered. Stimulating the kids and youths so they
will go back to formal school is part of the work.
14) Methodology
In the Descobrindo o Saber Project alternative workshops are developed
where children and youths discover their very own talents. The proposal is
based on the Paulo Freire method, in which the children and youths learn how
to do. They begin building their own awareness based on day- to- day practice
and on a process of successes and mistakes, learning how to discuss and how
to know and discuss the true meaning of life. The main idea is to encourage
the children and the youths to discover and develop their innate talents.
Beyond this, the project develops welcome reception activities that
the coordination calls “good morning work”. These activities have
the purpose of “making them feel welcome and in each workshop
getting each educator to do this work so the youth isn’t going to go to
the choir workshop and just sing. He’s going to the choir workshop
and if it’s National Indian Day he’s going to get to know what that is,
and he’s going to celebrate the day, or Soldier’s Day, or Mother’s
Day.” (Interview with coordinator, São Luis/MA)
Spreading the word on the Descobrindo o Saber Project takes place
through flyers, presentations in town squares, churches, through
recommendations and through announcements in public spaces. The
workshops are offered and interested youths join. There is no systematized
selection or specific criteria.
We really don’t have criteria, even because our concern is to offer
them a space to let them discover what they’re interested in. It’s not
just the art and education activities that are developed, but their own
interest for learning, for formal education. So we don’t have criteria
here. Whoever is in whatever grade, you only get in if you’re studying.
So there’s nothing imposed on you to participate in the project. (Focus
group with specialists/project motivators, São Luis/MA).
After joining the Descobrindo o Saber Project, the youths are introduced
to the various workshops and spontaneously begin to join the one they prefer.
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The project team demonstrates a preoccupation in making the youths feel
well received and receive orientation on family, sex, drugs, and violence
along with the activities.
The youths are closely accompanied by specialists on the Descobrindo
o Saber project while they are participating in the workshops. However, due
to the lack of human resources, this monitoring stops as soon as the youth
leaves the project.
The Descobrindo o Saber project youths are monitored by the
pedagogic coordination and this pedagogic coordination really does
their best for this systematized monitoring. (Interview with partner,
São Luis/MA)
It’s just this professional neediness, of people to help, because the
team is still really small to do this job. We get news, sure. You
know, you run into them, or they come to visit, but it’s not really
tracking them. (Focus group with specialists/project motivators,
São Luis/MA)
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partners
The Descobrindo o Saber project is not isolated. The project is part of a
network of municipal agencies that support each other, looking for new directions.
Because you can’t really work by yourself in isolation, so the project
isn’t isolated and FUMCAS, they’re fortifying this assistance policy
in a larger context, and that’s fortifying the citizen. (Interview with
partner, São Luis/MA)
[...]Descobrindo o Saber gets along well with the agencies. The project
is always present in the church, in the resident associations, they’re
there with the presentations, some seminars, debates [...] (Interview
with coordinator, São Luis/MA)
The one thing that confirms the visibility and sustainability of the Descobrindo o Saber project is the partnership with an assemblyman from the
Legislative Assembly of São Luis, the principal financial collaborator and
one of the project founders.
The Municipal Children’s and Social Assistance Foundation – FUMCAS
has been a partner in the offered training. There is no information on other
governmental partners.
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The church, resident associations, and an agency called DUCAR are
also mentioned:
We have a partnership with DUCAR and at times we manage to get
another partnership, but generally it’s very difficult. (Focus group
with specialists/project motivators, São Luis/MA)
16) Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
The Descobrindo o Saber project is generally evaluated at the end of
each year for us to take the negative and positive points and improve
the negative points for the following year and continue fighting for the
positive ones. (Interview with coordinator, São Luis/MA).
The youths take part in the evaluation, giving suggestions for improvement
and indicating what they consider positive or negative in the project.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· There is turnover and leaving. Some youths stop coming to the project
because they start to work.
This turnover, let’s say for choir, when they reach 16 or 17 sometimes
they don’t stay with us anymore, they get some job, they go to work
some way and from there they end up moving away from the workshop.
(Interview with coordinator, São Luis/MA)
· The main obstacle presented is the lack of financial resources:
[...] Financial obstacles because the resources are really reduced
and for us to develop better work we need more resources. (Interview
with coordinator, São Luis/MA)
· Lack of more training for the professionals.
I look at it like this, that it would really be a question of training,
because we are still really limited. I see that in this project there are
those who don’t know as much, even though they want to do things,
there’s this limit in terms of familiarity, knowledge, there’s this desire
to do things, but it has its limits. So this knowledge limit, this training
limit on how to work with these kids, how to train them to deal with
society, it’s really huge. (Focus group with specialists/project
motivators, São Luis/MA)
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To make the courses happen, a lot of times there just isn’t time for our
educators to adjust, because sometimes you want to do things but you
can’t because it’s only at that certain time. The people here are here in
their free time. What happens is there’s a partnership that we’re going
to establish in the realm of what’s possible. We need something specific
to deepen the philosophy of the proposal. (Focus group with specialists/
project motivators, São Luis/MA)
· Lack of specialized human resources to better develop the activities
and, principally, to accompany the youths.
The fact is, we need other professionals. For example, we need a social
assistant, psychologists, because of the kids’ values. It’s really difficult
for those of us who are simple pedagogues to work with this. So, at
times, we run out of tools to work with this kind of kid, and the family,
so we need other professionals to give the project continuity. (Focus
group with specialists/project motivators, São Luis/MA)
There are needs that go beyond the workshops. Sometimes it’s not
enough just to give them technical information about art in the
workshops. There are questions that go beyond that, and you
have to keep up with them in this affective psychological sense
and there really needs to be a professional with this ability. That’s
where it gets limited. (Focus group with specialists/project
motivators, São Luis/MA)
Who knows how to get on Internet? No one knows how to get on
Internet. And for us, as much as we know about other areas, we’re
really still illiterate in this computer area. And these kids, they really
need to get caught up in this too, because there’s this really big
discrepancy. We want to educate citizenship and values. These values
are imposed and these kids can’t keep up. (Focus group with specialists/
project motivators, São Luis/MA)
· Lack of participation and more effective accompaniment on the part
of the parents.
Working with these children, we feel they’re farther away from their
families all the time and their families are farther away from them.
We’re even trying to do this family/child project so that we can be
certain that this child won’t get off track in the future. (Interview with
coordinator, São Luis/MA)
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It can even be questioned like this: it’s not your obligation to take the
kids to the doctor, but it’s a way we have of stimulating the family and
demanding things of them as well, that they take care of their kids, got
it? What I mean to say is that you take the first step and the family keeps
it going. (Focus group with specialists/project motivators, São Luis/MA)
· The project coordination is responsible for promoting more integration
of mothers and fathers in the project, according to the opinions of the
parents themselves.
The first thing that needs to get better is the coordination, the direction
of the project with the community and the parents, taking the projects
to the agencies that can help. Going to hearings, and it’s necessary for
the parents to go, because the parents are really a big help at those
times. Second, the agencies should help, because we know that when
you develop a project here on this earth you really need a lot of faith.
There’s no doubt that you need faith to get a project going. (Focus
group with fathers/mothers/guardians, São Luis/MA)
18) Why an innovative experience?
Because the Descobrindo o Saber project team is based on the concept
of culture, sports, and leisure as important means to strengthen the youths’
self-esteem. Another important concept is that work that utilizes culture and
play is favorable to personal identity. This occurs in an effort to pass on the
importance of both cultural and social values to the youths.
In general, the evaluation is positive, and the participation of youths in
the program deserves mention: Even just because they try to find out our
opinion, what we think: have a voice, have a turn (Focus group with
youths, São Luis/MA).
· The community, the parents, and the partners describe the project as
essential for the positive development of the youths as they are treated
with respect and affection. Principally because the results are
extremely satisfactory according to those involved.
Taking advantage of this opportunity, I want to make it very clear that
our Descobrindo o Saber project here knows how to really help out in
our community. It’s really necessary that it goes on with more projects,
more courses, to see if we can really work with these families that
really need it...it’s not just the children, it’s the families. (Focus group
with fathers/mothers/guardians, São Luis/MA)
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· The project promotes the discussion and internalization of social values.
Yes, I think we really managed to use the improvement of the kids’
training in the question of preparing for the work itself. It’s a question
of making space in the discussions for what they want to talk about,
because they call it discussion for citizenship, the dream of working is
specific, and it helps the workshop if you can bring a lot of other
subjects to the kids, it’s important for training them as citizens.
(Interview with partner, São Luis/MA)
Here I started doing theatre, and they taught you other things that
were outside of just theatre, this social side. Values, citizenship, we
learn all this here, how to get along in a group. Here at the project
we’re still learning. They help you get all involved, they turn you into
citizens, this thing of making things work to get along socially and
spiritually too. (Focus group with youths São Luis/MA)
19) Effects of the Experience for Changes in the Youths’ Lives
· Return to school life and improvement in school performance.
We’ve already managed to integrate a lot of the kids in the public
school when the public school didn’t want to accept them anymore
because the kids were thieves, streetkids. (Focus group with specialists/
project motivators, São Luis/MA)
· Improvement in school performance.
There are changes in the kids’ schooling, their participation in
school has really improved, their participation in organized groups,
for example. Kids who really didn’t go very much to this kind of
thing, school was an obligation. Today, for example, they take the
workshops that they’ve done and they take them to the school, they
take the seminars that we do for Black History Week. (Interview
with partner, São Luis/MA)
· Increase in the youths’ self-esteem.
What do they get? It strengthens them internally because it awakens
their self-esteem for life. I really believe in this line of thinking.
(Interview with partner, São Luis/MA)
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· Behavioral changes in the youths. They recuperate their joy, their
hope. They become more respectful.
A lot of the youths get here all rebellious, no smiles, no joy at all and at the
end of some project you can already see that the kid is smiling, talking and
that we managed to let him be a kid, one who even adapts to the other ones
that hardly even talk at all. (Interview with coordinator, São Luis/MA)
So they change, they do. There are a lot of kids here that we thought
there was just no way. You know, that type that’s just marked, like he’s
going to die. He shows up and everyone just kind of gets out of the
way. Look, that kid got a lot better! He’s more human, more available,
looser and that’s how the other ones are here too. You really see it. He
respects you when you get there and if he’s fighting, if you go up to him
and have a serious talk, he stops fighting and that’s the end of it.
(Focus group with specialists/project motivators, São Luis/MA)
For the people who knew me at that time, now that I’m a more well
behaved person, I’m really so different from how I was before. I already
feel more peaceful. I already know how to listen to other people, to
their opinions. Because I didn’t know how to listen to anybody else’s
opinion. I didn’t want to know their opinions, just mine. (Focus group
with youths, São Luis/MA)
· Favor the development and emergence of leadership among the youths
and increase in their critical capacity.
They become more critical. One time this girl said to me: At school,
when the teacher put this word up she put the accent on the a and on
the o. And then I told her, Look teacher, the accent is not correct, it’s
only on the a because of the sound. And she turned around and said:
Girl, who taught you this? And I told her it was you at the Discovering
How to Learn project. This made me so happy because I could see that
a big difference had been made. I believe that we train them to be people
who question things. (Focus group with specialists/project motivators,
São Luis/MA)
We’re learning something good here, and they’re learning something
bad there in the street. How to rob, how to steal. The difference is in
the level of what you learn, because here it’s like you learn how to
open up and look at the world with this critical eye. (Focus group
with youths, São Luis/MA)
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· Favor an increase in the possibility of the youth getting a job, because
of the training.
We have kids here who already have jobs, kids that identified themselves
with the cutting and sewing workshops and ended up seamstresses,
people who are currently working with the things they discovered
here in the project. We’ve got children singing in other places, giving
presentations in other places outside of the project. And when they
present themselves out there, they feel they’re valuable and when they
feel valued, they don’t want to lose this encouragement. So they end
up staying. (Interview with coordinator, São Luis/MA)
I really want to study and make progress. In a certain way I want to be
independent, so I don’t have to be depending on my parents for
everything. I think it’s really past the time that we should be working.
(Focus group with youths, São Luis/MA)
· Education is treated in a broad sense.
I see it first of all as an educational question. I’m not talking education,
what grade you’re in, I’m talking about family education. The education
they get from the teachers themselves, the way they change how they
are, how they act. I want to say that this doesn’t mean that they have to
stay forever, but at least the time they spent here makes a difference. As
a matter of fact, I’ve been at these meetings and heard mothers saying
this. My son changed, after he got here, he’s different. I see this, they
express it, I’ve heard it here, I’m sure. You notice that if what we’ve got
here in this project could spread out all over the place, to the whole
community, to all of São Luis, or all over Brazil, on a national level,
I’m sure that it would contribute to our children’s education. To our
society, to our community. There’s no doubt about it. (Focus group
with fathers/mothers/guardians, São Luis/MA)
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4.5 Mato Grosso
4.5.1 CIARTE
1) Name of Organization
Secretaria de Educação do Municipio de Cuiabá, MT – Projeto Cidadania,
Arte e Educação - CIARTE (Secretariat of Education of the Municipality
of Cuiabá, MT – Citizenship, Art, and Education Project – CIARTE)
2) Date of Foundation
2000
3) City/State
Cuiabá-MT
4) Type of Organization
Public State
5) Contact
a) Pedro de Oliveira
b) Title: Project Coordinator
c) Tel.: (65) 623 4447
d) E-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites where activities are carried out
Municipal schools in Cuiabá, mainly in schools in low-income districts
7) Financing Sources
Funds are from the Mayor’s Office itself
8) Areas of Activity
Art, education, and street culture (rap, breakdancing and graffiti)
9) Objectives
· To inform, involve, and make adolescents, youths, families, and society
aware of the fact that it is possible to live in a culture of peace, with
valorization of life and respect for human beings.
· Integrating and uniting the communities involved; defeating violence.
· Developing youth protagonists and social protagonism.
10) Target Public
The project deals mainly with boys and young men aged between 11 and 25.
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11) Description and Background:
CIARTE is an umbrella project of the Cuiabá Municipal Secretariat of
Education that is characterized by supporting and systematizing ongoing
activities. It is also active in decentralizing those that existed previously and
were confined to one community, with no institutional support whatsoever.
CIARTE emerged as a result of problems the community faced from
violence and gangs:
It was created precisely for there to be an area to work with the youths
organized in the peripheral neighborhoods in what are usually
considered to be gangs. From our point of view, though, these are
organizations that could be viewed as a process of solidarity and
support among the youths. It’s an area where the youths can acquire
an identity. They can start to be respected and to respect others. It’s
also a way to defend themselves against the permanent aggression in
the outside world, many times in their own family environment. So
CIARTE’s work was directed towards understanding the nature of
these organizations and the possibility of approaching them in search
of a positive meaning for the very organizations that existed. (Interview
with Municipal Secretary of Education, Cuiabá-MT)
When talking to the youths, it became obvious that there was a need to
create a project because an initiative in the community existed and needed
to be channeled. CIARTE arose to unify the artistic initiatives from a
collective point of view in a process of organization in order to maintain the
artistic energy that existed in the community itself and to organize itself on
an institutional level in order to gather funds and to maintain an alternative
system as an option in the neighborhood and to work on other social problems
from there.
12) Personnel
The project counts on a permanent salaried team, various project
motivators and some coordinators. It is worth emphasizing the role the
coordinators have, mainly in the sense of systematizing activities which are
often disperse, with no methodological content. Usually the coordinators
have already done similar work in other institutions such as the Church, and
have specialized educational training.
The majority of the project motivators who work on the project are
volunteers who have no specific training. They learn through day-to-day
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contact with the activities. Some are artists. Many have already taken part
in the project and became project motivators afterwards.
Most of the project motivators were selected by virtue of their
experience, of work that has already been recognized; others through
the Secretariat’s internal selection process. (Interview with Municipal
Secretary of Education, Cuiabá-MT)
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
Within the Citizenship, Art, and Education Project, dance, music, and
drama activities are organized.
14) Methodology
CIARTE develops its activities in two modes: first, using public spaces
that exist in the neighborhoods – schools, community centers and churches.
Second, they seek larger areas when presenting large scale events originating
from the project.
The work begins with gathering together existing group organizations
and artistic performers by way of direct contact with the youths:
It was done through specific trips to the peripheral neighborhoods in
the city and by the identification by the school of the existence of these
organizations. After that, there was a process of getting close to them,
of involvement. In some cases there was even one or another
organization that joined the project, like the rap group. Ultimately, it
was personal contact, collected information. (Interview with Municipal
Secretary of Education, Cuiabá-MT)
Among the project’s activities, the students like hip hop and rap most,
but they also appreciate other forms of artistic expression almost as much
such as music and composition, Brazilian Popular Music in general, theatre,
and other forms of dance.
CIARTE basically has three steps in its activities, in the words of its
coordinator:
First there is the mobilization and advertisement for the program
through community dance groups who are already giving
performances. So you advertise, you create a situation, give out
uniforms, provide tape players for their rehearsals. With the support
of important agencies in the community like UNESCO and the
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Municipal Secretariat of Education you start creating an exchange
between local institutions – these can be churches, schools, or
neighborhood associations – to support the initiatives of these
teenagers because usually they don’t get to become a part of or
support these initiatives, much less organize them […] the second
thing is creating the technical question among the youths themselves.
This comes from the time when they get together and exchange
experiences, teach each other new things, new rhythms in music […]
the third thing is their training period, working to get experience
with teachers, psychologists, social workers in this area that’s related
to the social situation there in the neighborhood. This is where the
youth can start to broaden his vision of society. (Interview with
coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
In spite of these more or less defined steps, the project coordinator
stated that there was no standard methodology although it is possible to
highlight some aspects such as there being no distinction in the treatment
given to boys and girls; creation and consolidation of a culture of peace,
solidarity and citizenship; integral training for the youths and aid to the youths
as protagonists, among other things.
Up to the present moment there have been no dropouts, something
that used to happen in other projects. This is because of the atmosphere
of the project, which does not require fixed membership, in the sense that
the student is free to choose to carry on with his activities in the way that
best suits him. The majority continue because they like the activities.
Changes in their self-esteem were noticed, which led them to change or
stop certain activities:
The project has a liberating perspective, it doesn’t try to create groups
tied to it. It tries to intervene by recognizing the activities of these
groups. This reinforces the positive identities these groups have, and
from then on the groups can carry on by themselves. (Interview with
Municipal Secretary of Education, Cuiabá-MT)
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The formation of networks is a central characteristic. For CIARTE it
is important that the community be involved in a project. Therefore,
relationships are established with the mothers’ union, neighborhood residents’
associations, local schools in the areas where the project operates, with
youth organizations, with churches, and with clergy.
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The project is multiplying in three neighborhoods in the city with the
Hip Hop for Life project, where artists originally from CIARTE are working
with 60 teenagers.
We are creating a sort of organic unity among these youths. That is,
we know that if the project happens in the community and we can’t
guarantee follow-up or a form of organization so that the youths in
the neighborhood can ask for funds to keep their artistic activities
going, the project will end because of lack of economic support. The
project will fade out in that district. So what we’re doing is encouraging
the youths to create associations, as if they were in school. They join
the student association, creating NGOs that keep up the supply of
financial resources so that they can carry on with their artistic
activities during the whole year. So these youths can organize their
own NGOs in their community, with the support of the community
itself. (Interview with coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
The project uses a series of partners, the main one being UNESCO
and also the police force, and branches of various churches – Catholic and
other Christian denominations – and residents’ associations. A partnership
was established with the Municipal Secretariat of Culture which placed a
fine artist, a theatre professional, and various teachers and actors at the
disposition of the project to make up groups to staff the workshops.
16) The place of evaluation and research in the experiment
After the artistic activities have ended, small evaluation groups gather
in which the youths evaluate what needs to be changed and what needs to
be improved in the project as well as the difficulties they are facing.
17) Particular problems in the experience
· One of the major obstacles to developing the projects is the need for
suitable physical space to carry out the activities:
When this Community Center was stopped, the UNESCO people helped
us to pay the Community Center because they didn’t want to let us
have it for nothing, and it’s a non-profit project. Nobody charges for
anything. We have to pay to teach. We get no incentive at all. Now that
we’re getting an incentive, we could get an incentive from the president
of the neighborhood, the Community Center, but we don’t. (Focus
group with youths, Cuiabá-MT)
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Some communities, for example, either because they don’t have covered
areas in school or because they don’t have a community center, we
can’t hold any sort of event in the rainy season. That’s when the project
has the most problems here in Mato Grosso. (Interview with coordinator,
Cuiabá-MT)
· Another problem in the project is the lack of material resources:
We need materials, dance costumes for the kids, paper, colored pencils,
because they don’t have clothes for rehearsals. It’s like this shirt is
from the project and all that, and you need a costume to dance and
you don’t have one. (Focus group with youths, Cuiabá-MT)
Our biggest demand is for supplies. I’m the breakdance instructor and
today I don’t have a sound system for the rehearsal. I have this little
tape recorder and the kids got this box and fixed up a speaker so we
could have music to dance, because without music there’s no way you
can rehearse. There’s no way to pass on what you’ve been learning for
a long time. There’s no way. (Focus group with youths, Cuiabá-MT)
· Lack of cooperation from others.
It was like this, we always had that desire to work with people less well
off, it’s that we never had the resources. We had nothing, honestly, we had
nothing in the way of support and we asked the Secretariat of Education
for it – no! Not for hip hop, no. (Focus group with youths, Cuiabá-MT)
· Lack of participation of parents is a problem for the project:
This course here is really good, it’s great, because it gets lots of kids
off the street, the street kids. It’s just that the mothers, the way I see it,
don’t follow up on this. You can see it for yourselves right here. Today
there’s a meeting and I don’t see one mother here to speak. I mean,
they’re all out of it and they send their kid here but they don’t care.
OK, that’s fine, they didn’t come to see what’s going on. They don’t
participate in anything. They don’t care at all about their kids.
(Interview with parents, Cuiabá-MT)
Many youths find it difficult to participate because of scheduling
problems. Hip Hop for Life in particular has a timetable of scheduled
activities, mainly graffiti art and breakdancing. They are concerned about
creating flexible timetables in order to be available to serve a larger
number of youths.
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· It is difficult for youths to be volunteers on the program.
This ends up limiting the youths’ ability to act because they need to
survive. Sometimes they even have to leave the city to find work on
some farm. So if there was a way to guarantee the possibility of these
youths being free from these demands, for them to work directly or
specifically for the project, the number of volunteers would certainly
be greater. (Interview with coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
18) Why is it an innovative experiment?
· One of the innovative aspects of the project is the combination of the
youths’ development of artistic creativity with school work.
It’s a creation that opens their minds because sometimes the children
are very smart and intelligent, so there has to be something for them to
do, like a drawing. I think dance is very beautiful too, something
different for them to do. But I think school work is very important,
because they have to study, then by studying they have that creativity
to do something. (Interview with parents, Cuiabá-MT)
· Another aspect that is seen as innovative lies in the ability of the
project to admit and valorize forms of artistic expression that come
from the youths themselves and from their communities, creating a
new collective relationship based on art:
By doing theatre with the community we saw the artistic potential
that we had to influence the community, mainly the youths. The
community gets out of their houses to come. So the potential of art and
the breaking of patterns that art allows, that’s the easy way we found
to approach the youths, and that’s fantastic. (Interview with
coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
The youths are connecting with each other, they are becoming
protagonists of artistic continuity, of joining society. (Interview with
coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
· It is found that involvement with the project makes children and youths
spend less time on the streets:
Well, I see that the great majority of children who come here are
children who used to live on the streets, doing nothing. I see them
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getting busy here; and then one day I notice that they’re not spending
as much time on the streets as they used to. (Interview with members of
the community, Cuiabá-MT)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Youths’ Lives
· The time of the youth who takes part in the project activities is
completely taken up, which is a positive influence in keeping him
away from bad company or involvement with drugs:
OK, before, I used to live on the street. Now I get home from school, I
study a little. Where I live it’s just my mother and brother. I do the dishes
and clean up the house. Then I come here to the graffiti workshop. I go
home and study a little more, go back for breakdancing, then I sleep,
the next day it’s the same thing. (Focus group with youths, Cuiabá-MT)
Me, first of all, I’ve been dancing for 17 years and that started in 1983.
I used to fool around a lot, messed around a lot, gang fights, drugs, I
mean I was a real marginal, trained on the street. Then hip hop came
and made that really radical change, like it got me out of a deep hole
and I started to change with time and rehabilitated myself. (Focus
group with youths, Cuiabá-MT)
· Participating in the project as volunteers teaches the youths new
roles and social relationships:
I’m not a professional, but the excellent experience, like they say, is
the impact you can have on the students. You learn from them and they
become a sort of son or brother. You get to be a family, you fight, talk,
laugh, and here everything has an effect, it’s positive, it passes from
one to another one. I argue with the guys when they’re in the pinball
place, when they’re in the street: ‘Why were you late? Why didn’t you
show up?’ So it’s more or less like that, this positive way of living
together. (Focus group with youths, Cuiabá-MT)
· There is a clear difference between the youths who are part of the
project and those who are not:
The youth who goes through the project and manages to have a better
understanding of the world, he’s not better than anyone else from the
point of view of appearance. But he ends up being critical of society.
This makes things easier because he breaks down all these patterns
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that are put into his head. So the difference between a kid who is part
of the project and one who isn’t is that he’s got the chance for example
to widen his outlook and be someone capable of saying no to drugs
and saying yes to life. The project sets up ways for him to be an active
person participating in society, in his own family, and in his school
and community. (Interview with coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
For someone who is inside the project there’s already an ideology. The
people here are already learning, like I say to him: you’ve got to train to be
a citizen, not just a man. I try to teach them that the most powerful weapon
the human being has today is discussion and dialogue … so I think that
ideology, the idea, is a strength. If it’s the right idea, a positive one, everybody
will go along with you. (Focus group with youths, Cuiabá-MT)
· Parents recognize that involvement in the project has brought their
children opportunities for pleasurable use of their time. Their children
did not have access to leisure, and this has helped to make them
more relaxed:
He was always shut up in the house, he just went from home to school.
When I got home from work in the afternoon I let him play a little in the
street and at nine o’clock I brought him back inside. With this project
he’s a lot calmer, he’s not as agitated as he used to be because if you
stay in the house your mind gets closed, you get agitated and stressed.
Today he’s completely different. He plays, he’s happy, he puts on music
and dances, it’s really nice. (Interview with parents, Cuiabá-MT)
Here, they’re taking more responsibility. They know they have to be
here on time and when it’s over they know they have to go. (Interview
with the community, Cuiabá-MT)
They stay at home more, they’ve stopped wandering around the streets.
I see that they’re not the same as they used to be, they come straight
home from there, if you say there’s nothing going on today, they come
back. They’re not the same as when I saw them on the street. (Interview
with members of the community, Cuiabá-MT)
You know there’s been an improvement, because I live close by and I
see these kids and at least there’s not all that hanging around, those
fights. I mean, like at this time you know they’re here and when they
leave here each one goes home, at least that’s what we think. But when
they’re here they’re busy, they’re not fighting. (Interview with members
of the community, Cuiabá-MT)
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4.5.2 Recorder Orchestra
1) Name of Organization
Municipal Secretariat of Education
2) Date of Foundation
1998
3) City/State
Cuiabá-MT
4) Type of Organization
Public, municipal
5) Program/Project Analyzed
Orquestra de Flautas Doce (Recorder Orchestra)
6) Contact
a) Dejane Ribeiro Campos / Municipal Basic Education School
b) Tel.: (65) 641-5889
c) URL: www.orquestradeflautas.com.br
7) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
Dejane Ribeiro Municipal School
8) Funding Sources
The Municipal Secretariat of Education deals with the purchase of
equipment and teachers’ salaries. The structure of the school, painting,
and fitting out the music room come from the Direct Money to School Plan
(PDDE).
9) Areas of Activity
Music and citizenship
10) Objectives
· Develop musical activities as a cultural element, reorganize values, ethical
principles, and citizenship and re-define the concept of music as art.
· In addition to being a form of artistic expression for the young population,
to offer a cultural alternative to low-income youths who don’t have access
to music.
11) Target Public
Pupils from the Dejane Ribeiro Municipal School, mainly girls.
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12) Description and Background:
The idea for the Recorder Orchestra project came from the conductor
Gilberto Mendes da Silva, who had already organized a choir project in the
Federal Technical School, which had been closed. The conductor sought
contacts to develop a project that would involve music and could benefit
youths. He drew up a plan that was endorsed by the Cuiabá Municipal
Secretary of Education and passed on to the senior management of the
Dejane Ribeiro School. The conductor gave several talks on the project and
80 candidates enrolled. The next step was the responsibility of the Municipal
Secretariat of Education, which acquired 40 soprano recorders, 15 music
stands, and 15 plastic-covered folders, items that were used to begin the
classes. Later two bass recorders were acquired, four tenor recorders, and
four altos, completing the four instruments of the section.
13) Personnel
There was no selection of staff since the conductor/coordinator brought
the project to the school and later, by agreement with the school senior
staff, appointed a female conductor. Also there is no training; what matters
is the qualification of the teachers, who are professional musicians.
My professional background is not academic in the sense of going to
university, but since I was a teenager I have worked with major
conductors in Minas Gerais, […] musicians who had worked in
Europe, where the technical level and technical demands are very
high. So I studied with these people and with this background I started
to develop my own work […] I began with popular music, training
singing and instrumental groups in Brazilian popular music. And
here in Cuiabá I have kept up my studies with the conductors P…. and
V….. always in open courses but within the area of classical music.
(Interview with coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
I trained in music education at the Federal University of Cuiabá-MT.
My musical training is what gives me a firmer base to work in this type
of project. (Interview with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
With regard to the institutional link between the teachers and the project,
the coordinator originally received a salary paid by the Municipal Secretariat
of Education. Later, for personal reasons, he gave up his salary, but remained
at the head of the project in a voluntary capacity. The female conductor is
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being paid by the Municipal Secretariat of Education. When the students
give performances, they receive no payment.
14) Ongoing Programs and Projects
Recorder Orchestra (presentation of project).
15) Methodology
A working methodology is used that was developed by the conductor
himself. There is an entire basic project to teach the instrument and reading
scores, and this is combined with a discussion of social problems:
So they get here and go through a sort of basics of music class, and
from there we start to work on ideas on humanity, ideas on citizenship,
this aggressiveness thing, all at the same time. We do a lot of this kind
of work, guiding them, but we don’t really have the means or the
techniques to do this. (Interview with coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
We have the following system: he’s the conductor and I’m the teacher
conductor responsible for the first contact with the instrument. Then I
do all the teaching of music, finger position, classifying voices, and
sections of the orchestra. And the final work, polishing and putting
on the finishing touches, that’s Mr. G….’s job, the teacher conductor.
(Interview with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
There is a basic division between new students and the more
experienced ones: Today we have a room for beginners and one for
‘veterans’, and the beginners are being fitted in as they improve.
(Interview with partner institution, Cuiabá-MT). An interesting aspect of
the working method is the system of adoption whereby an older student
studies together with a younger one: And when they arrive for the first
time you see that nervousness, so we say right then, ‘You’re the
godfather or godmother of this new student so you’re going to sit with
him and help him study the repertoire.’
In spite of it not having been made clear, it seems that when the
theoretical course is over, the youths join the orchestra and this creates an
atmosphere in which they feel they belong.
When this group is formed, it is welcomed with a performance for all of
them, the orchestra plays for them, they get an instrument and become
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responsible for those instruments […] these are simple but effective
methods of motivation. We create expectations. We hope that you’ll be
at our next performance. (Interview with coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
There is a whole process of promotion through the program, according
to the youth’s development:
We have a classification system according to sections in the orchestra,
sopranos, altos, tenors, and bass, the same classification as in an
adult choir. The child first goes through the soprano in spite of it
being the most difficult ‘voice’, by going through the soprano, he or
she gains agility, learns the musical notes and how to read a score
more easily. From there, we have the contraltos, the contraltos are the
second most difficult ‘voice’, together with the bass, but you can only
play the contralto when your fingers can spread more because the
holes of the recorder are a little further apart. So only the older students
who can open their fingers more go into the contraltos. The tenors are
reasonably easy recorders to read and to play, but again only those
who have a wider finger spread and are advanced in reading music
go into the tenors. It’s the same with the basses, the student who has
greater manual agility, greater dexterity, is considered to be one of
the best. They think, one day I’m going to pass to the contraltos, one
day I’m going to pass to tenor, and one day I’m going to pass to bass.
So the child is not there just playing soprano for the rest of her life.
She wants to develop in the program and that’s progression. (Interview
with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
The selection of students depends on the number of recorders and the
student’s enthusiasm:
We have vacancies according to the number of recorders we have. If
we have 20 recorders we announce 20 places and selection is natural.
When a student doesn’t manage to adapt, can’t keep up with the group,
they say it: ‘Look, teacher, I’m going to stop because I can’t do this,
and I’ll come back next year’. So it’s the student who makes the decision
to stop or go on, and the point isn’t knowing how to play, that incredible
talent, it’s wanting and liking to make music. (Interview with teacher,
Cuiabá-MT)
It is worth highlighting the testimonies of the students on how they
came in contact with the program and the role of the teachers. Some youths
were motivated by wanting to learn other instruments, not the recorder, and
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in spite of having adapted to the orchestra, they would still like other
instruments to be included:
To start with I came here to learn to play keyboard. Then it got me,
they left the instruments with us and I picked one up and took it home
and started practicing. (Interview with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
I got interested too. Lots of people started but gave up, they said it
was very tiring. But it’s something I think is worth making an effort
for and not giving up because with this you can get something
better, depending on how well you do. (Focus group with youths,
Cuiabá-MT)
When I choose the repertoire, we use the typical recorder repertoire.
So the recorder is from the Middle Ages, the Baroque Period, and the
Renaissance. They liked this repertoire, but when we put in another
kind of music that they heard on the radio, that was nicer for them. So
they chose to play popular music and left the Renaissance behind
because popular music is more suitable for this town. They felt more
pleasure not so much because of the difficulty, but mainly because it’s
part of their daily life. (Interview with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
Activities include daily practice from Monday to Friday, lasting about
an hour. When the students are able to play the instrument, they start to
give performances. These performances take on a fundamental role as
they introduce the youths to a situation they have not known before then,
because they live on the periphery:
With these chances to get out of the periphery and get right in among
the elite, where they have the chance to see and eat in a good restaurant,
sit at a good table, stay in a good hotel, all this is heaven for them. It’s
a dream getting up in the morning after sleeping in a bed with a firstclass mattress, having breakfast with fruit, being in a hotel and relaxing
in the pool, sitting in a chair and sunbathing. You can see it in their
faces, it’s a totally different expression that changes the whole way
they look. There’s that ritual of rehearsing, leaving the hotel, going to
the concert hall, you have that whole atmosphere, the sound, the
dancers, the other artists … So they feel they’re at the real center of an
event. And before, right before the concert, there’s the expectation, the
audience arriving, the feeling, the adrenaline, the expectation, until
the announcer goes out and announces them, there’s that nervousness
about going on stage, the tension… And afterwards they get together:
these are unforgettable moments that can happen in the lives of anyone
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who has access to this. For them it’s the greatest thing and this is the
main motivating element. (Interview with coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
The performances bring about recognition for the youths and visibility
for the project:
Before, we didn’t go outside the school. We weren’t technically ready,
so we stayed in school, then we played for parents, for the mother’s
day party, Christmas. But then over time we got better. They grew up,
they improved quite a lot and we started to get invited to play by
businesses in town. Now we’ve played at the Mato Grosso Ranch
Hotel, we’ve played at FIEMT, we’ve played in the America TV Center.
We’ve reached a really wide audience through the media. (Interview
with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
Monitoring of students is confined to contact with the teachers:
The teachers observe, so they’re always reporting to us. The concern,
the desire of the teachers is that the project gets bigger because the
results in the classroom are very good. (Interview with partner
institutions, Cuiabá-MT)
We don’t have anyone who can carry out psychological monitoring,
but the role of the teacher is that of a psychologist, it’s the role of
mother, the role of aunt, it’s the role of lots of people as well besides
the teacher, but that type of professional monitoring, no, we don’t
have that. (Interview with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
16) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The main partnership is with the Municipal Secretariat of Education
and the Dejane Ribeiro Municipal School, a Federal Technical School.
The project’s activities have ended up having ramifications with other
institutions and involving the community.
You see, the links of the recorder orchestra are closer to choirs, they
share a space with the University choir and with the Technical School
choir. Sometimes they’re also invited to perform with ballet groups as
with SINOP, where there was a ballet group and other groups. With
SINOP there were several performances that were not just ballet but
also dance and musical groups, you know? In this sense, they share
their space, serving as a model and stimulus for other projects.
(Interview with partner institutions, Cuiabá-MT)
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The project also stands out in the sense of being a model for experiments
in other schools:
We were invited to play in a municipal school, to stimulate the pupils
to participate in a recorder orchestra as well, and they saw that it
could be done. It’s not going to be something just inside the school,
but a high-quality thing that the community can admire, in a school
on the periphery. (Interview with partner institutions, Cuiabá-MT)
The very impact the Recorder Orchestra has achieved has brought
about the need to implement other complementary activities:
There is, they feel a great need for this, the recorder orchestra students,
to some extent they are envied in school. So that’s why we need to
create other projects in the schools, because we have some kids who
have no aptitude for music, some who are more for sports. So we have
to start up other projects in school. We have the drama project, we
have capoeira, but it’s something more internal. (Interview with partner
institutions, Cuiabá-MT)
Usually the neighborhood community takes part in activities and attends
performances.
We perform in the widest possible variety of places, from the elite to
the communities really on the periphery, we’ve played in palaces but
also in wooden shacks. There were all kinds of groups and the reaction
was democratic, independent of social class. (Interview with
coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
17) The place of evaluation and research in the experiment
No systematic evaluation of the project has been made:
No, none, except for the self-criticism that we make and I talk a lot
with my assistant and we are guided by means of these self-evaluations.
(Interview with coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
I think it’s done by the teachers’ observations. (Interview with partner
institutions, Cuiabá-MT)
There is no evaluation, this sort of evaluation hasn’t been done yet. I
still don’t know why, but it really would be very important. Now I and
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the teacher [...] have evaluated the project on a daily basis, the
children and everything, who’s going to pass to tenor? There is this
kind of technical evaluation of the project, but it doesn’t encompass
the whole project. (Interview with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
18) Specific Problems in the Experiment
· The greatest difficulties are the lack of funds to buy instruments and
the orchestra’s own transportation. In the beginning, the problem was
convincing the community of the viability and importance of the project:
We have difficulty in getting more recorders and for the second phase
of the project, we need to increase the number of recorders because
the beginners are already getting better. (Interview with partner
institutions, Cuiabá-MT)
The difficulty with transportation, difficulties with instruments, we
need new instruments and it’s a little difficult to get them. We don’t
have appropriate clothes, we designed a uniform that the school could
get and it was the school that got the uniforms, not the Secretariat. So
if you have a more sophisticated performance, something that demands
better presentation, they don’t have it, they don’t have a decent uniform
for the consort. It’s very difficult when you get into the financial part.
(Interview with partner institutions, Cuiabá-MT)
· Those involved in the project try in various ways to deal with the
problems that appear:
We began to appear in the media and to talk about our situation, to
talk about Jardim Vitória, to talk about the Dejane Ribeiro School, to
talk about the work the organizers have done in school and the teachers
started to see our work with new eyes. Really it’s not some little group
that practices an hour a day. It’s a group that has taken the name of
the school and the district forward, because the district is considered
to be one of the most dangerous ones in Cuiabá. There’s a music group
there that’s doing something different from violence, that’s enriching
the neighborhood, so they’ve looked at our work with new eyes.
(Interview with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
· Often, however, the family itself can become a barrier, forcing the
youths to leave the project:
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Usually the student leaves, but leaves crying, because his father has
made him, or they’ve moved to another city. (Interview with coordinator,
Cuiabá-MT)
There’s a large turnover and it hurts a lot when you hear a child say
that the mother doesn’t want them to come any more because the child
has to go and work in the center of town, so she can’t come to rehearsal
any more. So some parents take them out, but it’s not because they’re
being mean, it’s a cultural thing and it’s financial necessity. (Interview
with partner institutions, Cuiabá-MT)
· Difficulties in understanding the importance of music, among parents
and children: while most of them provide the greatest incentive for
their children to work hard, some mothers belittle the importance the
project has for their children:
My mother wants me to skip it, but I don’t like missing it. There are
times when I get so mad because I missed it and the first time I did I
cried because I was so mad because I had to stay and take care of the
neighbor’s kid while my mom went to work and the kid’s mother didn’t
come to get her until seven o’clock at night. I was really furious. It
wasn’t fair to miss practice because of her. (Focus group with youths,
Cuiabá-MT)
· The conductor and the teacher confirm that the dropout rate is very
low and that the number of students who have stayed is constant.
However, it is important to note that turnover within the orchestra
creates vacancies for new members.
Dropout rate zero. We always have turnover. For example, if we need
more basses because we need basses and if we can get these two basses
we’ll take two kids off the soprano and put them on the bass recorders.
So then two spaces for sopranos open up and then we get two more
kids from out there, from the school itself. (Interview with teacher,
Cuiabá-MT)
19) Why is it an innovative experience?
· The director considers this to be an innovative experiment, and in
order to justify this opinion she focuses on the impact of the experiment
on the way the youths see their lives:
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I think the change in the attitude of the youths is already an
indicator of success. Their attitudes in relation to how they see
their lives. They don’t think small anymore. They want to be
something, they have a much wider view of life. (Interview with
partner institutions, Cuiabá-MT)
Because it’s a peripheral neighborhood, the wealth doesn’t lie in being
a recorder orchestra, but in being a recorder orchestra where it’s
located. It’s a great contrast to see those kids playing the recorder the
way they do. They’re perfect, and they’re wearing rubber flip flops on
their feet. That’s why every time I hear them I cry. Because it’s such a
huge contrast. (Interview with partner institutions, Cuiabá-MT)
20) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· Those involved maintain that the project has caused significant changes
in the lives of the youths:
I’ve seen a radical change in behavior. One of the things that worried
me a little when I got there was the level of aggressiveness, not of
violence. For whatever reason, you always noticed a conflict, that
intolerance. (Interview with coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
There’s been quite a change and over time the orchestra’s work has
been producing this peaceful behavior among the students. So the
student who has got into the orchestra has improved his grades in
school, the student has really created another type of behavior.
(Interview with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
· There is a change in the youth’s world-view, which starts to be more
concentrated on his responsibilities. It affects the youth’s very behavior.
He is calmer and more dedicated to his other daily tasks, without his
relationship with his friends being affected:
The one thing that stands out in the school community is the Recorder
Orchestra. Because it’s visible, you can tell who a student in the
Recorder Orchestra is. It’s precisely this vision of the world that gets
wider. They become more critical, they discuss things more. They don’t
change their behavior towards other students. On the contrary, they
are afraid of missing classes or tests because the performances are in
the middle of the week. They’re the same as all the others. (Interview
with partner institutions, Cuiabá-MT)
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· Mothers notice changes in their children’s behavior, especially the
decrease in aggressiveness:
I noticed it, yes. My daughters are more caring, more attentive, more
obedient, it’s changed a lot for them, always for the better. (Focus
group with mothers, Cuiabá-MT)
My kids used to fight a lot and now they don’t fight hardly at all. Now
they are more friends with each other and their time is full and they
help each other more. They’re more friendly with their other brothers
and sisters. They’re more responsible, aren’t they? (Focus group with
members of the community, Cuiabá-MT)
· The teachers appear to be the principal channels for this change in
student behavior, along with the music itself.
You feel the difference in the child, the one who was all feisty before,
acting out in school. Today they’re completely changed, because they
know that if you don’t behave you get bad grades and then you can’t
go to the recorder class. (Focus group with members of the community)
· It is also important to note what working with low-income children
can teach the teachers themselves:
I already taught in several schools as a music teacher and head of the
children’s choir, but I had only taught in private schools and the
children in my church were from quite a high social level. I had never
worked with children from lower social levels so for me it was quite a
learning experience, because I learned to see the world through their
eyes…. (Interview with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
· The effects noted by the youths themselves are interesting, since
they involve real self criticism of their previous behavior. The youths
affirm that they have learned how to be more united and more
responsible.
Before, I used to mess around a lot more and didn’t pay much
attention in class, mainly math class where you have to pay a lot of
attention, and now my friends can’t believe it… (Focus group with
youths, Cuiabá-MT)
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I’ve changed a lot, because before, I used to just like playing at home
and now I have this commitment, I’ve got to come straight here and I
can’t miss it because kids who do this are interested in wanting to be
something in life. (Focus group with youths, Cuiabá-MT)
The effect is also found on the level of learning technique, and the
conductor points out three main aspects in its development: musical
knowledge, a change in preference, and interactivity with art:
We learn about the names, all the notes, the music, we learn how to
know the sound, like hearing the sound and knowing what the note is.
(Focus group with youths, Cuiabá-MT)
· There is a clear difference in attitudes and values between students
on the project and those who are not:
There’s a lot of difference, unfortunately. One of these nights, I left my
car when I was accompanying the children in a performance and they
scratched my car with a stone. It was really vandalism. I thought
about it afterwards. What was the difference between these kids in the
orchestra and the kids who scratched my car? In the first instance,
none, because our kids go to school at the same time. They study at
night. They’re the same age, live in the same neighborhood, it’s just
that our kids in the orchestra would never do that, first because they
respect other people’s property, what belongs to other people, and
second because they know that violence isn’t part of their lives.
(Interview with teacher, Cuiabá-MT)
You can see a much greater tolerance among them and at home the
reports their mothers give is that they are more tolerant there too.
They’re less aggressive and on the playground at school you can see
it, if you look … you can see who’s in the project and who’s not.
(Interview with coordinator, Cuiabá-MT)
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4.6 Pará
4.6.1 Colors of Belém (Cores de Belém)
1) Name of Organization
Municipal Council of Belém – Municipal Secretariat of Education –
Sports, Arts, and Leisure Section (Prefeitura Municipal de Belém
– Secretaria Municipal de Educação – Coordenadoria de
Esportes, Arte e Lazer)
2) Date of Foundation
1999
3) City/State
Belém-PA
4) Type of Organization
Public State
5) Name of the Project Studied
Culture, School, and Joy Project/Colors of Belém Project
(Projeto Cultura, Escola e Alegria/Projeto Cores de Belém)
6) Contact
e) Fátima Monteiro
f) Title: Director of the Sports, Arts, and Leisure Section
g) Tel.: (91) 276 3493
7) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
Schools in the municipal school system. Leisure areas, town squares,
soccer fields, and all available public or private leisure installations
are also used.
8) Funding Sources
The program’s funds come only from the Council and they are Council
funds, routed through the Municipal Secretariat of Education. The
project funds are included in the Ministry of Education’s budget.
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9) Areas of Activity
Development, linking, and mobilization of groups working with
graffiti, theatre, music, and visual and fine arts.
10) Objectives
· Stimulating the development of self-esteem by valorizing the
artistic production of graffiti artists.
· Strengthening the youth movement, guaranteeing respect and
the exercise of citizenship. Revitalizing the cultural memories
of neighborhoods through artistic graffiti shows, fortifying the
love for the city’s cultural heritage.
· Establishing interactive spaces where the youth can participate
and belong in an effective way.
· Ensure that the spaces utilized for these activities begin to aid in
the youths’ overall development so that it becomes possible to
establish harmonious relationships with oneself and with others.
· Exhibit the productions of youths involved in the Colors of Belém
project.
· Discuss proposals for the organization and actualization of the
graffiti movement.
· Gather the various agencies that work with the youths and
welfare institutions for youths at risk.
· Bring the Colors of Belém project into contact with schools and
society in general.
· Strengthen the cultural policy developed by the Mayor’s Office.
· Guarantee the improvement of artistic techniques through
practical workshops that enable the youth to join the job market.
11) Target Public
The Colors of Belém project involves youths from low-income
backgrounds who usually have little education, aged between 13
and 22. They live on the periphery and to a large extent are
victims of violence. Usually they have been graffiti sprayers and
have been gang members. Some of them have already committed
criminal acts. Most of the participants are male.
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12) Description and Background:
The Belém City Council is developing the Colors of Belém project,
developing actions together with the young graffiti sprayers from the
periphery in an attempt to give new meaning to their form of self-expression
and organization in order to transform the landscape of the city.
The project promotes workshops, debate, and leisure activities for the
youths. According to the organizers, this is a form of social mobilization
designed to strengthen the affective relationship of those living in Belém
with their city. It seeks to revitalize the visual impact of the city with the
help of the graffiti sprayers in the neighborhood communities.
The Colors of Belém project is based on the principle that the expression
of the sprayers, in the view of the organizers, is seeking an aesthetic-cultural
value in the act of creating graffiti. These projects seek to redeem the
youths’ self-esteem and overcome the delinquent aspect of the graffiti
spraying, reaching a new level of relationships between the graffiti sprayers
and the city’s population.
The training process in the Colors of Belém project is based on research
such as that carried out by the Economic and Social Studies Institute of São
Paulo (IDESP), which states that the participation of youths and children in
cultural activities is quite restricted. It fails to take place in the majority of
cases through lack of information, knowledge, and publicity as a result of
financial and transportation problems, as well as through the lack of interest
and support on the part of the family.
In their distance from cultural activities, children and youths turn to
different forms of unhealthy activities like forming the gangs. These gangs
breed on the Belém scene with a lot of unofficial graffiti activity.
The project began in 1999, from an idea that emerged in 1998. This
was expressed as a request both from the Municipal Education Forum and
in discussions held in the City Council meetings and in Mayor’s Office
itself. The project answered the call from community movements worried
by the high rate of involvement of youths in acts of violence.
13) Personnel
The project uses specialists, technicians, teachers, and coordinators
from the Mayor’s Office. Its team is made up of cultural organizers, art
monitors who carry out workshops with the youths, art education specialists,
physical education teachers, and teachers for children. These professionals,
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together with the workshops, work in monitoring the workshops and those
involved in these activities.
Academic qualifications are not required to work on the project. All that
is required is an ability to work with the youths, using an artistic language that
turns the street sprayer into a graffiti artist. Thus, the criterion for selecting
project workers becomes the ability to work in the area of theatre, music, and
visual and fine arts. Some have training, but this is not required as an essential
criterion. More importance is given to experience in the area of art education
and the development of projects with links to the community and projects in
non-formal education. Some of the art teachers were trained in local
universities, but the majority have secondary and technical level education.
[…] it goes from those who have I don’t know how many master’s
degrees to those who never went to a university but have a special
skill, a specific command of a certain area. So this is the profile of the
workshop staff. You have people who belong to folklore, people in fine
arts and theatre with I don’t know how many years of theatre school
or they’ve just worked in the theatre since they were teenagers and
today they have an accumulation of knowledge so you feel they’re
able to work here. Many people have this profile. (Interview with
specialists/project motivators, Belém-PA)
Selection of members of the project team is done mainly by agreements.
Many are public school teachers who have skills in the area of the arts.
Those who are not teachers in public schools are chosen by existing
agreements with the Association of Art Teachers, with FESAT and
CLAUTE. These have to be specialists.
The Municipal Secretariat of Education offers biweekly sessions aimed
at training and instructing teachers and art instructors. These sessions
concentrate on artistic activities. The instruction takes on a specific form
according to the requirement of the particular workshop. When the team is
working on dance there is instruction in dance and so on, successively. The
specialists are mainly effective teachers from the field. They are publicly
appointed and are made available because they are artists or because they
have another specific skill in the area of the arts. In this case they are taken
into the Colors of Belém project.
There are also staff contracted by the system of agreements with
FESAT and the Association of Art Teachers (AEPA). There are no
volunteer workers, just partnerships with workers in the community
and on other projects.
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14) Methodology
Initially, a survey of the area to be worked in is made by visiting the
place and measuring the degree of violence in and damage to public and
private spaces. Once the place to carry out the project has been chosen,
the next step is mobilization. This is accomplished indirectly by the institutions
of the municipal government using pamphlets, direct mailings, banners, and
cars with loudspeakers. It is also done directly, by means of visits to the
youths’ houses and meeting places, and conversations with parents and
organized groups. Publicity is also done in the schools. In addition, a link is
set up with partners in local society, community leaders, the Spraying Art
group, teachers, and other cultural movements.
The majority of the youths get to know about the Colors of Belém
project through friends or other people in their community, mainly those
who are graffiti artists and have already participated in the project. It is
interesting to note that many youths in school seek out the Colors of Belém
project in order to improve their drawing skills. This is not necessarily because
they belong to graffiti groups, which suggests that the project may have a
preventative influence.
Today the project has an average of 12 groups, each one with its own
specific characteristics. For example, there is a group made up mainly of
skateboarders who were never directly connected to gangs.
A seminar on the Colors of Belém project is presented for the youths
and soon afterwards the ‘Graffiti Workshop’ is set up and put into action.
The main activity of a workshop of this type is painting panels and murals.
There is direct observation of the execution of the panels in the graffiti workshop
classes and in the meetings with the Colors of Belém project youths.
The workshop activities are carried out along with meetings in which
work in education and consciousness raising of the youths is planned, seeking
to give them socio-cultural training. Only those who go to the meetings can
take part in the graffiti workshop’s external activities (the making of murals).
The coordination plans workshops and holds biweekly meetings with
organizations where a direct inter-relationship between the two situations is not
always dealt with. The situations are that of the youths in the organized movement
and that of those who are more regularly attended to in the workshops. There
is also the training situation, where the two groups meet biweekly at night and
discuss the problems they are experiencing, from organization to the graffiti
workshop itself. The activities have no fixed time limit, lasting as long as the
group needs. Many are re-directed but remain within the Colors of Belém
project. Most of the workshops last one year on average.
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Meetings for evaluation and recommendations complement the
evaluation process. These meetings are held monthly with the Colors of
Belém project managers and biweekly with the organized graffiti groups.
Meetings are also held with parents, community centers, cultural movements,
school administration, and teachers.
As well as having information about the life of the youths before the
project, leadership attitudes are fostered so that some project members
become points of reference in the community. Nevertheless, there is no
systematic follow-up on those who dropout of the Colors of Belém project
or on those who have completed its activities.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The Colors of Belém project has the support of two other Mayor’s
Office programs: Art and Citizenship, organized by FUNPAPA (an agency
of indirect administration of the municipality of Belém which is responsible
for coordinating municipal policy on social services) and Culture, School,
and Joy, organized by the Municipal Secretariat of Education; the Belém
Organized Graffiti Artists Movement; the Metropolitan Association of Graffiti
Artists; the Association of Art Teachers; the State Federation of Theater
Actors and the Theatre Actors Session.
In the beginning there were some partnerships with institutions such
as UNICEF and the EMAÚS Group. At the moment however, Colors of
Belém is involved with inter-secretariat work. EMAÚS still has an
information exchange relationship with the project. A partnership with the
Federal University of Pará is worth pointing out: the youths were invited to
paint a wall of the university following the proposed theme – flowers of the
Amazon. There are no partnerships with the aim of providing the Colors of
Belém project with funds.
Interaction with the various organized groups of graffiti sprayers in
the communities facilitates and strengthens the link the Colors of Belém
project has with the community.
They [Colors of Belém project) give us a lot of support in the financial
area, sometimes you only have enough money for a one-way ticket
and they pay the return ticket, our lunch, and the supplies, sometimes
they give them to us. They help us in all sorts of ways, making us feel
happy when we’re doing our graffiti, when we’re going to participate
in something. (Focus group with the community, Belém-PA)
Various agreements have been signed with artistic institutions such as
FESAT, AEPA, and CLAUTE. In addition, various organized cultural groups
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such as Refavela have actively participated in the Colors of Belém project.
There has also been participation from the Catholic Church in the project’s
work, mainly with the community.
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
Within the Colors of Belém project, biannual formal evaluations are
carried out by the Municipal Secretariat responsible for the project. An
audit of activities is carried out in which the main points to be reviewed are
defined. One very positive result of these evaluations was the change in the
methodology of the project with the inclusion of meetings with the youths to
discuss their realities.
Every semester the project specialists also carry out an ‘inventory’ of
the work, in which a quantitative record is made of the number of new
professionals who have been taken in on the project. Categories of research
in education within the movement have been developed on a systematic
basis. There are also other records, such as photographs, etc. In addition to
this, research is being carried out in universities in the state of Pará on its
activities and their impact.
For example, we have what is a very important advantage for us. That
is that there are training institutions that are doing research, students
from UEPA, UFPA and UNAMA are currently doing research on our
projects. (Interview with coordination, Belém-PA)
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Lack of funds and infrastructure was felt to be a problem by those
involved, since the budget granted by MEC is not enough to fully
develop the Colors of Belém project.
· Lack of participation of other Municipal Secretariats and greater
communication between them to allow the work to be taken further
and become multi-disciplinary was pointed out as a serious problem
in the project.
· Absence of more effective participation on the part of the government
agencies responsible for the area of violence among youths is also an
obstacle to the growth of the project.
· The project needs greater visibility as well as more efficient publicity
strategies.
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Our biggest problem, and that of the Mayor’s Office as a whole, is to
make our projects visible. We have not invested very much in
communication media. Our method is very basic, we do a lot within
our own network, going on community radio, going into the
communities with the projects and sometimes we go to a big
communications organization that we have access to. But I see it as
one of the points we have to think about. We have to think about it in
order to overcome it, because the projects are interesting and
sometimes we have a project and the community doesn’t know about
all of it, that it exists and that they can participate. (Interview with
coordinators, Belém-PA)
· The undefined nature of groups connected to the school or to the
agency was also cited. They start the process and request greater
continuity and follow-up. This is the example in the case of families
who question the lack of monitoring both of the youths in the
workshops and of those who have left.
Ok, they help from time to time with supplies, if we didn’t have supplies
we wouldn’t be able to do any graffiti at all, but I think that it’s not just
supplies, man. Another thing I think is wrong is that they ought to have
people full-time, because the people who are looking for the project
need something, you know. It’s not supplies, no, it can’t be bought like
paint, it can’t be bought… (Focus group with community, Belém-PA)
· The social difference between teachers and project members and
the difficulty in dealing with these differences also appeared as an
obstacle to the experiment.
These are people from another level and one level is never the same as
the other, you know? The relationship is always going to be friendly,
but it will never be equal, and you can get that into your head. I’ve
already stopped talking to them, I told them this, that if they really
want to help they shouldn’t give us supplies, they should get closer to
us, talk to us. And they should say: since we’re going to do a project,
I’m going to where you are. Let’s meet, let’s get things going, show that
they can live with us, have this contact. They’ve already proved they
can do this, because they’ve already done it, it’s just that they didn’t
take it far enough, you know? Maybe there wasn’t enough time, but
why didn’t they hire somebody who had the time to really spend time
with us? (Focus group with community, Belém-PA)
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· There is almost no turnover, but the rate of dropping out seems to be
quite high, cited in a number of testimonies. Many youths dropout for
the widest variety of reasons, the main ones being lack of family
support and the attraction of drugs and gangs. Many of the youths
return to being part of the cycle of violence.
There were the ones who wanted to leave. They wanted to, they
themselves. So there they go and they start to sniff glue and they don’t
come back any more. (Focus group with youths, Belém-PA)
· Even though meetings are held with parents, due to the characteristics
of the youths in the project, most of whom have been gang members
and graffiti sprayers, the Colors of Belém project doesn’t have a real
connection with parents. Many of the youths don’t have family as a
reference anymore and, in addition to that, there is a lot of prejudice
on the part of parents regarding the activities.
18) Why is it an innovative experiment?
· The importance of enabling youths to use culture, sports, or games to
channel their energies is agreed on among the participants. Many
believe that these activities are fundamental to the youths’ maturing
process, as well as to reducing the violence among them. Also, various
other factors indicate the innovative nature of this experiment.
· The project continues to stimulate a new role for schools, which is
that of an open space for discussion, character training, and respecting
popular culture.
The school starts to see that it becomes more of a space for learning.
So I see today that the school is already providing a space for this
discussion, you know? It’s already including that dimension that
is the aspect of culture in a broader sense. (Interview with
specialists, Belém-PA)
· The project has contributed to strengthening the organization of society
in this area through constructing an artistic movement to bring together
young graffiti sprayers. It has awakened a new vision of the public
heritage, of youth, and its value to society.
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It makes you understand that it is better to sketch or draw freely
than draw secretly and scratch things that way. (Focus group with
youths, Belém-PA)
First thing, a project has to be socially committed, a project that first
thing tries to develop an integrated person and looks for a young
dreamer, a kid who is concerned with his context, a kid who is
concerned with himself, who is concerned with visions of the world.
(Interview with specialists, Belém-PA)
· It has the power to spur the development of new abilities, opening up
possibilities in the job market as in painting. It also tries to strengthen
self-esteem and the consciousness of citizenship among the youths.
The work that Colors of Belém is doing is really great, in schools in lowincome areas, where the parents don’t engage in dialogue with their
children. Teachers and instructors have a more open relationship with
them, they are people who speak the same language as the kids, you
know? They share and the kid opens up, feels at ease and starts to draw,
to do graffiti, it works. (Interview with partner institution, Belém-PA)
19) Effects of the project in terms of changing the lives of the youths
· Among the effects found in the lives of the youths, a basic
characteristic has been the strong change in their view of the world:
They change the collective relationship they have among themselves.
They change the way they read the world, you know? They have a
much stronger relationship with the school, you know? (Interview
with coordinators, Belém-PA)
· The youths receive education and experience a humanization process
and the formation of an awareness of their rights:
But I believe in this as a way of valorizing what is human. It’s a
channel for humanizing people and social relations. It’s a channel
for saying no to some social practices that, as well as excluding,
make people feel so excluded that they feel they can’t fight, they
don’t know that they have a right to their rights. (Interview with
coordinators, Belém-PA)
They never thought of going into a public agency, you know? Talking
about what to do with a public grant was like something from another
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world for them. Today they can come here at any time of the day or
night and talk to us, on the question of self-esteem, of improving selforganization, mainly because the government transmits the question
of self-management as a pre-supposition of being democratic, of the
people. (Interview with specialists, Belém-PA)
· The youths have managed to free themselves from a situation in
which they were at risk, principally from violence. We can see also
the decrease in neighborhood rivalry and gang fights.
They aren’t how they used to be. They were always fighting, fighting
every night. They started to change, to learn other things. Half of them
aren’t, like, messing around, you know? So, what I mean to say is that
some of them are more together now and they can make better use of
their time. (Interview with specialists, Belém-PA)
If there is rivalry, it’s outside. When they come into the classroom, they
stop. They change completely. (Interview with specialists, Belém-Pará)
The question of territories has changed, so much so that we have
carried out activities with different groups from different
neighborhoods and we’re breaking up the neighborhood system.
(Interview with specialists, Belém-PA)
· Participating in activities has developed abilities and also brought about
new perspectives, including those concerning work.
There’s another meaning, I’m an ex-graffiti sprayer … I wanted to try
myself out to see if it was cool; so I sprayed, risked my life at night,
risked getting shot, anything. But it was just a phase and I got out
because that wasn’t for me, I’ve been working now for three years.
(Focus group with community, Belém-PA)
Those who are really in gangs, it’s a question of lack of possibilities,
of not being certain of that first job, of you saying: ‘At least I can
guarantee letting you study. At least I’ll guarantee letting you express
your culture, being able to access the means to a good life, to material
things.’ I think that first it’s this question of them hanging around the
streets with nothing to do. When you can guarantee them an activity,
guarantee possibilities, a direction, then you can definitely develop
their abilities. (Interview with specialists, Belém-PA)
They’re going back to the streets and talking among themselves and
looking for other possibilities for themselves. A lot of them are doing
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work like commercials, or they’re painting the front of a shopping
center or a night club. They can do graphics. Groups are buying
their own supplies and showing that the can is more. It’s like a brush,
they can express themselves better today. (Interview with specialists,
Belém-PA)
· The project has brought about a great change in the youths’ behavior.
Now, no, you don’t think any more about getting a stolen can and
going off spraying. You think more about next year when I’m going to
work, about the money I’m going to get, I’m not going to go around
using other people’s houses. We’re not going to just spray anymore,
we’re going to draw, trying, like to get better, improve in this, do
better drawings. Before, I thought the day I get a gun I won’t have to
run away from anyone, I’m going to spray everywhere. That was what
I thought, not now. Now’s the time for me to get my money, I’m going to
buy supplies to paint my whole house, and it’s pretty big. I’m going to
paint the inside of it. My dad’ll let me, mom too, to improve it. At least
I, for me, I’ve gotten better. My thinking is completely different. (Focus
group with youths, Belém-PA)
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4.6.2 Radio Margarida
1) Name of Organization
Centro Artistico Cultural Belém Amazônia (Belém Amazônia Artistic
Cultural Center)
2) Foundation Date
1992
3) City/State
Belém, PA
4) Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5) Program/Project Analyzed
Radio Margarida Program
6) Contact
a)
Osmar Pancerra
b) Telephone: (91)222-5849
c)
e-mail: [email protected]
7) Locations where the Activities Take Place:
Federal University of Pará Campus; schools, community centers and
locations in the communities of the benefited neighborhoods.
8) Origin of Resources
The budget depends on partnerships that are established throughout the
year. Some projects receive financial collaboration from organizations
such as UNICEF and ABRINQ in addition to public agencies such as the
Association for the Support of the Solidarity Community, the Executive
Secretariat of Labor and Social Service and BNDES.
9) Areas of Activity
Art (health, education), the environment, cultural exchange (research,
human rights), citizenship and professional training.
10) Objectives
To contribute to the development of the human potential of the youths
through popular education.
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To provide professional training and the means to compete professionally
in the job market.
To encourage the struggle for the rights and exercise of citizenship.
To solve problems such as the lack of opportunity for the youths to
participate in professional training courses as well as their lack of access
to sports, culture and leisure activities.
To redeem the playful cultural dimension of each community through
artistic and cultural activities such as games, music and puppet theatre.
11) Target Public
Youths and adolescents from 14 to 21 years of age from low-income
families suffering from a lack of information, leisure, culture, sports and
professional training.
12)
Description and History
The Belém Amazônia Artistic Cultural Association is primarily known
for its Radio Margarida program. This program works with children and
youths from low-income areas and with the community in general, developing
activities focused on popular education. The target public of this program
are youths from 14 to 21 years of age that come from low-income families
and that have little or no access to leisure, cultural or professional training
activities. The program allows this access to everyone, independent of race,
sex or religion.
The organization utilizes the widest variety of artistic languages and
means of communication. The principal areas of activity are art, education,
health, the environment, cultural exchange, research, human rights, citizenship
and professional training. In the courses that are offered there is a search
to redeem the self esteem of the youths, encouraging interpersonal
relationships and using group dynamics to help confront the obstacles the
youths face in their daily lives.
The projects developed by Radio Margarida have a broad reach and
significance in the greater Belém area as well as in some cities in the interior
of the state. The projects have already received prizes that have granted
them recognition for work with adolescents. These prizes include the
Netherlands National Lottery – Art and Education with Children and
Adolescents of November, 1996. The program was nominated for this prize
by the UNICEF/Amazônia office of UNICEF/Holland. More recognition
came in the form of credits on the CD A Tempestade ou o Livro dos Dias,
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from the rock group Legião Urbana in September, 1996. The CD cites the
program as important in defending the rights of children, youths and women.
The program was also a finalist in the Itau/UNICEF-Education and
Participation prize in 1997.
The idea emerged and developed in 1991 and then became an NGO. The
NGO Belém Amazônia Artistic Cultural Center was legalized in 1992. Initially,
the program was restricted to sporadic projects. They were invited to put on
puppet shows to distribute information on the Statute of the Child and Adolescent.
From 1994 onwards, the Radio Margarida activities began to be developed in a
continuous fashion. The largest signs of this change were the beginning of
projects in conjunction with the Federal University of Pará and the formalization
of the popular education method called Action Radio (Rádio Ação) and with
the signing of a partnership agreement with UNICEF.
The principal idea of the program arose from the decision to use art,
the theatre, the circus and clowns to talk about social issues, to use
culture...in this case there was an effort made to create a social program
in another fashion, starting from thinking about culture and art, art
education. (Interview with Coordinator, Belém, PA)
13) Human Resources
In general, the motivators/educators have college degrees or they are
professional artists. Radio Margarida counts on art-educators that link
academic training with experience in culture and popular education, in addition
to experience in the field of art-education with needy youths.
The Radio Margarida program is made up of art-educators and other
professionals. Two social assistants have been developing a puppet theatre
project and one with clown presentations that emphasize art as a way of
delivering information. There is also a social assistant that has direct contact
with the youths in the project. There is a self-taught fine artist who has
been developing projects of art-education in the areas of health, the
environment and cultural exchange. There are also a few performers that
act, work the puppets, and perform as clowns.
There are social assistants, art-educators, pedagogues. Most of them
are art-educators, but it doesn’t really matter what the profession is.
What matters is that education is taking place through art. (Interview
with Coordinator, Belém/PA).
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In the beginning of the Radio Margarida activities, the motivators were
volunteers. They were invited to participate in initial meetings and the
selection criteria was their action and their identification with the program.
Currently, people with college degrees are selected (psychologists,
social assistants). This criteria is preferable, but it is not always necessary.
Individuals with experience in art and who have been affected by this
experience and who have had some experience as art-educators are given
preference. In general, these are freelance professionals that receive
payment on a per service basis.
The training sessions are internal and constant and focus on training
educators in theatre practices aimed at peripheral populations. These training
sessions (workshops) have taken place through a partnership with UNICEF
since 1994.
14) Current Programs and Projects
The Radio Margarida activities concentrate on projects with youths
and the community in general with the following:
Youth Project: a project to combat the violence surrounding youth in
Belém with sports, cultural and leisure activities like games, group dynamics,
theatre and music.
Environmental Education Project: environmental issues are discussed
with the community. These issues include preservation, clean up, hygiene,
forestation, recycling methods for urban waste and other related themes.
Contact with these communities is made through prior links with the local
neighborhood associations. These contacts take place about a month in
advance and the programs are developed after this.
Radio Action Extension Program: this project takes place in
partnership with Liberal Radio AM. It is an integration project of UFPAPROINT. The main activity of this project is centered on visits to the schools
to develop themes to be discussed with the youths themselves. These themes
are given one hour of radio time with an expert in the field. The main themes
are job safety, the Statute of the Child and Adolescent, sexuality and drugs.
They are all themes related to the youths. The program is finalized with a
radio soap-opera that is produced and performed by the youths themselves.
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Professional Training Project: this project is developed in partnership
with the Association for the Support of the Solidarity Training Program. It
seeks to train the youths as environmental agents. This course seeks to
redeem the self-esteem of these youths, working on their interpersonal
relationships. The course uses group dynamics in order to help the youths
confront the obstacles they face in their daily lives.
Wide Eye Cinema Project: in partnership with SETEPS and the
Solidarity Community, this project seeks to train and qualify youths for the
technical areas of video and TV with an emphasis on ECA, education,
professional qualification, citizenship, work and creating income opportunities
and associations.
Public Ministry and the Community: this project allowed the services
of the Public Ministry to be developed directly within the community. This
facilitated requests for judicial action and made it easier to accompany cases
that already existed.
Health and Joy Project and the Smile Project: in conjunction with
UNICEF, these projects aim to distribute information about health and
hygiene through educational actions that occur through methods that are
vital to health.
Among these activities, the Youth Project deserves special mention.
Activities focused on combating violence are developed through sports,
leisure and culture. The theme of this project is Everything for youth:
sports, culture and leisure. Nothing for violence.
15) Methodology
Experiences resulted in the institution’s commitment to develop projects
focusing mainly on childhood and youth with socially excluded individuals.
The project proposals are developed in a collective form that includes
everyone in the institution. The projects are then formalized by the partners
and the projects are inscribed as part of the Solidarity Training Program.
The method used is language as a means of communication. Emphasis
is given to theatre, video education, games and mobile sound systems. The
stress is on an artistic and playful way to reach the public. Different urban
and cultural aspects of the neighborhood and the community are examined
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in order to use them during the period the activities take place. This is
always accomplished through a point of reference like a community center,
association or school. From this moment on specialists and educators put
themselves into the neighborhood and develop a variety of activities in
partnership with the schools, community centers and the community in
general. The interested youths go through a selection process to enroll in
the activities.
Depending on the nature of the project, theatre and puppet presentations
are held along with artistic attractions, games and shows. There are also
educational projects in the open air with huge screens in schools and
community centers. All sorts of artistic means are used to get the necessary
information across. The duration of the activities and the courses depends
on the establishment of partnerships and the availability of funds. On the
average, the projects are financed for six months.
We go there with our team, we go and visit the schools and the
community centers. We take theatre and puppet shows and we put on
these artistic attractions. We have these games, these acts and shows.
We put out these educational invitations and we do it out in the open
air with big screens and we have shows out there too with the whole
population. (Interview with coordinator, Belém/PA)
The assimilation part is easier. I remember when I was little and I had
to study the history of Brazil and I used to say why don’t we make a
film so I could see it and it would be a lot easier. Because sometimes I
would go to the movies and I would get home and I would tell the
whole story, the whole movie. (Focus group with specialists/motivators,
Belém/PA)
The demand for the courses mainly comes from boys, but Radio
Margarida reserves places for girls. The program also reserves special
places for special needs kids. The demand is usually much higher than the
number of places available. For the training course for environmental
agents for example, there were 30 places available for around 200
interested individuals.
The duration of the activities depends on the partnerships that are
established and the design of the project. The courses last an average of
five or six months. The projects from the years 1998 and 1999 were six
months long. For the year 2000 they were five months long as they were
working according to the financial partners who determined the duration
of the projects.
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There has not been a great amount of continuity in the projects and
there has been no accompaniment with the youths after the courses end.
This is a problem brought up by all concerned, including the adolescents
themselves. This lack of continuity for the projects occurs for different
reasons. These reasons include lack of space. (There is no official
headquarters for the project. It occupies space that is provided by the
university.) There is also a small technical staff (20 people) for so many
activities. There is also a lack of funding.
Today Radio Margarida has an agreement to go into the area and
train multiplying agents. But the minute that Radio Margarida gets
out there’s this vacuum. Why’s that? The youth doesn’t have a real
investment to move ahead with what he’s learned, or to pass it on.
(Focus group with community members, Belém/PA)
It gives the training to the youth but we can see that there’s really
no follow up because the person who is qualified by these classes
by Radio Margarida needs to have a chance to get a job and put
into practice what they’ve been studying. So Radio Margarida is
training this professional and just leaving him or her there. So I
think the program could get this person more involved and put
what they learned into practice. (Focus group with parents/
guardians, Belém/PA)
To really provide continuity to the project on a long-term basis it would
really have to accompany the youths. This is really difficult because
when the training course is over, you’ve got the funding issue. Because
as an institution we just really don’t have the money to do this kind of
follow up. (Focus group with specialists/motivators, Belém/PA)
16) Networks, Multiplication, Partnerships
The Radio Margarida Program has links and institutional partnerships
with public agencies, developing public services in political policies that are
focused on youth. The main public partners are the Association for the
Support of the Solidarity Community, the Executive Secretariat of Labor
and Social Service and BNDES.
Special mention goes to the partnership with the Federal University of
Pará that provides space for the headquarters of the agency to develop
outreach projects on artistic languages and communication media in
conjunction with Radio Margarida.
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Other partners are UNICEF and the ABRINQ Foundation. Some
partnerships with women’s movements and environmental agencies should
also be mentioned. These include the partnership with the Novo Encanto
Association and the Ecological Movement. Another highlight is the joint
action with the Center of Defense, an agency that is dedicated to denouncing
violence against children.
Various partnerships and alliances are made through other civil society
agencies and public agencies. However, not much emphasis is given to
these links. The joint action occurs in areas that the agencies have in
common and basically involves cultural and artistic movements together
with artists as in the partnership with the Radio Worker’s Union and TV
Cultura from Pará.
The youths’ families are involved beginning in the selection process
when home visits are made. They are also involved in meetings that take
place periodically. However, it should be noted that some parents show no
interest in the activities their children participate in. This leaves something
to be desired in terms of family involvement in regards to the multiplying
effect of the activities.
On the other hand, there are excellent repercussions in the communities.
The trained youths turn into multiplying agents and they pass on information.
Above all, this occurs in the environmental education area. They visit schools
and community centers and public squares and put on theatre and puppet
theatre presentations with texts that are easy to understand and that
incorporate the reality of the community.
17) Evaluation and Research in the Experience
Periodic monitoring visits are made by the Solidarity Training
Program and by specialists from the Executive Secretariat of Social
Service. These visits evaluate the daily routine of the projects and
this is how continuous evaluations are preformed for the partners of
each project.
Our evaluations are periodic and always take place with the partners
that develop the projects. So, for example, in October and November
last year there was this BID evaluation on our UMA project and now
we have a SETEPS and Solidarity Community evaluation about our
environmental agencies course. We have constant and periodic project
evaluations. (Interview with coordinator, Belém/PA)
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Internal evaluations are performed by the technical team and by the
students and participants in the projects. This evaluation takes place through
observations and an exam of the project results that is presented by the
youths. Other means are discussions between the project participants and
meetings with the technical team and family members.
18) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Resources and Infrastructure
There is a clear preoccupation with the lack of resources for the
development and refinement of the Radio Margarida projects. The resources
are insufficient and irregular as they depend on establishing partnerships.
According to those involved with the projects, other problems that affect quality
are the lack of adequate infrastructure and the lack of an official headquarters.
They also cite the small amount of supplies and the lack of human resources.
Lack of resources, partners, and the absence of institutions that make
themselves available to work with civil society in a serious fashion
without making political demands for things...(Interview with
coordinator, Belém/PA)
[...] unfortunately we still haven’t managed to get the funding with
partners that could finance a headquarters, a place where we could
develop, get a permanent place together and develop a project with
the community. (Focus group with specialists/motivators, Belém/PA)
·
Sustainability
Financial difficulties threaten the sustainability of the Radio Margarida
Program. Another item that refers to the sustainability of the program is partner
turnover. According to the coordinator, some projects do not even take place
because UNICEF considered the agency capable of obtaining resources through
a wide variety of sources and began to invest in other programs.
[...] it even reaches the budget, the financial timetable. There’s no
room to breathe. They pay for some things and other things you have
to get somewhere else. So the agency itself that’s doing the financing
doesn’t really give you support. That’s one of our problems. We reinforce
this sustainability, we’re always going after these projects, developing
them in three months, six months. Then they’re over and we’ve got to
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go after it all over again. This is one of our problems. (Focus group
with specialists/motivators, Belém/PA)
·
Quantity and Duration of the Courses
The students consider the number of places in the courses to be very
limited (the demand is much higher than the offer). They also see the duration
of each course as very short (five to six months). This makes it impossible
to develop activities in a deeper fashion.
Look, I think that it should really be opened up, the structure of
participation in Radio Margarida. Even we can see that they can’t
take it any further, and Radio Margarida should really be able do it.
I think it’s an investment that really has to be made. (Focus group with
community members, Belém/PA)
Well, the only negative thing is that I thought it was really too short.
It wasn’t enough time, you know, it was already ending and I got a
little sad. (Focus group with youths, Belém/PA)
19) Why is it an Innovative Experience?
· The importance of projects that work with culture, sports and games
to channel energy and to mobilize the affective and emotional potential
of the youths in a positive fashion is highly recognized. This is part of
the line of action of the Radio Margarida Program. The program
stimulates self-esteem through activities linked to theatre, dance and
music. One example of this is education for citizenship.
One of the positive aspects of the project is that they treat everybody
the same. They try to get that into our heads, that everybody’s equal,
that nobody’s better or worse than anyone else. You are what you
want to be. (Focus group with youths, Belém/PA)
They really make us learn a lot about fighting for our rights, fighting
for what’s ours. So they’re always stressing that you’ve got to fight for
your rights and that nobody is inferior to anybody else. We’re all
equal. It’s also that you can grow in life like that and you can help
other people grow too. (Focus group with youths, Belém/PA)
In addition to this, another highlight is the fact that the program creates
places where the youths can spend their idle time with activities that arouse
their interests.
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· Positive effects in relationships with the community are associated
to participation in the projects. This indicates that the strategy of
combining art with educational issues and principles of citizenship
are effective.
The community is always asking “Why don’t we ever see those clowns
from Radio Margarida anymore?” It’s not like Radio Margarida
abandoned us. Take this to the community, encourage them, because
there’s still hope. I think that spreading the word on Radio Margarida,
I think this is hope because the youth of today is tomorrow’s adult.
(Focus group with community members, Belém/PA)
· The partners also demonstrate their satisfaction with the projects’
results.
We’ve seen a lot of results in this year of partnership. You see the kids
are happy by the looks on their faces and their enthusiasm during a
theatre presentation or a game. You see it in a workshop, the child is
happy, the kid knows that he was the one that could make this
transformation. He could play that game, he could make something
that could have been garbage into something else, into something.
(Interview with partner, Belém/PA)
· Normally, the youths do not drop out of the programs. They only drop
out when they get a job that prevents them from participating in the
project.
It’s certainly a success when you measure it in terms of how the kids do
not drop out. You see that in the end you really managed something.
The kids are really involved. They know what’s going on, they’re
motivated. I think it’s because they get all this motivation because
every day it’s something new. They get theatre, painting, discoveries.
So every day it’s like this new thing because environmental education
is like that, there’s no formula for environmental education. (Interview
with partner, Belém/PA)
20) Effects of the Experience on the Lives of the Youths
The youths demonstrate enormous changes in behavior when they
participate in the projects. They become more trusting and secure and
they feel more able to fight for their dreams. Many of them begin to
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behave in a more responsible fashion. They even change their behavior
with their families.
· The youths also begin to feel motivated in investing in their futures.
Many of them begin to make an effort to get into university. This was
a dream that seemed very distant to them before participation in the
projects. In addition, they begin to become familiar with their rights
and begin to act in a more active way in order to obtain them.
For me the positive thing about this course was that it really improved
things. I think I got more responsible because before I never worried
about getting up early to do anything. Not now, now I’ve got this
worry. I think that my relationships at home really changed a lot.
(Focus group with youths, Belém/PA)
· Through professional training the project provides the youths with
the means to compete in the job market. This training has been
carried out in an integral fashion, developing the youths’ sense of
responsibility and encouraging them to continue their studies,
including university. It also enables them to fight for their rights and
exercise their citizenship in a complete way. This set of factors has
provided the youths that benefit from the programs with greater
outlooks for their lives.
[...] I’ve seen this behavior thing work. Because the fact that the kid
gets into a university has this huge meaning. The kid feels responsible
and even after the course the kid feels responsible for coming back
one day and going on to college. You watch the kid working on it, on
that desire to change, to be somebody. (Focus group with parents/
guardians, Belém/PA)
· An effort is made to develop the youths’ socialization processes,
with emphasis on respect for differences and on solidarity.
So you get this kid socialized, working in groups. You can see that
there’s this dominating and this submissive class. You watch them
looking for solutions for their own problems. You can see that they see
themselves as oppressed, but they also see the opportunity for changing
this. (Interview with coordinator, Belém/PA)
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The course taught us how to deal with the differences that people
have. Things like you, me, everybody, we’re all really part of a unit.
We’re all we’ve got. Like the course taught us how to get along with
each other, how to deal with differences and accept them. So we had
all these classes with a social assistant who gave us this exchange
thing so we could learn how to live in society, in a community. So we
could live in a group and get along together. It’s like today we don’t
really have this excellent getting along thing, but we do get along
pretty good. (Focus group with youths, Belém/PA)
· The youths feel valorized because they have been given useful
information for their future. They feel encouraged to overcome their
own limitations.
I think that the big difference, the main difference is that we’ve got
information that they didn’t get the chance to have. So this is important
because it’s like the information that we have gives us more ability to
understand, to accomplish and to find ways out of some of the situations
that we come up against in our lives. So that’s the difference. It’s that
a lot of the kids out there when something happens or there’s some
problem they want to kill someone or do something really fast. But in
here we learn that you don’t always do the easiest thing because
down the line you’re going to regret that thing that you’re doing now.
(Focus group with youths, Belém/PA)
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4.7 Pernambuco
4.7.1 Coletivo Mulher Vida (Woman Life Collective)
1) Name of Organization
Coletivo Mulher Vida (Woman Life Collective)
2) Foundation Date
1990
3) City/State
Recife, PE
4) Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5) Program/Project Analyzed
Viva a Menina Adolescente (Viva Teenage Girl)
6) Contact
a) Ceci Helenize Prestelo Bezerra - President
b) Telephone: (81)3431-1196
c) e-mail: [email protected]
7) Locations where the Activities Take Place:
Low-income communities in Olinda, Recife, Paulista and Boa Viagem.
8) Origin of Resources
UNICEF, Cáritas/Germany, Austrian Mission, Ansertai Berlin, POMMAR,
CISS, WCF Brazil, KVE and Solidarity World Action.
9) Areas of Activity
Prevention and combat of domestic violence, abuse and sexual exploitation.
10) Objectives
To prevent and combat domestic violence, abuse and sexual exploitation
of children, adolescents, youths and adults, mainly female, that are victims
of this type of violence.
To work on the self-esteem of young adolescent victims of domestic and
sexual violence.
To prepare the youths to confront the process of violence within the
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family, according to the parameters of the Statute of Children and
Adolescents.
To create alternatives to overcome violence with youths as subjects in
this process.
To provide personal and human growth for children, adolescents, youths
and adults, mainly female, that are victims of domestic violence, abuse
and sexual exploitation.
To work on a project for the prevention of STDs/AIDS and teenage
pregnancy.
11) Target Public
Children, adolescents and young women from low-income communities.
Priority is given to those that live with domestic violence, abuse and
sexual exploitation. The age group varies mainly between five and 22
years of age, with the exception of a program specifically aimed at women
over 23 years of age.
12) Description and History
The Woman Life Collective began its activities in 1990. With its
own resources, the program rented a space to begin working with women
that were victims of domestic violence, abuse and sexual exploitation. In
1991, workshops were held in the peripheral areas where leaders were
chosen to train and organize mutual support groups in each neighborhood.
In the beginning, activities took place in four communities: Nova Olinda,
Rio Doce, Bultrins and Ilha do Rato. In 1992, the institution coordinated
the Latin-American Caribbean meeting against domestic and sexual
violence. This event generated an important network of women all over
the Latin-American continent.
The Viva Teenage Girl Project began in 1992 in four communities.
Through questionnaires that were distributed in the public schools,
adolescents that were living in situations of violence were selected to
participate in the projects. Groups of 20 to 25 adolescents met in
neighborhood schools or block associations or in Catholic or Protestant
churches that were provided for the weekly meetings. After a few years,
this project, in conjunction with the Woman Life Collective, received the
highest UNICEF award – the Children and Peace Award 1998.
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In 1994 the institution’s activities increased significantly. The institution
was able to rent a space. This was a support house for these adolescent
girls. The institution was also able to include reinforcement to psychological
services with artistic-cultural and sports activities.
13) Human Resources
Human resources include a university level educator. There is hope
that in the future this educator will be someone from the group of adolescents
that is already taking the necessary training to reach this goal. There is also
a psychology group working in the institution that includes two psychologists
and four volunteers.
A university degree in psychology, social service, education or sociology
or current enrollment is required to be an educator. The selection process
begins with announcements in the universities. This is followed by curriculum
analyses, interviews and specialized recommendations. One of the principal
elements for selection is the candidate’s “charisma”. Value is given to the
candidate’s desire to work with adolescents as well as the ability to develop
workshops. Value is also given to qualities like patience, communication
skills, dealing with the preconceived notions of the youths and the ability to
pass on information appropriate to the characteristics of the target public.
On admission, the educators go through a training course for
approximately two months. They approach the themes they will be working
on in the neighborhoods. The Collective’s projects are developed by paid
professionals and volunteers. The volunteers are fewer in number. Using
volunteers is a recent practice that began in 2000 and that is being developed
more specifically in the area of psychological support. Currently the
institution counts on four volunteers in this area.
The youths that stand out in the project begin to become involved as
monitors. There are work-study individuals that are paid for periods of six
months to one year. They receive training during this time and develop
activities with the educators in different communities like Água Comprida,
Campo Grande, Janga and Tururu. They also receive transportation costs
according to their hours and the neighborhoods they travel to.
14) Current Programs and Projects
The main project is Viva Teenage Girl. This project involves a wide
variety of programs that focus on the prevention and combat of domestic
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violence, abuse and sexual exploitation with those that live in a situation of
personal and social risk. These programs are listed below.
Happy Child – Developed with children (boys and girls) above
five years of age that live on the street in a situation of social risk in
the municipality of Boa Viagem/PE.
CMV Computers – Holds computer workshops with female
teenagers and youths that are victims of domestic violence, abuse and
sexual exploitation in the involved communities.
Prevention in the Schools beginning with Municipalities – Developed
a prevention project in the involved communities.
STDs/AIDS – Proposes a project for multipliers in the schools,
beginning with the girls that are in the project and focusing on youth
protagonists.
The Woman Life Collective developed two projects directed towards
adult women.
Woman Citizen works with the training of community agents.
Transition Group is directed at young women between 18 and 22 years
of age that are not included in the children and adolescent age group.
With the exception of the Happy Child Project, the other projects are
directed exclusively at women. This includes youths, adolescents and
children. The main activities include psychological and legal service. They
also include the organization of a theatre group and belly dancing classes.
There are also projects that focus on sexuality in a positive way, encouraging
love for the body. There are also Spanish and English classes and tutoring
in math, biology, physics and Portuguese so the adolescents can prepare for
the college entrance exam. There are also computer classes.
We have some teenagers that have passed the college entrance exam
and today they are educators. Little by little we’ve been organizing a
sports project. There’s a beach volleyball field in front of where the
Collective used to be, so we started organizing tournaments for the
teenagers on the beach. We did this in line with the concept of arteducation as fundamental for human development. (Interview with
coordination, Recife/PE)
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15) Methodology
Schools are considered to be the main instruments for the youths to
have access to the project. Many youths that participate in the Collective
got to know about the Collective through schools. This is the place that is
given priority in terms of distributing information on the Collective’s activities.
Periodic assemblies take place every two months with the participation of
educators, the target-public and community leaders to discuss the
“institutional lines” of each project with a group of directors and coordinators.
The institution acts directly according to the socio-economic
characteristics of the region. Priority is given to low-income areas.
Contacts are made with schools and/or neighborhood associations and
mothers’ groups. This is done in order to obtain specific information about
the communities in an effort to reach the target-public. Meetings are
organized to present the Woman Life Collective to the community and to
apply questionnaires. After the questionnaires are answered a list of ten
selected girls is given to the school.
It’s not that we didn’t want the ones that weren’t selected. It’s not that
they’re not wanted, but that we have a certain profile that we’re
looking for. The questionnaire lets us know if something is bothering
the girl, if something is going on. If it’s a teenager then we don’t just
make this set identification, they’re welcome in the groups. (Interview
with coordination, Recife/PE)
On the average there are 25 adolescents in each project in the case of
Viva Teenage Girl where most of the Collective’s activities are developed.
There is a very high demand that is not met for adolescents and youths of
15 to 17 years of age. The majority of the youths of 15 to 17 years of age
enroll in the Collective because of histories of sexual abuse and domestic
violence. According to the educators, this violence is expressed in bad
treatment and sexual abuse. Most of the time they are only identified as
such in group dynamics that occur in the activities. Many youths also relate
personal involvement with agents of violence and involvement with drugs.
This profile justifies the emphasis on psychological support in the workshops.
There are criteria for the girls’ to continue in the group. There are
rules that have to be followed, as there are in school. No tardiness, no
smoking, etc. In the headquarters, the Woman Life Collective developed a
variety of projects with adolescents and youths in the form of professional
training and computer courses. Workshops to develop the youths to talk
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about and work on situations of domestic and sexual violence are also
developed with a therapeutic and preventive approach.
There are activities where teams of youths go into the communities to
put on theatre plays that are rehearsed in the project. They also work with
photography and even learn photography techniques, developing photos that
are then sold. Another highlight is an information bulletin produced for
women. According to the youths, the Collective “really demands a lot in
terms of studying.” Part of the methodological proposal of the educators is
systematic accompaniment of the youths’ performance in school.
The Woman Life Collective is building an important action in the sense
that some of its practices and guidelines in the prevention of domestic and
sexual violence among youths have become political policies. The municipal
project deals with preventive means against domestic and sexual violence.
The Collective trained teachers from the municipal public school system for
three months. The goal of this project is to carry out a pilot project on
prevention that will go beyond the municipality of Olinda and expand into
other neighborhoods. The actual prevention project is limited to 25
adolescents in 12 neighborhoods. There are seven in Olinda, two in Paulista
and two in Recife. The Collective has also developed activities with the
Camaragibe and Cabo Mayor’s Offices.
Annual reports are made in order to monitor the youths in the projects
during the activities. Surveys about the girls’ conditions of life are used
towards this purpose. However, there is no accompaniment of those that
leave the project.
16) Networks, Multiplication, Partnerships
The Collective is part of a network of NGOs from the social area
in Pernambuco. There are groups that act in streets and town squares
with street children movements. Casa de Passagem (Transit House) is a
feminist NGO and is a Woman Life Collective partner in organizing a
network for the combat of violence against women as well as abuse
and sexual exploitation.
Activities are also developed in conjunction with the Luiz Freire
Center, CENDHEC, the Pe. Ramiro Organization, Women of Cabo
Center, Community Schools Federation and other networks like Ruas
e Praças (Streets and Town Squares), Sobe e Desce (Up and Down) and
the Women’s Forum. The Collective used space from NGOs in other
communities like Desperta Criança (Wake Up Child) in the Cidade
Tabajara neighborhood.
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Once a month the Collective holds meetings with the mothers of the
youths in the project. Contacts with neighborhood associations, mothers
groups and cultural groups are made for the project in order to develop a
project that is tied to the community. Participants from other NGOs and
community leaderships come to the Woman Life Project from many
directions. The Conselhos Tutelares are local independent courts that deal
with youths and adolescents and this becomes a meeting place for these
different organizations. This contact allows for communication channels of
mutual assistance to develop.
In addition to the previously cited organizations, the Collective has already
developed projects in collaboration with delegations from the European
Parliament, the Green Party and the Justice of Peace of Germany. The
Collective has also developed projects with institutions from Poland, Austria
and other countries. A publication about the Woman Life Collective experience
in Europe is being negotiated. This was initiated by international organizations.
17) Evaluation and Research in the Experience
In terms of evaluation, the Woman Life Collective uses a project
methodology where each workshop in each neighborhood produces a
report on every activity. Weekly, the educator and monitor team meets to
discuss outstanding issues and directs them to the legal or psychological
sector. There is also a system of trimester reports. At the end of the
week the youths’ school performance is evaluated as well as the type of
leisure activities they are participating in. Part of the methodological
practice is family participation. The youths’ families attend meetings that
are held by the institution. This is done with the intention of working with
the mothers from the point of view of valorizing self-esteem and serving
against domestic violence.
There are also evaluations that are developed by external parties. These
are group dynamic activities that seek to evaluate the developed project and
also work with the team to verify what they are doing. This aspect is considered
to be important because the Woman Life Collective projects demand
professionalization and also psychological and emotional support. This year
there were group dynamic activities that involved psychodrama specialists.
18) Specific Problems in the Experience
· One of the main problems faced by the institution is difficulty in
managing extremely complex professional and emotional situations.
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These situations involve factors that include financial and human
resources and relationships with the themes that make up the life
stories of these young women in the project. Pain is one example.
The biggest problem the Collective has had is really the same one
that the NGOs have and that is the question of the extreme demands
of an NGO. It’s as if it were a private company but it’s not. You can’t
work for profit with a public that’s in a situation of risk, suffering
and pain. When you work with the public that we work with, that
lives in a situation of deep pain, the people that work with this
public also have to work on themselves. They all have to be in
therapy, because working with so many situations like this makes
you either go crazy or become specially and humanly compassionate.
At the same time, though, you’ve got to have a little distance.
(Interview with coordination, Recife/PE)
· Scant funds are also stressed in addition to counterpart involvement
in terms of political policies for the youths. The educators also
emphasize lack of funds for transportation as an obstacle to trips for
the youths to places like beaches that are farther away.
· Educator turnover is also pointed out as a problem from an operational
point of view. Because many of the educators are enrolled in college
or have other jobs, there is a certain lack of continuity in working
with the youths.
19) Why is it an Innovative Experience?
There are a wide variety of characteristics that corroborate the
innovative quality of this experience.
· The intense participation of family members in attending meetings
held by the institution. This collaborates in the valorization of selfesteem and service against domestic violence of the involved
participants. This is one of the positive evaluations that the families
themselves make of the Woman Life Collective experience. The
mothers in particular consider the strategy of working on prevention
in the schools as extremely important. This contributes to the
broadening of the project’s clientele as the youths that are involved
bring their friends, sisters and neighbors.
· In addition to this multiplying quality of the Woman Life Collective,
where the participating youths bring others, the chance to combine
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cultural activities with professional training courses is another one of
the innovative aspects of the project. The project is considered to be
extremely remarkable in the different way it manages to involve the
youths. This is especially true in consideration of how difficult it is to
keep adolescents in projects like this.
· Another characteristic is the fact that the experience allows for
learning based on a collective process. This offers greater possibilities
for insertion in the community the youths are part of.
Through an experience like this, the youths begin to fight for their
community school to get better, for the mothers’ club to get active.
The neighborhood associations start to demand basic sanitation
and demand that some condemned shack be demolished. So I think
that these youths, these women, even the children begin to have
that consciousness of community and rights. (Interview with
coordination, Recife/PE)
· Experiences like this are also active in terms of valorization of the
youths’ self-esteem. This is accomplished through a critical
examination of citizenship that is worked on with the monitors in the
institution. The monitors are paid for their work.
· The playful activities promoted by the project are appreciated by the
mothers because they also have the opportunity to play and have fun
through the Woman Life Collective. These are aspects that are
considered to be essential for the bio-psycho-social development of
the girls and youths that are in the project.
20) Effects of the Experience on the Lives of the Youths
· There are diverse effects for the youths that go through the project
and become monitors but they all converge in an essentially positive
way for being part of the Woman Life Collective. They affirm that
there is a lot of learning when they act in a collective way and that it
is very gratifying being able to be paid for their work. This fortifies
the consciousness of their rights and autonomy, particularly for the
young women. This work is extremely important for these youths.
In addition to reinforcing ties to their identity, the work develops and
reinforces the vision they have for the future. Based on their
experience with the Collective, many of them decide to study
psychology and pursue a professional career.
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For me, the opportunity to work as a monitor has been very important
for the training and for the experience that I’m having working with
the people in the neighborhoods. I’m getting to know girls and
teenagers and we’re sharing information. It’s important to have this
experience working with teenagers because I’m a teenager too and
it’s something that’s really given me a lot of knowledge in terms of
learning to be a future educator or psychologist. It’s a profession
that’s going to help me a lot in the career I’m going to follow in the
future. It gives me the opportunity to work in a collective, to work in
a group. This united thing really helps a lot. I think that it’s been
really important for me and for the life of these other girls that are
monitors. (Focus group with youths, Recife/PE)
· Among the changes in the lives of the youths that are involved with
the Collective, one of the highlights is a broader social point of view.
This is shown in a higher degree of consciousness, participation and
responsibility in the reality they live in. This has repercussions in the
youths’ relationship to school. Their school performance and class
efforts increase tremendously. It’s interesting to note that for some
of those interviewed this change relates to other changes that are
also triggered by the relationship with the Collective. These changes
include improvement in self-esteem. The participants begin to feel
more valuable and respected. This is shown in the following
community interview.
Many times even school performance improves because they are valued
and when you feel valued you start being productive in a different
way. (Interview with community, Recife/PE)
· Some youths point out the help that they receive in this type of “group
therapy” where they talk about the problems they have in common.
This happens because you talk and the girls have experience and
problems like yours. Even if you only see that you’re not the only one
who’s going through it, you can help and be helped. (Focus group
with youths, Recife/PC)
· For the youths, the work in the workshops has been inspiring values
and culture, bringing about deep and lasting changes.
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In the beginning, I stayed really quiet in the group but later on I
loosened up. I got to like it and I’ve been in the Collective for five
years now. (Focus group with youths, Recife/PE)
· The youths’ mothers that become involved with the Collective’s activities
stress that their daughters’ behavior changed in terms of affectionate
relationships and sexuality. This is true especially in relation to the
prevention of STDs/AIDS and teenage pregnancy, thanks to the
information that they receive in the debates held by the Collective.
When they start dating and getting sexually involved they know how
to defend themselves. This I’m really sure of. Because here that’s what
they teach the most, how not to get pregnant, how not to get a disease,
how to defend yourself from the things in life. I think the project really
teaches a lot. My daughters are really prepared for this. (Focus
group with mothers, Recife/PE)
Participating in the Collective really makes a big difference. I’ve had a
15-year-old teenager in my house for one month now. She’s already been
pregnant twice. She got pregnant when she was 12 years old and she had
a baby when she was 14. If she had been involved with the project like my
daughter has been I believe that she would not have gone through this.
She lost one when she was seven months pregnant and she’s got an 11month-old now. (Focus group with mothers, Recife/PE)
· According to the mothers, the youths became less shy and more
communicative. Before getting involved in the Woman Life Collective,
the majority of these youths had few options for their after school
hours. They participated in a few leisure activities, or in a few outside
courses that were generally computer or language classes.
· The youths that talk about how they spent their time before
participating in the Collective emphasize that becoming linked to the
experience caused significant changes in their lives’ routines and in
their ethical values. Both areas took on a broader social orientation
and a preoccupation with sharing knowledge. This occurred in
reference to increasing their information base on sexuality in addition
to changes in their point of view on studying.
I really didn’t do anything before. I hung out in the street, bugged out,
watched TV. I just stayed at home and slept late. I didn’t study. I told
my mom I was going to school but I went to my friends’ houses. Then
after I got in the Collective I started to care about my studies and I
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started to get an idea about what I wanted to do with my life. Now I’m
sure I want to have information. I asked my mom how I was born and
she told me it was an airplane, a swan and that her scar [caesarian]
was only a cut. Today I know better and I can pass this knowledge on
to other people. (Focus group with youths, Recife/PE)
· For the youths the changes related to self-esteem and participation in
the Collective’s activities many times are part of a slow process and
the changes are not immediately noticeable. According to the
educators, these changes may even take years.
When they start to talk about coexistence you can see that she really
wants to change, because she’s got this other point of view. She goes
after it and she puts herself into the group. If she’s shy she starts to talk
and expose herself and value herself and the other person. She even
starts valuing her body. That’s when she starts putting on a little
lipstick. There are a lot of things that make us say that there’s been a
change. It depends on the person, the changes are slower, subtler,
sometimes they spend years with us and then later they take that step.
This is due to the fact that this project collaborates with self-esteem
because the girl gets here and she’s really fragile and she gets into the
group and from there on there’s this strengthening of her self-esteem
and there’s this change. Yes, it can even be a really significant change,
it’s not just the change but what happens in terms of considering limits.
(Focus group with educators, Recife/PE)
· Another change is related to the youths that suffer from sexual abuse who manage to overcome this. This is called the pain cycle.
They return to an affective and sexual life after a period of participating
in the workshops organized by the Woman Life Collective.
The idea is not for the Collective people to keep defending the
teenager. The idea is for her to gain the means to say to her brother,
her father or stepfather, her grandfather or her nephew – ‘you’re not
going to rape me anymore,’ or ‘you’re not going to sexually abuse
me’. It’s for her to say “I have the right to go to school,’ ‘I have the
right to study,’ ‘I have the right to go to a party,’ ‘I have the right to go
out,’ ‘I have the right to think,’ ‘I have the right to go and see, say
what I think, decide and know the rights of the Statute of the Child
and Adolescent, and to know my responsibilities too.’ (Interview with
coordination, Recife/PE)
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4.7.2 Auçuba
1) Name of Organization
Auçuba
2) Date of Foundation
1989
3) City/State
Recife - PE
4) Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5) Name of Project/Program
School Video Project
6) Contact
a) Paulo Ricardo Paiva de Souza
b) Function: Coordinator
c) Telephone: (81)3441-2722/3268-7422
d) e-mail: [email protected]
7) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
Auçuba activities are developed in the following neighborhoods in
the city of Recife: Morro da Conceição and Bomba do Cemitério.
8) Funding Sources
Foundations, businesses, and governmental programs. Auçuba’s
main partners are the Odebrecht Foundation and the Ayrton Senna
Institute. Additional financial partners include the C&A Institute
and the Kellogg Foundation – which give support to the activities
of the ANDI network (Press Agency for the Rights of the Child
and Adolescent), in addition to local partners such as the OK
Network, SENAFE, and Martpet, a communications company.
9) Areas of Activity
Communication and Education
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10) Objectives
· Develop the capacity of the youths to interpret information,
enabling them to understand the specific language of
communication media.
· Construct a critical vision of what is transmitted to them and
create a commitment to the democratization of access to
communication media.
· Work on training the youths, utilizing communication as a
pedagogic proposal.
11) Target Public
Youths who are students in public schools in low-income areas,
living in contexts of poverty and violence. Emphasis is given to
youths with leadership qualities, as much to those who distinguish
themselves in the classroom as interested productive students as
to those that generate some kind of negative mobilization.
12) Description and Background
Before becoming an NGO, Auçuba existed as a group of friends active
in the area of cultural production. The organization was founded in 1989
and only established an encouraging financing partnership six years later.
The team that put Auçuba together liked working with the youths. It
wasn’t anything more than that. There wasn’t any technical question
behind all this... Working with youths is interesting because they aren’t
stale socially, professionally, intellectually. So it’s easier, it’s a more
open mind for creating something. If you provide the means for them to
be creative, they’re going to create a lot more than you can, because
you’ve got some things holding you back. (Interview with coordinator,
Recife/PC)
13) Personnel
The majority of the professionals involved in the implantation of the
Auçuba projects graduated in social communication – journalism and
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broadcasting. They are also social scientists specialized in education. In
addition, there are work-study participants in these areas.
Everyone who participates is paid, including the work-study participants.
The NGO does not work with volunteers because a specific program to
include this kind of collaboration has not been developed yet.
The two founders of Auçuba are the principal coordinators of the
project, and many of the educators participate as idea partners in the
development process for the Organization’s methodology.
Training for project motivators is accomplished through work developed
daily on the projects, as a type of specialized practice. Hours vary between
25 and 40 hours per week.
According to the testimony of one educator:
My degree is journalism, social communication. Afterwards I
specialized in the area of pedagogic training and the minute I got out
of university I came to work at Auçuba. (Focus group with educators,
Recife/PE)
14) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The Auçuba NGO works with training activities in the area of social
communication.
Video Schools: The students learn production, filming, and journalism
techniques. The youths are encouraged to talk and write about the
controversies and news in society, especially in their communities. The result
is produced in a newspaper, called Fanzine, which is distributed in the
community:
I went [to Rio de Janeiro] as a representative. There was a group from
Brasilia, a group from Rio de Janeiro, and me, representing Recife, to
see the Rocinha slum. [..] I was the one who produced [the video], I
wanted to show the people in the group but they got scared. They got
all superstitious. I wanted to go to the cemetery and film and no one
wanted to go. (Focus group with youths, Recife/PC)
Canal Auçuba: A service channel directed towards the youth.
This program has four well defined projects. The first is Video School,
where the youth learns to produce videos. The second is Fanzine
School, with the same profile as the video school only working with
alternative electronic communication, mainly video and Internet
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(traditional printing and radio transmission are accomplished
through Internet). The third project is called Communication and
Education, which focuses on public school teachers and educators
from other NGOs in the education area, seeking an intersection between
the NGO and the school. A fourth project is called Incubator and it is
an incubator for young learners, where these kids of 18 to 24 who are
getting out of adolescence and entering adulthood become prepared
to open their own business, preferably a cooperative model. (Interview
with coordinator, Recife/PE)
Junior Communication Aide: This is a project of intermediate service,
working with institutions that work with the youths developing means of
internal communication. This is a work-study project as well. This program
is part of a national network of news agencies focused on the question of
childhood - ANDI (News Agency for the Rights of the Child and
Adolescent).
Sector 3: At the moment of data collection this program was still in a
planning phase. Through this program, however, a strategic alliance strategy
is being sought between Auçuba and other organizations currently active in
the same area.
15) Methodology
The Auçuba NGO is considered to be one of the pioneers in working
with education for youths in Brazil with communication as a methodology.
Perhaps Auçuba is the only organization that works with this aspect of
youth protagonists for creation, making the youth edit a video like a
professional. You’ve got others that work with Internet, but they teach
the kids how to use Internet. In Auçuba’s case, Internet is a
methodology that the kid can use to become a citizen, a professional in
any area, not necessarily in communication. That’s the difference.
(Interview with coordinator, Recife/PE)
The youths take part in workshops where interactive activities are
developed. These are drawing workshops to work on the question of
aesthetics, body work, photography work, and basic training in how to put
out a printed newspaper and later one on Internet.
Later, they take part in more technical workshops, which may be video
or the fanzine magazine. In the fanzine workshop there is an initial stage of
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basic computer techniques in order to get into contact with technology.
Then they begin to work on a homepage, constructing sites. After this stage,
they participate in the video workshop, and later they are trained to integrate
all of the production centers.
According to one of the coordinators, the selection process for the
youths is being evaluated and improved since the institution has been
delegating the responsibility of choosing to the schools and there is no clearly
established methodology for this. The girls and boys are selected by the
schools and sent to participate in the program:
This is a point of evaluation in the institution today. We are
searching for a new design for this. This connection with the school
is of great interest to us, because these youths all come from public
schools. We would sit with the school administration, with some
teachers and coordinators, and we would outline the basic profile
of the kid, one who preferably was the one that made some kind of
mobilization happen. But we didn’t go into a lot of details, so the
school had the freedom to choose who they wanted. What we want
to do now is participate a little more in the selection process, so
we’re making up this profile in a more detailed way. (Interview
with coordinator, Recife/PE)
The participation of the communities is important for exposing cultural
diversity and confronting opinions.
16) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
Auçuba has been developing activities in cooperation with other
institutions that are active in the area of youth education, through ANDI
with headquarters in Brasilia. These organizations are CIPÓ, in Bahia,
Ciranda, in Paraná, UGA UGA, in Manaus, and the Image Workshop, in
Belo Horizonte. The NGO is also part of the Education for Communication
Network – REDUCOM – composed of 15 Brazilian institutions that work
with education through communication with the support of the Ayrton
Senna Institute.
In the beginning of its activities, Auçuba had established stricter
relations with the residents’ associations in the regions it worked in.
Through these associations ties were formed with the community schools
and currently the activities of the NGO are even more linked to the public
schools in each region where it is active. Projects with various communities
have already been developed:
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There’s a kid here at school who, through the residents’ council, began
to take a course at Auçuba. He told me ‘They’re going to have a
contest over at Auçuba, they’re going to choose a community to work
with. I want to enter my community in school. Will you help me?’ So I
helped. We sat down for three weekends and got the books out, the
history of the school. This was the formal part so Auçuba would visit
the school. He took the story of the neighborhood, he took all this
information. I typed up a history of the neighborhood, the community
diagnostics. I gave it all to him. The other students that studied at
Auçuba took it all over there. They looked at who was best and it
looked like we had won and the people came here to look at the
school. I told this to the teachers and we decided to make a film telling
the story of the school and a little about the kind of work we do. I was
the one to go to the meeting at Auçuba, to ask them to come see what
we do here at the school. I went, but before this a kid showed this film
he had made at Auçuba. It was this ghost story. On the day it came out
he came here to the school and other kids from other communities that
work with Auçuba came too. So, we had this day for citizenship class.
It’s a class where we have debates on political and social questions
and the history of the life of society. The kids do interviews. Well, it was
more or less like that. (Interview with principal, Recife/PE)
According to their representatives, the principal mechanism used by
Auçuba in the search for partners was the development of a solid, clear
methodology, one that makes an impact. This, associated with the support
of a good funding source, was what allowed the NGO to move ahead
with activities and gain national recognition. Auçuba maintains partnership
with the Ayrton Senna Institute, the Odebrecht Foundation, the C&A
Institute, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, OK Network, SENAFE, Martpet,
universities, and a number of governmental organizations, like the Recife
Mayor’s Office.
The Odebrecht Foundation was the first to believe that an interesting
methodology could come out of this. They financed an idea, not a
prepared methodology. They financed the idea for the construction of
a methodology. It’s because of this partnership that we were able to
open our doors to the world out there. (Interview with coordinator,
Recife/PE)
The relationship the Mayor’s Office of Recife has to the Video School
project happened mainly through the Secretariat of Urban Planning
and Environment and through the Secretariat of Education. In the
Secretariat of Planning, the project was included in the Environmental
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Education Team’s projects, with special attention to the Botanical
Gardens of Curado Center, a live document of bio-diversity in the
Atlantic Forest and of the ecosystem of the urban farm of Recife. In the
Secretariat of Education these actions concentrated on the Youth in
Movement project, coordinated by the Cultural and Sports Activities
Department. (Testimony on CD-ROM – School Video project – Media
Education)
17) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
A monthly evaluation is performed along the year and there is one
annual evaluation where planning for project improvement occurs. There
hasn’t been an evaluation with an external evaluator yet, due to lack of
resources.
18) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Auçuba faces resource problems as do many organizations of this
type. In addition to others, as one of the coordinators points out.
The main obstacle is lack of resources. It’s getting more and more
complicated to get funding. The second obstacle we’ve been seeing is
the question of time. That is, how to deal with this space-time
compression in relation to planning [activities]. Another obstacle is
this new vision of what we want from social projects, this current
invention of the third sector. We’ve got to be careful not to fall into that
trap, not to be seduced by the usefulness and positive quality of this,
knowing how to use the interesting things this can bring. […] The NGO
is not a business and has to act differently than a business does. That’s
a challenge, and we’re trying to build a model of self management and
it’s a tough job. (Interview with coordinator, Recife/PE)
· The current impossibility of tracking the youths that complete the
programs also worries coordinators and educators in Auçuba.
We really don’t have the energy for this closer kind of tracking. We try
to keep track through the ones that always come around and stay in
touch with the others. Now we’re putting together a project design
that’s for going back to the community in order to allow for this tracking
on location, within the community. But it’s a new thing and we’re still
putting it together. (Interview with coordinator, Recife/PE)
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My dream is for us to be able to have these little seedlings of community
TVs in every community where there’s one of our students. We could have
these editors of fanzine magazines too. It’s just that the supplies we work
with are really expensive. We work with video, with Internet. It’s expensive.
So it’s not so easy for them to become independent like we want them to
be. Because their ideas can be independent but in terms of structure
they’re always tied to Auçuba and we don’t have any way of making
video equipment available to everyone. This is a big problem we haven’t
been able to overcome yet. (Interview with educator, Recife/PE)
· In addition to confronting these obstacles, there is also a negative
effect of accelerated growth of the organization. The increase in the
number of activities and students in the programs is having a negative
effect on one of the primary objectives of the NGO, the effective
participation of the youths in all developed stages.
[…] At times, you slip up because of this speed. You have to pass on all
of the content in the fastest way possible and you end up being a
technician, and the technique doesn’t allow for much participation.
[…] At times you just don’t have time, because of the volume of the
things you have to do here, to sit down and plan so that you can do all
this so fast in a way that won’t be a problem, in a way that will be a
help. So, Auçuba doesn’t have planning, above all pedagogic
planning that will allow for this kind of participation. (Interview with
coordinator, Recife/PE)
· The question of participation is also considered in terms of project
financing. The Organization is feeling the lack of structured planning
that would allow for more interaction among its partners.
[…] external interference, for example, the funding source that puts
money in here and starts to ask for things. If you don’t have really
good planning, this can work as negative interference. You trip up on
the process of participation. That’s what happened with Solidarity
Training, and there are some things we can see here with Ayrton Senna
that could go this way too if we’re not careful. It’s much more a question
of policy on how to advertise and on the network projects than of what
the project itself actually does. They don’t really mess around with the
project. What we like is when the funding source participates in the
project design. We like interference, if it’s positive. (Interview with
coordinator, Recife/PE)
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19) Why is it an innovative experience?
The Auçuba programs are generally evaluated well. The fact that
they have a nationally and internationally recognized methodology is an
important reference of legitimacy in the evaluation.
Successful, yes, but there’s still a lot to be done, corrected, perfected.
[...] One of the reasons [for this success] is that, when we had consistent
resources, we were able to systematize a methodology of action, well
or badly, good or bad. But I believe that good methodology is a sign of
a successful institution too. Because an institution that comes from
nothing, literally zero, and manages to be in a certain way a national
reference in the area of education for communication today, that’s a
successful NGO. [...] In the evaluation that was performed, we could
see that Auçuba has this enormous potential for participation. [...]
You’ve got the question of controlled participation where you’re going
to tell them that they have to do something and they do it controlled.
This controlled participation can be manipulated, but in Auçuba’s
case this wasn’t perceived. Some limitations were discovered, but at
other times in Auçuba we work with another type of participation.
That’s power participation. The kids have this co-management in the
process with the Auçuba specialists. We haven’t yet reached selfmanagement power participation, but we believe that this is going to
start happening with the communication centers. (Interview with
coordinators, Recife/PE)
· The community also enthusiastically supports Auçuba’s initiatives.
The Video School project, I thought it was spectacular. I’ve already
participated in two meetings at Auçuba and I think that you’ve got to
have continuity not only within the school, but bringing it out to the
community too. (Interview with partners, Recife/PE)
What I tell the kids here from the school is that the kids who take part
in this kind of activity, the big difference is in this different experience
they have that’s taking part in cultural movements and political
debates. Taking part in an activity that Auçuba promotes is reflected
not only in the practical part, but also takes in content where the kids
work with citizenship, etc. This is what’s going to support the kids in
overcoming obstacles, like competing with others who’ve had different
types of life opportunities that they don’t really get out there. (Interview
with partner, Recife/PE)
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· Art and Culture are the foundations that the NGO’s methodology is
based on. They are strong motivators for the great interest the students
have in the professional training activities.
One of the bases for the project is artistic training. So, you’ve got art
education as a really strong foundation for this project. We work with
photography, drawing, dance, theatre. That’s the base. (Interview with
coordinator, Recife/PE)
These projects are born as much from the necessity for a cultural process
as from the necessity for a social process. There’s just no way not to
associate these two things for me. I think if we don’t associate them we’d
really be committing a sin. (Interview with coordinator, Recife/PE)
· When asked about the importance of cultural and artistic activities
and leisure in the battle against violence, one of the residents of a
community linked to Auçuba answered:
They help. Because you’re going to work with this person’s sensitivity,
with the human being. You’re going to work through painting, dance,
theatre. You’re going to express a number of feelings as well as
frustrations. This [the project] is worked on. It’s not psychoanalysis,
of course, but it’s a way for the youths to express their ideas, their life
situations, and the life situation they are part of. This marriage between
my situation and the situation I’m part of whether it’s in the municipality
or the state, I mean, it creates this consciousness. I think that dance
and theatre, all cultural work, work that’s got something to do with
art contributes to a viewpoint. You start to open your eyes up to a
wider vision of society, of life. You start to feel encouraged, valued.
Even if you don’t come and take part in theatre, or being an actor or
painter, it’s something that’s going to make you feel something that
makes you discover other possibilities. I don’t know. It’s going to wake
you up to reading, wake you up to other professional activities, redeem
your value as a person and the value of the other person as well, of
your partner. You’re going to start sharing all kinds of things.
(Interview with community member, Recife/PE)
· The debates that occur in some of the project’s activities seem to
have a strong impact in the way that the students evaluate their lives
and their priorities. The students also acquire the capacity to make a
critical analysis of society. They become conscious of the important
role they play in society as well.
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I think that the value of education is that you get this global knowledge
and you get a language to know and communicate about this revolution
that’s happening. (Focus group with youths, Recife/PE)
When I talk about culture, I’m talking about the country’s culture,
there’s got to be more respect for the country, for the citizen and it’s
essential that you have a school to guide you. Education has a lot of
value for us, a lot of meaning. (Focus group with youths, Recife/PE)
[…] That’s why I say that we have to show what we’ve learned, we
have to show reality, we have to show the truth, we have to debate
things. We have to get together, to collect information so that we can
throw everything on a tray and make just one thing out of it […](Focus
group with youths, Recife/PC)
20) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· Among the main changes in the lives of the youths, one of the Auçuba
coordinators reports:
First it’s self-esteem. This is a fast thing. In two or three months this kid
is already starting to have an interesting self-esteem reaction. Second,
this perspective on the future starts to emerge in these kids lives,
something they don’t have in general. They start to think that they can
be more than that thing that’s being handed to them naturally. These
two changes are the strongest things we’ve got. There are even some
material changes. For example, we’ve got cases of kids who are making
videos and they’re managing to make four or five minimum salaries
per month. (Interview with coordinator, Recife/PE)
· Another important effect is the return to school, or even improvement
in school performance.
There was also the case of a kid who was going to get thrown out of
school because of bad behavior and after he got into the project there
was negotiation between us and the school to give him one more
chance. This kid ended up finishing the course without another
problem in school. (Interview with coordinator, Recife/PC)
I had stayed back a year in school. The coordinator came over to me
and told me that I couldn’t fail. So I started to really work hard in
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school and I never had to stay back another year in school. This year
I’m about to finish and if it hadn’t been for this, I think I would have
given up or stayed back a lot. I wouldn’t have the ambition that I have
today. I’m thinking about the future, about tomorrow and the day
after tomorrow. (Focus group with youths, Recife/PE)
· The educators and even the people in the community emphasize the
changes in the behavior of the youths.
You can really see that the kids here in the community and the ones
who came from outside to do these videos, they have this responsibility,
this sense of organization. We saw it in the discussions on how to
prepare the video on the community, the questions they asked us. I
mean, what we notice when they were making this video with us was
the maturity level. It’s very interesting, mainly their enthusiasm, their
interest in something good, something productive. I think it’s really
good for the kids. It’s a really positive sign that the thing’s having a
positive effect. (Interview with community, Recife/PE)
· The students learn to value their culture and they become conscious
of their own identities. In addition to this, they begin to understand
how important cultural and leisure activities are to the community.
I think that there’s a question of identity as well. Besides being an
extremely playful thing, because it’s really delightful, it’s a pleasure to
redeem your identity. They have the chance to work on this black
identity thing for example. Sometimes they work on this within the
communities and they open this up as a final video project, they do
this and they take it into the community for discussion. For them, this
is an extremely important thing. With this, you reaffirm yourself as
black. (Interview with coordinator, Recife/PE)
· The professional training of the students also guarantees them
improvement in their quality of life and their expectations for the future.
I try to spend most of my time taking classes here. I’m in senior year,
and when I finish I’m going to take the college entrance exam and
God willing I’m going to work every once in a while as a cameraman.
Sometimes, something comes along for me. Right now I’m not working
and I’m looking for a job. [...] I film weddings, birthday parties,
practically everything that comes my way. (Focus group with youths,
Recife/PE)
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4.7.3 Centro das Mulheres de Cabo (Cabo Women’s
Center)
1) Name of Organization
Centro das Mulheres de Cabo (Cabo Women’s Center)
2) Date of Foundation
1984
3) City/State
Cabo de Santo Agostinho, Pernambuco
4) Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5) Contact
a) Silvia Maria Cordeiro
b) Function: Coordinator
c) Telephone: (81) 3521-0040
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
In Cabo de Santo Agostinho, Palmares, Água Preta, and Catende
7) Funding Sources
UNICEF, CB Children, Terre des Hommes-Switzerland, World Vision,
Mayor’s Office of the Municipality of Cabo, Ministry of Social Welfare,
and the federal Solidarity Community (school scholarship resources).
8) Areas of Activity
Defense of rights and art, culture, and citizenship workshops.
9) Objectives
· Contribute in the construction of gender equity and affirmation of
women’s rights of citizenship through the following lines of action:
reproductive health, sustainable development and gender, promotion and
defense of the rights of children and adolescents (nurseries, prevention
and combat of abuse and sexual exploitation, professional training for
youths and adolescents and combat against “sexist violence”).
10) Target Public
Women, adolescents, youths, and children. The majority are girls that are
directed to the school by Court order, or by the Conselho Tutelar. This is
a governmental agency in the judicial area that deals with local institutions
in the guardianship and supervision of children and adolescents legally
considered delinquents. Their re-education is commonly developed with
the Conselho Tutelar, local agencies, and NGOs and this is the case of the
Cabo Women’s Center.
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11)Description and Background
The Cabo Women’s Center was founded in 1984. In the beginning, the
project only worked with women who were victims of violence. In 1998
projects were implanted for youths investing at first in psychotherapy and
self-help groups with emphasis on what the girls had to say. Today, in addition
to psychological service, there are interactive cultural and educative-play
activities, as well as professional training courses.
The Cabo Women’s Center is an agency that already has 16 years of
experience in the field of defense of rights and space for art, culture, and
socialization for the citizen. The Center develops partnerships with a broad
spectrum of public and private organizations in Cabo de Santo Agostinho
and Recife. The seriousness of the Center is highlighted by these institutions.
The agency works with youths from poor neighborhoods on the
periphery of Cabo City. Many of their mothers are included in the Center’s
activities. Recruitment seeks a balance among the sexes, being that the
majority of participants are daughters of mothers who are heads of
households.
The Center has the requirement that the youths attend school. Many
of them have gone through the court system, through the Conselho Tutelar
for example with problems of delinquent conduct. There are youths who
have begged on the street and others who were involved with prostitution.
Many of these youths were victims of sexual violence in their families.
In the context of domestic violence, some of the youths involved have
already experienced some delicate situations from the point of view of
physical aggression, psychological pressure, and sexual abuse itself.
That’s how the Center has become a reference for this kind of problem
question, mainly of violence. There have been a lot of youths, mainly
teenage girls, who have come through here because in this project we
really make an effort. We give more attention to the woman that has
been violated than to the violence. And when it happens to a boy, to a
teenage boy, we provide shelter and we approach whoever’s doing
this in the most appropriate way. It’s a question of focus. The violent
acts that we have to approach, that is, when youths are the agents,
they’re on the infraction level, like small robberies, drugs, or minor
assault. Cabo is in a little bit of a privileged position in the area of
youth support. The Conselho Tutelar here works and the local court
system is organized to a certain extent in terms of providing some
support for this kind of problem. (Interview with coordinator, Cabo de
Santo Agostinho/PE).
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The demand is high, even for the projects that do not include the school
scholarship. The mothers are generally associated with the Center, and
many of them take part in projects related to generating an income. The
others take part in courses with public legal defenders. For the population
between 15 and 24 years of age specifically, activities in the area of training
are developed in addition to socio-educational activities related to the rights
guaranteed by the Statute of the Child and Adolescent.
12) Personnel
In the beginning, the projects utilized a considerable number of
volunteers. Today, there is an insistence on the importance of professional
training for the educators as the majority of them are involved with the
institution on a full time basis. The team profile is professional and is made
up of psychologists, lawyers, social assistants, and educators with experience
in popular education and gender. Volunteer work is minimal and originates
for the most part in the clientele itself that trained at the Center.
These professionals come to the NGO through invitation. Priority is
given to professionals from the Cabo municipality. For the courses of public
legal defenders, women leaders from the peripheral communities were
selected. The majority of the professionals are hired on a full time basis.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
Young Communicators Project: The project trains youths to work in
broadcasting and communications. This project counts on a complete radio
studio where the youths are trained in the techniques and procedures involved
in the taping of a radio program. The project receives support from UNICEF
and the MacArthur Foundation.
Sustainable Development Project: The project acts in the rural area
through gender, sexuality, and reproductive health workshops. It serves
women and youths (men and women) who are of reproductive age.
Violence Against Women and Adolescents Project: Through the
support of Terre des Hommes-Switzerland, the program offers legal aid to
the youths as a group or on an individual basis. A course for legal public
defenders is also developed. In this course, women (leaders) that deal with
problems of violence (physical, domestic) in the community perform the
directing of questions to the Court.
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14)
Methodology
The duration of the courses varies depending on the activities. The
shortest last an average of three months and some last a year. Each course
counts on an average participation of 30 women.
In the recruitment of the youths, contact with women in the communities
is emphasized. Peripheral neighborhoods of the city of Cabo are given
preference. The youths recruited relate to the families of the women that
are already in other Center projects (associates). This is not the only
requirement, however. Information on the Center is spread in the
communities and among local leaderships that have contact with the agency.
The involved youths share their life stories in the beginning of the
classes, in circles (“talks”) with relaxation and meditation exercises. These
are precious moments, according to the statements collected in focus groups.
A lot of specific methodologies are tried, but they’re always based on
the youth. We employ participatory theory to stimulate them to talk, to
recognize themselves as social subjects. It’s one of the interesting ways
to get these kids to talk about who they are, what their desires are,
and how they want to be seen. (Interview with coordinator, Cabo de
Santo Agostinho/PE)
The orientation workshops are about sexuality, birth control methods,
health, and prevention. There are also groups of youth focused on safe sex.
In addition to this, some groups are systematic and present dance and theatre
courses for example. Culture serves as a transversal element in the distinct
activities of a social nature for citizenship.
We also work with the writing question. It’s a little bit of everything,
reading and writing. When it’s time to play we do these concentration
exercises, group integration. We also talk about how to act in certain
places, the social roles of men and women, social limits, customs.
There’s the educational side. We introduce ideas of hygiene. Through
dance, we have the opportunity to introduce two dimensions – the
psychological,l the emotional side. And the question of education,
because if you dance you’ve got to have discipline. You’ve got to
participate, you’ve got to be responsible. This is difficult, mainly in
preparing for presentations, because it involves commitment, time,
and discipline to participate. It’s a process and you have to avoid
competition and arguments among the girls. The idea is to build a
group, a team, for them to start to feel part of the same family. This
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requires a lot of conversation. (Focus group with specialists/project
motivators, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PE)
A scholarship to help with costs was instituted in collaboration with
the Solidarity Community in order to encourage participation and increase
the minimum income of the family through the youth. This encourages them
and contributes to an increase in their self-esteem to the extent that they
gain more consideration from their families. In the meantime, the school
scholarship is only for the projects related to the Solidarity Community.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The Women’s Center is an agency that is part of the Conselho Tutelar,
with partnerships with agencies like the Solidarity Community, SEBRAE,
the Mayor’s Office, Caixa Economica Bank, and others, developing activities
with children and youths.
Partners related to the Conselho Tutelar emphasize that this alliance
with the Women’s Center allows for the structuring of a public defense
network in the field, sharing responsibilities.
When we direct a teenager who’s got a problem, it’s important to be
able to count on a project like the Women’s Center. The Conselho
Tutelar needs the Women’s Center today. Everyday we get cases and
it’s not only with teenagers, it’s not only with children, but they involve
adult women as well. They arrive intimidated. So, we have the Center
as a comprehensive partner that gives us security. We’ve got somewhere
to run to, to get help. So this partnership with the Cabo Women’s
Center has been significant for all segments of Cabo society. It’s been
very good. (Interview with partner, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PE)
For the Mayor’s Office of the municipality, the partnership with the
Cabo Women’s Center serves as a social resource, highlighting the Center’s
work in the area of legal aid and preventive health in addition to collaborating
in the public agencies going to the “needier communities”, fortifying agencies
that act on this level.
We have a partnership with the Women’s Center. It’s an extremely
established agency, an agency that has various types of resources,
principally in our area, providing legal aid. There’s the question of
health as well. This partnership is extremely interesting because of
the precariousness that exists in the municipality and even in the
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State. For those of us at the Mayor’s Office it’s appealing because we
can count on support and we know where to direct things. It becomes
easier to work, to exchange ideas and experiences. (Interview with
partners, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PC)
The Center works with other organizations, including NGOs, in the
area of gender relations. It establishes exchange with other organizations
that give priority to a playful and interactive approach. Many of these are in
the areas of specific identities, like African culture. The Center also builds
a network with the youths’ families, as the work requires that the youths’
families be included as participants in the project.
The community is also a target, through partnerships with unions and
resident associations, especially those that work with women and victims of
violence. This work includes guidance and monitoring. Another alliance
with residents associations is occurring through legal assistance from the
Cabo Women’s Center.
We have been searching for and encouraging agency forums for the
exchange of experiences and joint projects. We have the goal of
making these services universally available. We are seeking out
society as a strategy and we are seeking out the local public agencies
not only for resources but to stimulate more definite policies to serve
these populations. (Interview with coordinator, Cabo de Santo
Agostinho/PE)
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
According to the instructors, the surveys served to change the practices
of the Center at certain times. Based on surveys with the youths, it was
possible to identify the more satisfying activities. These were the activities
that brought about a compensation for “touching the pain” with sessions of
psychotherapy, as the youths that come to the Center bring histories of
violence with them. The importance of establishing theatre, dance, and
capoeira workshops was identified in this way.
Surveys about cultural character are developed in conjunction with
the youths and the instructors. According to the following reflection,
these surveys contribute in an important way to broadening cultural
horizons and investigating the roots of culture. They also contribute to
breaking preconceived ideas about these characteristics, as in those
of African origin.
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There are youths that are traveling, for example the Maracatu group
and the Ere Nation group. These groups were invited to perform in
communities on the periphery and today they’re performing
professionally. It’s redemption for culture and at the same time for
self-esteem. There’s knowledge about their ancestors, their roots,
and it gives this value. This experience is not usual in Cabo. It came
from Olinda. In the beginning when we put on the dances, the girls
were critical. They didn’t know about things like afoxé dance. They
said it was black magic. So we did this survey project about popular
dance and culture. And to our surprise the kids chose to work exactly
with African dance. In the beginning, it was the one that was most
discriminated against. They had already put on frevo and maracatu
dance, but this dance with drums is different. It really gets to you
and maybe that’s where the prejudice comes from in the beginning.
(Focus group with specialists/project motivators, Cabo de Santo
Agostinho/PE)
The youths participate in various stages of development of the courses
and activities. This goes from diagnosis and evaluation, discussed jointly
with emphasis on interactive techniques among the educator teams and the
youths.
There is currently an evaluation of the efficiency of the activities. For
example, the proposal of workshops with the mothers came from an answer
on one of these evaluations, which was brought up by the instructors in a
team discussion.
The projects are up to date and use more formal evaluations on
two occasions. One is an internal evaluation with the team, which includes
self evaluation. The other is with the partners. It announces program
results to a wider public and includes discussions with the youths and
their parents in relation to the goals established by the Center’s Board.
This is a semester evaluation and is based on what is currently going on.
There is another annual evaluation with large participation on the part
of the students..
The youth’s performance is evaluated in the Center’s activities and
in their school and family life. There is also a registration of the youths
that have been or are currently involved in the NGO. There is a
preoccupation with putting together a tracking system for these youths,
but there is also recognition that the time is more dedicated to the routine
and project activities.
There have been meetings and reunions with ex-associates, in that
they are used to coming to the Center regularly, spontaneously. Some of
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them go to the job market through the Center, by taking part in work-study
programs with the Caixa Econômica bank or local businesses. This facilitates
contact and also takes place through the schools where they have dealings
with the communities.
We have had post-course meetings to get to know a little about what
they’re doing, if they’re still studying, if they’ve got some kind of
problem. It’s a type of informal monitoring, but it works. (Interview
with coordinator, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PE)
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
The youths positively value coexistence with other youths and with
educators, but they complain about discipline and responsibilities. For the
educators, this reaction is simply part of the process of socialization with
social obligations. They believe that this problem is overcome through from
participation in the projects.
The partners of the agency consider it a must to invest in professional
training courses, with special attention to the first job and the expectations
the youths have in relation to the job market. On the other hand, they recognize
that the youths, the Center’s clientele, are disinterested and not very
enthusiastic about participating in these courses.
There are problems in fulfilling some items on the original project. For
example, monitoring of family life through domestic visits is difficult to fulfill
because of problems in making these visits. There are only five people on
the Center’s coordination team. Faced with this difficulty, the team chose
to work with mothers’ groups. Nevertheless, mothers do not show up in
many cases and some of the girls were abandoned by their parents, or the
mothers and fathers they live with are alcoholics.
According to the instructors, there is a lack of a social assistant’s
collaboration for evaluations through school and family visits. The objective
of these visits would be to analyze changes in behavior on the part of the
youths as much as to evaluate how the parents and the schools are valorizing
these changes.
The specialists/project motivators emphasize that one of the obstacles
for meeting these project goals is the absence of parental participation,
particularly resistance on the part of the mothers who are commonly the
only ones responsible for the youths’ families. In some cases this resistance
is due to the difficulties they find in traveling to the group workshops.
However, little by little this resistance has been overcome.
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· There are problems with youths that reach the age limit for association
in a Center project for adolescents.
You can’t exclude a kid just because they turned 19, considering that
many of them come from unstructured families and live in a situation
of abuse in their family. In some cases, these girls are included in the
Center to participate in theme workshops and they’re also instructors’
helpers. (Focus group with specialists/project motivators, Cabo de Santo
Agostinho/PC)
There are problems in working in a network with other similar
institutions in Pernambuco. In Cabo de Santo Agostinho, the Center has
made alliances with another similar organization, PROCUCA, a project
with the Secretariat of Education that organizes summer camps and has
theatre activities. Youths from the Center also have contact with ballet
groups like the Majê Mole and Daruê Malungo groups. With this last group
there were joint visits to museums. However in the case of organizations
like these two and others like the Women Life Collective, that are in other
cities, there have been contacts. There is still the intention to make contacts
but there are problems in creating links owing to physical distance and lack
of financial means for transportation.
18) Why is it an innovative experience?
There are many formal visible indicators of the youths’ program success
in the Cabo Women’s Center. Among them are high demand, persistence
of the involved youths, low dropout rates, the fact that many of the youths
manage to earn more and overcome behavior problems that they were
having in school, and the placement of youths in the job market, as in the
area of community radio and communications.
· The value of the project is better understood when the context of
social vulnerability and the neediness for spaces for culture, sports,
and leisure is considered. This is especially true in the schools. The
profile of the target public needs to be considered as well as the fact
that these youths have been involved in situations of violence.
In Pernambuco only 7% of the public schools have a sports field. In
the field of culture and art there are even fewer opportunities. The
teenagers get here [to the project] victimized, full of bitterness. In the
project they not only seek to redeem their own identities but they look
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for a complete cultural training as well. They find it here and
demonstrate it out there. The project is important because of this and
because you can’t count on many alternatives. There’s no back up.
Besides the activities in the project, what do they have to keep busy?
What are they going to do? What are they going to find? So this
project has been providing answers for these questions. (Interview
with partners, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PE)
I work with education. I’m a primary school teacher and a public
employee of the State. The school doesn’t furnish the necessities of
the child or the teenager. You see so many dropping out, giving up,
because there’s nothing that stimulates them to stay in school. The
kid spends four hours in a school and this kid who’s in the street
goes to school because of the food and then he goes back on the
street. A lot of times he starts to skip school because there are more
interesting things to do on the street. Mainly at the end of the year
it’s really a problem. There’s missing staff, missing teachers, missing
everything and we end up having to take on other functions. That’s
when the kids say ‘Teacher, let us play ball.’ And I go crazy looking
for a ball and all of a sudden the kid plays ball, gets all sweaty, gets
tired, drinks some water and goes to the classroom all calmed down.
You can see that it’s important to keep busy with sports and the kid
wants some kind of contact with culture. There have been cases of
teachers being assaulted but the student doesn’t respect anyone
because he’s not respected as a person or a citizen either. (Interview
with partners, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PE)
· The receptivity of the youths is also related to the dedication of the
project motivators in the Center’s activities:
It’s not just a story of culture for culture’s sake. It’s something intense,
developed. A lot of teenagers like being in the project more than
staying at home. They like to be with people who are inside the project
more than they want to be with mom, dad, anyone else from the family.
So it’s love really, it’s taking it on and saying I’m going to do it because
I love it. So, I believe that from that point on you’ve just got this
positive product. (Focus group with specialists/project motivators, Cabo
de Santo Agostinho/PE)
· The project is considered positive in relation to others with the same
format, with emphasis on accompaniment and courses of medium
and long duration investing in citizen training, artistic training, and
preservation of the roots of natural cultural expressions.
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There is accompaniment. This is not a project like others in the cultural
area with activities of short duration, fast, that don’t allow the people
who are participating in the project to assimilate the content. There’s
a beginning, a middle, and a product. There’s no end, because you
invest in training, as much to be a citizen as to be an artist. There is
the possibility of the art that’s learned here becoming something that
will serve in the professional lives of these kids that are learning the
art of dance. It’s worth pointing out that it’s not just dance, it’s popular
dance from Pernambuco. So beyond socially redeeming this child or
teenager, it’s also redeeming this culture that has gotten lost along
the way. (Interview with partners, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PE)
· The project is also considered innovative because of its collaboration
in redeeming the roots of national culture, passing the value of
appreciation on to the youths and contributing to this redemption:
Yesterday Pernambuco was being raised to the national level through
television with a maracatu dance group, and another group. It was a
live broadcast. With projects like this, the teenagers are redeemed,
their internal selves. It keeps them busy, taking them out of a situation
of risk and showing them another reality, providing them with other
opportunities. Projects like this are important of course, but this one
is really special because it discovers talents as well. You can go to a
culture area, or dance, or theatre. Projects like this discover talents
and provide opportunities in a society that’s suffered like ours has,
especially in terms of teenagers, youths. The schools are not very
attractive. It’s projects like this that take these kids out, that rescue
them, that give them a new viewpoint. (Interview with partners, Cabo
de Santo Agostinho/PE)
· As in other similar projects, self-esteem is also emphasized as a benefit
that the youths acquire through the experience. The value of this is
associated to sociability and a sense of belonging to a community.
[Participation in the Center’s activities] improves self-esteem.
The youth feels more like a person to the extent that they are
prepared, they start to be more loved and respected. (Interview
with partners, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PE)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· Changes in behavior occur, and the youths move away from violent
behavior (as victims and as agents). Both the youths and their families
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consider participation in the Center’s play-culture activities and the
citizen socialization projects to contribute to getting more out of school.
They also refer to other changes, such as better care of their
appearance and more interest in getting information. A number of
those interviewed related to the Center warned that the misery in the
youths’ family groups limits the long term positive effects on the
youths. However, they insist that a real change takes place in relation
to the value of education and the school. The after school tutoring
activities that take place at the Center contributed to this.
There are a lot of cases of youths who start to improve in school after
a period of Center activities. They start to get passing grades. This is
because of the projects that we do with school tutoring. It’s a question
of math. We work on getting over the difficulties they have in the
public schools. So they start getting passing grades, they improve in
school. It’s really concrete, you get it? Their satisfaction is visible.
They start paying more attention, they get more out of school. It’s
really wonderful because these are kids who don’t even have a decent
place to sit and study and their family relationship isn’t always a
structured relationship. So their participation in Center projects gives
them a certain support network and they manage to do better in school.
(Interview with coordinator, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PE)
· Youths and their mothers talk about cases in which participation in
the Center’s projects contributed enormously in getting the youths
away from violent situations and practices in addition to improving
the circumstances of the mothers’ lives by minimizing their anguish
related to the risks their daughters run:
My daughter changed a lot after she came here to talk with the
psychologist. She used to go out on the street and beg. She lived on
the street, all dirty. Today she doesn’t live on the street anymore thank
God. She changed for the better. (Focus group with mothers/fathers/
guardians, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PE)
My daughter changed too. She was involved with prostitution, drugs,
a bad group. Today she’s more understanding. She stays at home.
She’s changed a lot. (Focus group with mothers/fathers/guardians, Cabo
de Santo Agostinho/PE)
I think that I was really hardheaded. I did whatever my friends did. I
ran away from home. I spent days away from home. I drove my mother
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crazy. I didn’t care about anything. I didn’t want to stop to study and
then after I came here it just stopped. I got my head together. I learned
how to be a responsible person. I learned how to live with people.
(Focus group with youths, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PE)
There were a lot of times that I just stayed away from home without
telling my mom where I was. My mom would worry. She just prayed for
me all the time. I even reached the point where I was using drugs. I did
what the others did. I used drugs, I sniffed glue and did a lot of other
things that I shouldn’t have done. Then I got into the Center project and
I left all this behind and I don’t want to use anymore. Thank God I got out
of all that. (Focus group with youths, Cabo de Santo Agostinho/PE)
· The speech of one girl demonstrates the positive effects of this strategy
in relation to accomplishing changes in the way of life of these youths:
I learned to respect my mother, my uncles, something I didn’t know. I
cursed all the time. I didn’t respect anyone. When someone said
something to me I just sassed right back. I learned not to run away
from home to go out with someone, not to use drugs because of the
Center and my mom’s willpower. That was how I spent a little time
without using drugs and I’ve stayed that way until today. I do everything
I can to get these people out of it, but you just feel sorry for them
because you can’t get them out of it. (Focus group with youths, Cabo
de Santo Agostinho/PE)
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4.7.4 Centro de Cidadania Umbu Ganzá (Umbu Ganzá
Center for Citizenship)
1) Name of Organization
Centro de Cidadania Umbu Ganzá (Umbu Ganzá Center for Citizenship)
2) Date of Foundation
1998
3) City/State
Recife, Pernambuco
4) Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5) Contact
a) Marcos Vicente da Silva
b) Function: President
c) Telephone: (81)3428-3311
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
The project is developed in the neighborhoods of São José, known as
Coque, and Santo Antônio of Recife. Some of the activities take place in
other locations, for example the theatre, so that the youths can have contact
with other realities.
7) Funding Sources
The resources of the project originate from the Federal Government, Brazil
Child Citizen - BCC, and the Worker’s Assistance Fund – FAT. From the
State Government, funds come from the Children’s Circle program, which
is linked to the Secretariat of Planning and Social Development –
SEPLANDES. From the Municipal Government, funds come from the
Child and Adolescent Fund, which is linked to the Municipal Council for
the Child and the Adolescent in the city of Recife. Funds also come from
international agencies such as UNICEF and the TELEMAR company.
Sporadic donations from businesses and private individuals are also
received.
8) Areas of Activity
Social street education, art education (music, dance, and theatre), and
culture.
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9) Objectives
· Promote social inclusion of the child, adolescent, and youth through an
allied action that provides potential for improvement in their family
(domestic group).
· Provide the youths with opportunities as artistic and cultural producers
within the community, giving them access to information and techniques
on body expression, dance, singing and “musicalization”, putting on
presentations, marketing, and fundraising which can become useful in
future development of the youths’ creative potential and earning capacity.
· Stimulate local cultural production and provide new leisure opportunities
for the community.
· Contribute to the youths’ personal and collective growth through mutual
respect and professional responsibility.
· Encourage community and collective organization among the youths.
Encourage associative coexistence, using the interaction among the
youths with leadership potential, including artistic and cultural potential,
and to encourage such organization among other young persons related
to incidents of violence.
10) Target Public
The programs and projects are developed for the population between 15
and 24 years of age.
11)Description and Background
Umbu Ganzá is a non-profit non-governmental organization founded
in 1998 with a social concern that incorporates culture as an element of
personal and collective redemption for children and youths in low-income
neighborhoods of Recife. The program’s principal actions are developed
in the neighborhoods of São José and Santo Antônio. These neighborhoods
have been mentioned in newspapers as areas with high incidences of
violence. In addition to this, some activities are developed in the House
of Culture, a space provided by the Secretariat of Culture and the Cultural
Foundation of Pernambuco – FUNDERPE. The House of Culture is
located near an area that is known for prostitution and even sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents..
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One of the things that makes Umbu Ganzá unique is that the educators
are from the community and in the middle and long term they begin to
encourage groups or associations. In the first place, teenagers and
youths in situations of personal and social risk, on the street or tied to
the gangs in the community are our primary focus. Special assistance
is given to youths who are under legal supervision due to cases of
delinquency and are supposed to follow educational programs
according to judicial orders. In the second place, we recruited
teenagers and youths that had already had some kind of introduction
to culture in the neighborhood, with dance and music groups with the
objective of getting these youths to organize themselves (youth
protagonists). They would be a positive reference for the first group.
The group that founded the agency had participated in a governmental
project that worked with youths and we realized the creative and
constructive potential, mainly in the change in the life stories of these
kids. When the NGO was founded, in the beginning it competed with a
project at the Support Association of the Solidarity Community –
APPCS. They developed a bricklayer class (the first option for the
course was the possibility of getting a job within the community).
Soccer and cultural production – some of the kids like rap, others like
drums, and others dance - came out of a process of listening to the
youths, parents, guardians, and local leaderships. (Interview with a
project coordinator Recife/PE)
The first cultural and artistic production course (1998) was financed
by the Solidarity Community. Youths that had developed some kind of artistic
activity in the community, including in the street, went to work as instructors.
Currently the institution’s projects serve around 40 youths. Of these, 20
have been associated with the institution since the beginning, in the role of
monitor in community activities.
12) Personnel
The project’s employees are divided into categories between those
that spend all day at the project – two social specialists, a sociologist, a
social assistant, a support educator, and a cook – and those that are there
on a part-time basis – a psychologist and the instructors of specific areas by
hours/activity, including the music, theatre, and dance teacher. There is no
volunteer work. Some of the monitors are youths enrolled in the organization’s
activities and the majority are enrolled in secondary school. There is also a
project of group work with the youths’ families that is developed by a
psychologist. The instructors are chosen based on résumé evaluation and
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previous experience. Training consists of a specific project in relation to the
area of knowledge. Meetings occur focusing on discussion and sharing of
the institution’s objectives. Links are established through contracts with
instructors and permanent support staff and scholarship grants for the project
monitors and the youths.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The institution develops programs with activities focused on street education,
art education (drums, dance, theatre, and acrobatics), recreation, reading, and
insertion in school. Meals are provided for the youths, in addition to psychotherapy
support aimed at victims of domestic violence and sexual abuse. A project for
cultural, artistic, and sports activities is currently being developed in conjunction
with the youths. With the families, especially the mothers, biweekly meetings
take place for sewing and the like, and conversation. This has had an incredible
effect on improving the self-esteem of the participants.
The Costa Project, which is part of Umbu Ganzá’s activities, rebuilt
spaces in the community with the collaboration of the youths who took the
bricklayer’s course in 1998/1999. A soccer team was formed but the dance
and music activities became more popular. An effort to make the community
in general and the school community more aware of questions related to
childhood and youth is also part of the activities developed by the institution.
Dance, theater, and music classes are periodically developed at the
House of Culture (a space provided by the Secretariat of Culture and
FUNDERPE), and activities in visual arts are developed at the Monsignor
Barreto school, in the Coque neighborhood.
14) Methodology
The methodological proposal anticipates daily six-hour meetings Monday
through Friday totaling 30 hours a week. Among the activities will be physical
exercises, dynamic games, and collective activities focused on self-esteem and
reflecting on questions of gender, ethical values, race, exclusion, identity and
otherness, and coexistence with differences. These are projects with specific
content, establishing connections with the questions raised in the citizenship module.
[...] In our practical existence we put on theatre, presentations,
rehearsals with the kids that help and serve the littler kids and
teenagers with the goal of identifying educators. (Interview with project
coordinator Recife/PE)
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Before starting activities, the institution developed a broad project of
advertising the projects in the community through community radio stations
and through sending bulletins to the schools. The goal is to mobilize the
school community through local leaderships and community youth groups.
Participants are selected through an application process. The institution
invites the youths for a wider explanation of the course. This is followed by
meetings with the youths’ parents in order to clarify the activities. The next
step is participation in group dynamics with the purpose of motivating the
youths to participate in the courses. These youths receive a scholarship of
R$ 50.00, a meal, educational supplies, and money for transportation.
The institution’s proposal is to transform everything produced by the
children into book form as a way of recording their productions.
Another proposal developed by Umbu Ganzá is a cultural festival that
is performed by the youths in conjunction with the communities and in alliance
with various other groups.
In general, the activities are organized into modules, with each one
lasting 30 to 60 hours. There are citizenship modules and other specific
modules that include music, drums, diction, posture, dance, theatre, stage,
lighting, sound, marketing, project development, and fundraising activities.
This method is based on the constructivist theory, where construction of
knowledge is based on respect for the youths’ reality.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
Partnership is a strong point for Umbu Ganzá. It is one of the main
preoccupations, as much for the financial sustainability of the project as for
its social visibility. One of the principal elements of the program is the youths’
presentations in shows, which contributes to their self-esteem and inclusion
in the cultural market. The partnership and support network maintained by
Umbu Ganzá is highly diversified. This is also true for the type of alliance,
collaboration, and exchange that is established.
With the House of Culture, linked to the Secretariat of Culture –
FUNDARPE and other governmental organizations, Umbu Ganzá
establishes relationships for the use of physical space, presentations, and
the exchange of experiences among the youths.
As many of the program’s activities are focused on the area of art
education through theatre, music, dance, and acrobatics, many of the
presentations are put on in a wide variety of well known locations in the
city such as the House of Culture and the Geraldão and Apollo Theatres,
in addition to schools. In relation to the latter, the project develops activities
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with students in the public school system. This happens as much in the
schools themselves as in other spaces, putting together groups with youths
from the schools and communities. These groups take on a certain
significance in reintegrating the youths in the school community.
The agency makes an effort to relate with all of the neighborhood
organizations, residents’ associations, mothers’ clubs, senior
citizen’s groups, youth groups, churches and religious groups, in
addition to municipal, state, and community schools. This is done
because of the belief in the principal of community social
mobilization. In each organization, however,0 this way of relating
has occurred on several levels. In relation to social movements, we
are part of a network of alliance and service to children and
teenagers from RPA 01, from the Get Your Life Back Alliance Center.
We also work with non-governmental social agencies and with
groups of agencies linked to Futura TV. In relation to the agencies
that work with youths, such as the Luis Freire Cultural Center,
Gestures, the Photographic Gallery Observatory, and the Assistance
Legion of Recife with youth agents, and other movements like
Garbage Mouth, in Peixinhos, we encourage exchange among the
youths. We are also allied with the Daruê Malungo group. As an
example of shared cultural activity, I’d like to mention the Garbage
Mouth project in Peixinhos, the multiplier youths from Gestures,
the work of the Life Institute, and the music and dance groups from
the community( the Dolente Samba group, Suingueira dance group,
Samba Art, Rosa dos Ventos, Tito Youth group, etc.). (Interview
with project coordinator, Recife/PE)
The project is concerned with establishing partnership ties with the
families and the communities it is a part of. The family is considered to
be an important link for the boys and girls. Because of this, meetings
are held with those responsible in order to include them in the
organization’s activities. In order to use physical space and include the
community in the projec,t partnerships are developed with a wide variety
of residents’ associations.
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
The projects of the non-governmental organization Umbu Ganzá are
evaluated regularly by monitors from the Solidarity Community, a funding
partner. Evaluation meetings are held by module with the youths, families,
and the specialist team. The last one was held in December, 2000.
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The youths participate in this phase of the project by evaluating
teacher performance for each module along with discussions, planning,
and decision making.
Another form of evaluation performed by the institution is the domestic
visits and psychological guidance which comes at the request of the youths.
Periodic reports are produced with information organized in a
quantitative form and through qualitative reports. The attendance records
of the youths are also used.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· One of the main problems pointed out by the institution is the question
of the small amount of time used to work on the activities. The
institution considers this aspect to be harmful to the quality of the
projects.
One problem is the short amount of time that the course lasts,
because a social educational project is not made in five or six
months. It needs more time to mature. One of the strategies to
overcome this was to direct a project to agents and art educators
on STDs and HIV/AIDS where we gave priority, with the youths, to
what they consider to be essential in the class. We’re considering
the possibility of their continuing to study this. (Interview with
project coordinator, Recife/PE)
· The youths state that they are extremely satisfied to be part of the project,
but they emphasize the problem of discontinuity. Also cited is the structure
by weekly module, which they consider to be difficult and exhausting.
I think it’s so good that I wish I could sign on for another year, but one
negative thing is that there aren’t enough classes for the people who
want to participate. (Focus group with youths, Recife/PE)
I wanted the course to not last one week for each module because
learning in just one week is really hard. If it was one month for each
course, even without the scholarship. In one week it’s pretty hard for a
guy to learn. (Focus group with youths, Recife/PE)
· The question of lack of resources was also cited by the institution as
a problem. Without funding, it becomes difficult to provide continuity
to the projects.
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The resources are minimal and the strategy is to give priority to what’s
essential, for the class, to work with the instructors who have the
largest social commitment, because what they pay us, it’s really not
much. (Interview with project coordinator, Recife/PE)
· There is a certain resistance on the part of the community and the
youths who are in the project themselves in relation to the other
youths in the community. The argument is that a considerable part of
this group has been directed to seek out the project because of the
scholarship. This is something that is considered by the institution to
be a cause for competition among the youths.
The strategy is to have exchange with the experiences of youths in
similar communities and with few resources, preferably those with no
scholarships, so the kids can see how they’re really being given an
award. (Interview with project coordinator, Recife/PE)
· According to the educators, relationships with public agencies can
cause problems. In some governments, partnerships that were
extremely positive were established but their continuity was weakened,
and in many cases compromised. This situation essentially becomes
one of waiting for these people to be replaced.
· The scholarships offered to the youths can have a negative effect if
they are used by politicians as tools of favoritism during elections.
Many times the local and community leaderships tend to manipulate
the benefit to the youths. On the other hand, the course becomes a
valuable tool for some of the youths once they are going to receive
an assistance scholarship.
· The attempt to revert the negative image of violence that is associated
with the youths from the community has created a questionable effect
at times. Once some of these youths are highlighted individually
through artistic recognition, they start to feel superior to the others.
This creates a differentiation among them within the project itself.
· The lack of monitoring for the youths after the projects are over is also
considered to be a large obstacle towards the success of the projects.
Responsible members of the institution recognize this as a difficulty in
the program, due to the fact that other projects are always starting.
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· There is a predominance of males in the participating group. According
to the institution, this characteristic is due to the macho and competitive
qualities of the men in the community, who make it difficult for women
to take part in community leaderships.
18) Why is it an innovative experience?
The experience has been considered successful stemming from various
factors. Among these is the receptivity of the youths themselves and the
possibility that projects like Umbu Ganzá offer in terms of getting to know
other local groups. The project motivators and educators themselves are
youths from the community that have gone through the activities promoted
by the institution. Today they are part of the team.
· The institution managed to gain legitimacy with the community, which
had previously experienced only prejudiced programs of short duration
that strengthened social stigmas like generalized violence.
· The project has been extremely valued for offering alternatives that
focus on taking these youths out of their high risk situations and
situations of social vulnerability.
· For the involved individuals, the project has managed to contribute to
institutionalizing proposals on the level of public policy. This has
occurred by insisting on partnership relationships with government
agencies. They also state that the project made a decisive contribution
to the deconstruction of the predominance of male participation in
the programs. This broadened the participation of girls in artistic
activities which had previously been dominated by the boys.
We girls came here wanting to go to the dance course, because we
really like to dance. We came here for that, really, but there were other
things. There’s voice, drums. We got interested in learning. (Focus
group with youths, Recife/PE)
· Another positive aspect of the project was investment in sustainability
and in the possibility of multiplication of the projects developed with
the youths:
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The possibility we have is that we manage to get volunteers and
we’re trying a partnership with someone who can come here and
provide continuity for this group in terms of musicalization. Another
possibility is the group itself, because of the need to keep on studying,
to be together, and to help each other. That gives continuity even
just because they’ve already expressed the desire to start a library
with the people from the Garbage Mouth Movement. Another
possibility that shows there are ways to multiply the experience is to
exploit the fact that we’re developing a cheap project. The cost is
around 200 reais per capita. We intend to get projects going that
have this culture cure in people’s educational process, in their
community mobilization too. We want to get projects going based on
this experience and to make proposals to the government, make
proposals to the cultural boards and insist on policies for youth.
(Interview with educators, Recife/PE)
· In addition to this, the project provides education and popular
knowledge. There are contacts between the educators and the youths’
families, establishing an educational chain that goes both ways (the
educators learn more about the family context and the parents learn
more about youth culture through the specialists).
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· A number of individuals interviewed refer to the improvement in
self-esteem, in sociability, and in the youths’ taking on the role of
protagonist as effects of the project. This is related to the fact the
youths feel that they are able to make socially important realizations,
in addition to their being socially visible in a positive way and widening
their circle of relationships. They demonstrate consciousness of
themselves as the subjects of their rights. When these rights are
exercised, the youths then become a reference for their communities.
From a material point of view the youths currently get a scholarship,
a meal, educational supplies, and transportation, in addition to the
exchange with other agencies. From a spiritual point of view they get
knowledge and the exchange of knowledge. They get to experience
new ways, visions, and values. They experience group coexistence.
They have contact with different people. They exercise responsibility,
relationships, and the ability to make things happen, dreams, desires.
They get to change their story and start to construct a life project.
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They get to be a positive reference for other kids in their neighborhood.
They’re less easily manipulated by political groups, election groups,
and those eternal association presidents. This all happens because
they begin to relate to power in a more human way, a way with more
solidarity. (Interview with project coordinator, Recife/PE)
The kids like the project because they get together. They meet among
themselves. This really contributes to their self-esteem. Being together,
getting to know other cultural groups from other communities. They’ve
got this financial encouragement in their pocket. They’ve got a little
money to go to the movies, to have an ice cream cone, to go to the
beach. They get home and they help with the groceries. They can help
fix the wall that’s falling down in their house. They can help their
mom. This really helps the kids feel extremely valued because of this
money. They love the group dynamic activities. We use this video made
with the help of UNICEF. It’s filmed by Viva TV and it’s called To Have
a Life, Be a Group. The kids love it, it recognizes their work. (Interview
with project coordinator, Recife/PE)
There is evidence of positive results in terms of sociability. Based on
the group formed by the youths in the program, they organized this
chorus together with another group that was already playing. They’re
getting this group together with traditional music and chorus. They
produced this dance show too with the other kids from Umbu Ganzá
who had already done a presentation in a cultural festival at Pátio de
São Pedro. Because of the classes in this project, they’re also
organizing a performance for the Theatre Forum. (Interview with
educators, Recife/PE)
The project allowed for the discovery of talents within the communities,
exploring the potential of artistic-cultural development for the citizen.
According to the institution, there was a significant increase in the
participation of the women of these communities in the project’s actions.
This characteristic was considered unexpected owing to the predominance
of sexist relations which privilege only male participation.
Umbu Ganzá is opening up spaces for people to participate in the
culture area. (Focus group with youths, Recife/PE)
It changed because we never thought we were going to be playing in
the GeraldãoHouse of Culture and today the gang just gets in easy
because of the course. If it weren’t for the course how would we get in
there? (Focus group with youths, Recife/PE)
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· The youths’ relationships with school improved considerably with
participation in the project, allowing some of them to return to attending
classes. Changes could be identified in relation to the youths and the
school space. There was a decrease in the youths’ involvement in
fights. There was also better use of the physical space at the school
as an area for leisure and cultural activities, turning it into a “protected
space” for the youths.
Another thing that changed was school performance. There was a
high rate of failing grades. Umbu Ganzá started with us last year, in
1999. They held a number of courses. And from last year to this year
there was a change in relation to failing grades because when the
students gave up they kept skipping class, and the next year they
would fail again. Now the kid comes to more classes and behaves
better. This is really something very positive for us. The problem,
according to the project coordination, is that they don’t know how to
keep it going here at the school. A lot depends on maintenance. But
whatever depends on us, on the school, for this NGO’s projects to
continue, we’ll do. Because our evaluation is really positive. We’ve
got improvement in behavior and in learning here at the school.
(Interview with partner, Recife/PE)
They were the most positive thing in the school. This is a school that’s
located in a needy community, a community where the rate of violence
is extremely high. So we’ve also got a high dropout rate, a failure
rate, and we have a lot of students who aren’t in the right grade for
their age. These projects that are happening here in the school made
the dropout rate go down. The students participate more because they
know that participating in school will make it easier for them to
participate in the project. This student is more conscious of what he
has to do. He’s more of a citizen, and he even starts getting more
demanding, fighting for his rights. When I say, and I’m the principal,
‘It’s this way.’ He or she says ‘No, it’s not that way, because of this, or
because of that.’ (Interview with partner, Recife/PE)
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4.7.5 Programa de Atendimento à Criança e ao
Adolescente – PACA
(Service for the Child and Adolescent Program – PACA)
1) Name of Organization
Secretariat of Social Action (SEAS) of the Mayor’s Office of the City of Camaragibe
– Pernambuco
2) Date of Foundation
1997
3) City/State
Camaragibe/PE
4) Type of Organization
Municipal Mayor’s Office - governmental organization
5) Name of Project/Program
Programa de Atendimento à Criança e ao Adolescente – PACA
(Service for the Child and Adolescent Program – PACA)
6) Contact
a) Adelaide Suely de Oliveira
b) Function: Secretary of Social Action of the Mayor’s Office of Camaragibe,
Pernambuco
c) Telephone: (81) 3458-2974
d) e-mail: [email protected]
7) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
Priority is given to the communities through partnerships with social agencies,
churches, and schools, but also in the headquarters of the Secretariat of Social
Action.
8) Funding Sources
Municipal Mayor’s Office of Camaragibe, UNICEF and the ABRINQ Foundation
for the Rights of the Child and the Adolescent
9) Areas of Activity
Art, culture, education, and the environment
10) Objectives
To follow the Statute of the Child and Adolescent and the Organic Law of Social
Assistance in regards to attention to children and adolescents.
11) Target Public
Children and adolescents, boys and girls of 7 to 17 years of age of all races and
creeds that are in situations of personal and social risk and/or legal conflict, from
the five political-administrative regions of the municipality. These individuals are
directed to the program by the Juvenile Court or the Conselho Tutelar, a
governmental agency in the judicial area that deals with local institutions in the
guardianship and supervision of children and adolescents legally considered
delinquents. Their re-education is commonly developed with the Conselho Tutelar,
local agencies, and NGOs and this is the case with PACA.
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12) Description and Background
In 1997, a study of the situation of the youths in the municipality of
Camaragibe was performed. The results demonstrated the high degree of
social vulnerability the youths of the municipality were subjected to. A high
level of violence against the youths of the community was shown. This
violence included deaths. There was also a high rate of teenage pregnancy,
around 40%, including children of 10 and 11 years of age. The youths did
not have any outlook for their lives and they did not have any space for
leisure. Many of them were not in school and those that did go to school
went and after school let out they were out loose, with nothing to do.
Faced with this reality, the Service to the Child and the Adolescent
Program was implanted. This occurred due to the necessity of bringing
other activities to the youths that could keep them busy with other questions
and to discuss the problem with them. This was done based on a diagnosis
that was made by the Secretariat with the help of a large group of educators
based on the study of the situation in the municipality. Today PACA is
considered to be the most important program for children and youths in the
Mayor’s Office. It’s important to note that in the year 2000 the municipality
of Camaragibe received the Mayor’s Children’s Award, promoted by the
Abrinq Foundation for the Children’s Rights.
13) Personnel
The program counts on project motivators that have combined academic
training and experience in culture and popular education, in addition to a
history of participation in social movements, NGOs, and in areas of
government, in the art education field, and in activities focused on youths
from needy populations.
Among others, the program is made up of the following project
motivators: a social psychologist with experience in needy communities,
government projects (Mayor’s Office), and NGOs, two project motivators
who have degrees in History and experience in projects with adolescents in
street situations. These project motivators have also specialized in citizenship
through cultural expression, in addition to dance and cultural activities with
adolescent girls with histories of drug abuse.
The project motivators undergo a résumé selection process which
includes the development of project proposals discussed in groups. This is a
training element in team work which is later formalized in semester training
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activities. The project motivators emphasize the importance of professional
commitment. According to the coordination, the training should be constant
so that the adolescent can trust the situation. It is also necessary that the
project motivator have technical capacity, in addition to sensitivity in dealing
with youths. The majority work full time and everyone is paid, including the
work-study participants.
14) Ongoing Programs and Projects
PACA is a program with ramifications in distinct projects and courses.
These include computers, English, silkscreen, drums, capoeira, dance, and
theatre. Among the projects, Criarte and the Ecology Brigade stand out.
The activities that attract the youths the most are computers, drums, and
capoeira. This is especially true for those youths between the ages of 16
and 17. Perhaps this is true because they want to take full advantage of the
resources offered by the program in the little time that is left to them as
most of them leave the program at the age of 18. This demand could also
indicate the excellence and social legitimacy of the program among the
target public, and could also point out the fact that other programs of this
type do not exist. The courses offered by the program last an average of six
months, but there are those that last a year.
PACA is a program that currently has eight projects focused on the
child and the adolescent. Each project has a specific objective. Criarte
works with children and youths in the 7 to 17 ½ years of age group.
Criarte works with the cultural part, with creativity. There are
workshops for drums, silkscreen, workshops that are tied to cultural
questions. And in these workshops we talk about themes that have to
do with the adolescent. Urban violence, pregnancy, AIDS (in the
courses). These courses are a pretext. The text itself is to discuss themes
with the youth. There’s the Boys and Girls of Camaragibe project, that
works with kids who are between 10 and 17 years old. Even thought
this project is really directed at the municipal schools it ends up serving
the kids who are 10 to 14 or 15 years old. We talk about themes that
have to do with sexuality, gender relations, domestic and sexist violence,
STDs and AIDS. It’s this meeting time, this information and preparation
time for these teenagers. There’s also the Camará Child that has a
project for eradicating child labor, and a project for getting kids out
of the garbage dump area, 110 children. There’s another project called
Young Culture Agents and the Environment that’s tied to minor
offenders and works more on the question of urban violence. This
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project serves the group that’s most vulnerable in terms of urban
violence. We work with these youths giving a training course in culture
and the environment so they can be multiplying agents. This project is
three years old and in general the public is sent by the Conselho
Tutelar and the Juvenile Court. Another project is the Ecological
Brigade that deals with youths between 10 and 17 ½ years old. They
discuss the question of sustainable development and the environment
and they have a joint activity with the communities. The other project
is called Legal Citizenship and works only with teenage offenders
directed to the program by the Juvenile Court. This accompaniment is
more particular. There’s a project that’s beginning now with the Enough
Abuse campaign. This campaign has to do with ill treatment and sexual
exploitation of children and adolescents, we work with the question
of violence against the child and the adolescent. In relation to this
specific problem. We have a public of 150 youths. We did a study, a
diagnostic of children who suffer sexual abuse or rape. We used
mechanisms like the Juvenile Court, the Conselho Tutelar, the Court,
and we found in such study a number that was close to those institutions
over this year, an extremely high rate of violence against the child
and adolescent. We’re going to create a service center here in addition
to a preventive action in the communities. (Interview with coordination,
Camaragibe/PE)
Previously, more boys attended the PACA projects. Now, however,
there is a good representation of both sexes. The projects serve both a
spontaneous demand which is considered “social”, and another “legal”
impulse motivated by the Conselho Tutelar and the Rights Council.
15) Methodology
Project motivators develop a project proposal that includes a diagnostic
of the city and all the specific communities. In this diagnostic, the schools are
emphasized with their situation and their necessities. The entire team meets
periodically to prepare integrated planning. The approaches are transdisciplinary
and are based in the prevention of violence. For example, if a theme for
debate is defined having to do with domestic violence or drugs, activities are
developed based on three thematic areas. These would be gender, sex, and
race, areas that are considered strategic in behavior changes.
The project seeks to develop a combination of activities that have
both artistic and professional finalities. The computer course is very
attractive to the youths and is oriented towards passing on citizenship
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values. For example, in teaching programs like Microsoft and Word, charts,
graphics, and tables about violence are created using statistics on violence
against women.
16) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The project develops alliances with other secretariats, with the church,
with the Federal University of Pernambuco, and other institutions. Some
projects also receive financial collaboration from organizations like UNICEF
and ABRINQ. Various projects have resources from the state government
and the Ministry of Welfare and Social Assistance.
The program is woven into a process of contacts with other
organizations in the social program field. However, this occurs more
because of relationships the project motivators have with other
organizations. This fact indicates a lack of contacts with other government
projects (for example with the Culture Foundation, which develops a youth
theatre group among other activities). Some project motivators come from
other organizations like the Transit House (for women related to
prostitution), the Camará Theatre, and from other Mayor’s Office projects
such as the Young Learner Program from SINE (with resources from the
Worker’s Assistance Fund and in partnership with SEBRAE), that orients
work-study participants. However, project motivators emphasize the lack
of governmental alternatives that direct the youths in terms of continuity
in the professional training process.
Candidates’ family members are interviewed when the classes are
being formed. This helps in strategies in dealing with the youths by
detecting relationship difficulties between the youths and their family
members. Periodic contact is maintained in terms of intervening on the
family level as well.
We’ve got teenagers with this enormous desire to learn, to want to
change, to become part of a different context. But you can really see
that the kid is really abandoned too. There’s a very high rate of
abandonment in the family. I can see this in the service I do. These are
teenagers whose family delegates the responsibility of changing the
kid’s behavior to someone who’s dealing with that child, that teen.
When in fact, it’s not our responsibility. Our role is to work with the
family as well, to interact with the family to contribute to a change in
behavior for this kid and that is in fact what happens sometimes.
(Focus group with specialists/program motivators, Camaragibe/PC)
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17) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
The diagnostics of the communities, with emphasis on the schools,
help re-design projects in accordance with the realities that the youths
experience:
The diagnostic is a qualitative evaluation, a take on reality that is
performed by a team of five people from the Secretariat itself (used for
the creation of Criarte). We would go everyday to some places in the
city to observe. To observe reality, behavior, the number of kids living
on the streets in the center of the city. Observing and taking notes on
what we saw. Then afterwards we would do some interviews, nothing
structured. Some interviews with business people, community leaders,
health agents. Then we used this to get an idea of the reality of these
children, these kids in the city. (Focus group with program specialists,
Camaragibe/PE).
The program also undergoes external evaluations, when collaboration
from non-governmental sources is received. For example, the program is
currently being evaluated by UNICEF (anticipated to end in December).
There are also contracted external evaluations.
18) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Those responsible for the project cited Mayor’s Office and SEAS
budget cuts as the principal problem in the projects many times.
The main problem is money, because even though we’ve got financing
from different agencies, which certainly means a lot, it’s still too little
for the size of the program. We can’t serve the groups in the community
that we want to yet. The demand is much too high. And we don’t even
do much advertising, because we’re afraid of creating an expectation
that we couldn’t handle, that we couldn’t respond to. (Interview with
coordination, Camaragibe/PE)
· Other difficulties faced by project development include human
resources. This area is considered to be extremely insufficient to
face the demands. There are also too few material resources for the
project. Physical space is limited for the types of activities performed.
Many of them are developed in the schools and the communities.
There are also management problems in the projects, lacking more
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present supervision and technical assistance which would allow for
more long term planning. There is limited technical autonomy on the
part of the project motivators. It is believed that this is due to the fact
of their being part of a public institution. They complain that their
activities are more legitimate than those performed by the Mayor’s
Office (knowledge of dynamics and not just results). This problem,
according to the project motivators, also comes from the “lack of
comprehension of the social importance” of the project, making it
difficult to make decisions that affect the activities’ taking place.
· The institution can’t handle the teen’s progress, the proposal’s
progress. We had a proposal to do maracatu dance, getting dance
groups from the community together and putting on maracatu dance
for Children’s Day. The month of the project, the institution had
financial problems and wasn’t able to let those kids do it. (Focus
group with specialists, Camaragibe/PE)
19) Why is it an innovative experience?
· According to the coordination, the program can be considered a
success due to its expansion. In the beginning there was an average
of 200 adolescents in Criarte. This number has reached almost 3,200
served in four years. In the second semester, 2000, PACA served
around 1,200 youths.
· Part of the history of the project’s success are specific cases of
recuperation for some of the youths. There is a case of one youth
who was directed to PACA by the Juvenile Court because of
involvement with violence, assault, and drug dealing. Today this youth
is 18 years old and he participates in a community theatre group. He
also does arts and crafts and still maintains affectionate ties to the
program team. They keep track of him as well. There is the story of
another youth who was an accomplice to a murder. He confessed
his involvement to the project motivators. He was then directed by
the Juvenile Court for psychological attendance. This created a
network of protection and recuperation around him. There is another
story about a youth who went through the program and took the
college entrance exam.
· The project allows for a change in the perception the youths have
about the reality they live in.
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You touch on sensitivity really, on an emotion that is beautiful. It’s not
that specifically that’s beautiful. It’s on what is revealed to them about
their own behavior. It certainly contributes to this change in attitude
in terms of violence. It lessens the pain of everything going in such a
cruel way. It gives them something else to hope for, this group that’s in
their lives. The only fear is that you might point him out in some way,
just when they’re starting to fight for their own rights. (Interview with
coordination, Camaragibe/PE)
Projects like PACA invest in preparation. We know that the kids are
going to confront this extremely tough reality. The minute they’re in
the job market they’re going to face huge problems in relation to
social inequalities. (Interview with coordination, Camaragibe/PE)
· The educators and project motivators go on to highlight motivation
and commitment from the perspective of alternatives to violence.
They also highlight community motivation, creating an outlet for the
activities.
The community always searches us out at the end of the course. There’s
a lot of motivation. (Focus group with program specialists, Camaragibe/
PE)
At the end of the courses, the Community looks for us to a new activity.
The youths’ self-esteem changes. They start to believe as well, they
‘trust that it’s possible to change, transform, become more human,
family relationships start to be more affectionate.’ (Interview with
PACA/SEAS coordination, female, Camaragibe/PE)
The critical capacity of the youths develops. They point out the
weaknesses of the educators themselves. They acquire knowledge in relation
to their rights. Their school performance improves. Today they participate
a lot more in class. They’re leaders, they do better in school. (Interview
with coordination, Camaragibe/PE)
· The youths also emphasize what they consider to be positive parts of
the projects. They highlight the fact that the project allows them to
have an alternative space to spend their time in a creative way, which
takes them away from meaningless idle time and situations of violence.
They relate changes in their life that have occurred because of their
participation in the projects. They cite the differences in their lives
from the lives of the youths that don’t participate in the project.
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The kids that aren’t part of the projects go to school and hang around
in the afternoon playing ball, talking, getting together in little groups.
Some of them do something good but there are others who just don’t
care about anything. The projects are really interesting. It’s gotten a
lot of kids out of just staying at home with nothing to do, or getting
together with people they shouldn’t. They come here to take the courses
and that’s really important. (Interview with youths, Camaragibe/PE)
20) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· There are behavior changes in the youths. They show improvement
after they become involved in the projects. Their cultural tastes change
and they begin to value national and regional expressions more. One
example is maracatu dance.
· When compared to the youths who do not participate in the
program’s projects, those that participate stand out for showing a
higher level of integration with the group, showing leadership. For
example, they organize cultural activities in their communities and
they invite the project motivators to participate. Some examples
include a youth from Alto da Pedrinha who organized activities in
his school, asking for participation from project motivators from
another program. Another youth made a videotape about cultural
groups in the community.
· Changes in the image of institutions are also cited. A certain rejection
of the disenchantment that commonly exists among the youths in
terms of institutions occurs. Gains in relation to their posture as citizens
and social responsibility are confirmed. Other things are also
highlighted including the broadening of this posture, through the
recognition of their rights.
I used to think that these kids thought that the Mayor’s Office, that is,
society, didn’t have any kind of objective for them. Today, thank God,
there is concern for these kids. There’s this preoccupation with the
young citizen and I believe that this project that the Mayor’s Office is
developing, not just here with us, but with streetkids, is a cool project.
It’s an awesome project because they’re not just looking at today.
They’re looking at tomorrow, at who you’re going to be tomorrow,
what your attitudes are going to be tomorrow, what kinds of things
you do. (Interview with youths, Camaragibe/PE)
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Ok, in my neighborhood this project is extremely important. Because
before the people there just didn’t want to be worried about anything
at all. I’ll tell on myself here. I’ve smoked already. I’ve done a lot of
things. But after this project I saw that this smoking thing, this messing
up other people thing, it’s got nothing to do with nothing. After this
project a lot of things changed in my life. I just built myself up in a
different way. (Interview with youths, Camaragibe/PE)
It really meant a lot for me because after I got in the Environment
Brigade I started to thing differently. Before I used to throw trash on
the ground when I was walking down the street. It’s normal. Everybody
does it. But after I got in the Ecology Brigade I could see that was
wrong. I was doing something aggressive against the environment.
Other things like cutting trees, I never did that but you can see it’s
happening all around you. So I started being this defender of the
environment and I don’t do it anymore. If I see someone doing it I talk
to them and try to explain why it’s wrong. A lot of people don’t accept
it, but you’ve got others who have this viewpoint on the environment.
(Interview with youths, Camaragibe/PE)
· Through the project’s activities the youths change their perception of
their rights:
There was a positive change in my life because here at the Brigade a
psychologist works with us every Wednesday. She works on gender
and violence and it’s really showed me that I have to fight at home so
my mom will treat me the same as my brothers. She can’t say that my
brother can go out and that I have to stay home. My mom can even say
that, but I have to fight for my rights. I think they teach you that here,
how to fight for your rights and fulfill your responsibilities. (Interview
with youths, Camaragibe/PE)
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4.8 Paraná
4.8.1 Escola de Rodeio Erê (The Erê School of Rodeo)
1)
Name of Organization
Escola de Rodeio, Baliza, Tambor e Adestramento Erê (The Erê School of
Rodeo, Exhibition Jumping, Drums, and Horse Training)
2)
Date of Foundation
1990
3)
City/State
Campo Mourão/PR
4)
Type of Organization
Private company
5)
Contact
a) Isaias Genero
b) Function: Project Coordinator
c) Telephone: (44) 523-3821
6)
Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
Headquarters at the Campo Mourão Ranch in PR
7)
Funding Sources
Resources come from the Campo Mourão Ranch itself
8)
Areas of Activity
Sports
9)
Objectives
To contribute to the training of young “cowboys”.
To train youths in activities related to horse breeding.
To keep youths busy with an activity that combats idleness.
10) Target Public
Children and youths from lower income levels, residents of Campo
Mourão, Janiópolis, Turneiras do Oeste, Araruna, Tabiru, Apucarana,
and Maringá. All participants are enrolled in the formal school system.
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11) Description and Background
The Erê Rodeo School is a private entity created with the objective of
teaching youths rodeo competition techniques and to train them as well to
work with breeding and raising animals.
According to the coordinator, the program emerged in a casual manner
through a request made by a friend of the coordinator.
Everything started when this ex-cowboy friend of mine suffered an
accident that left him paralyzed. Before he died, he asked me to make
a dream of his come true, one that he hadn’t been able to do. It was to
put up a school for cowboys. (Interview with coordinator, Campo
Mourão/PR)
The experience has been developed for more than ten years, training
professional cowboys and rural workers.
12) Personnel
The school has a professional staff and some occasional volunteers.
The coordinator is responsible for the execution of all of the school’s activities,
and he is the one who manages all administrative activities.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The main activity for the boys concentrates on rodeo training. However,
the youths are not obligated to participate in this training. There are a wide
variety of options of training on the farm, in addition to duties that they all
have to learn and perform.
During the day the boys can play drums, train for exhibition jumping,
swim, play soccer, and ride horses. They also learn to cut cattle’s horns,
milk cows, treat animal hides, shear, break animals in, build fences, and
become involved with farm maintenance.
14) Methodology
For the youth to become enrolled in the school, a form is signed by the
parent or guardian as a “term of responsibility”, due to the risks that the
child runs in the sport.
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It is vital that the youth be enrolled in a formal school in order to
participate in Rodeo School activities. In addition to this, the school has an
“internal regulation” which must be obeyed by the students. This regulation
is strictly enforced by the instructor. It contains rules of contact that serve
as guidelines for the youths that participate in the school.
All of the students are male. The coordinator believes that it is difficult
to administer the participation of girls with the project’s current resources.
According to the coordinator, girls require more attention and distract the
boys. However, some girls eventually go to the school, participating in
horseback processions, drum tests, and exhibition jumping. Girls do not
participate in the horse training, however.
The training, entertainment, and farm maintenance activities occur on
Saturdays and Sundays during the day. At night rodeos take place at the
school. The group also participates in some traditional regional rodeos. In
addition to this, two contests take place twice a year in literature, music,
poetry, and drawing. The theme and the dates of these contests are agreed
upon among the students and the teacher.
In order to be a professional rodeo cowboy, the youths must be at
least 18 years of age and must have a worker’s permit that allows them
to practice the sport. The youths must demonstrate knowledge and ability
in order to obtain this permit under the responsibility of the Erê Rodeo
School. It is not enough to just be of age and attend the school. The
teacher is often more strict in relation to the student’s techniques than in
relation to his age.
The minute they’re 18 years old, or if they think they’re able and I
think they’re ready, we give them their permit and their letter. Then
they can follow the rodeos. (Interview with coordinator, Campo Mourão/
PR)
Student attendance is marked for all activities and they are given grades.
In addition to this, the project coordinator makes an effort to monitor student
performance in school and in the community.
Even the youths who have already obtained their licenses are obligated
to maintain a minimum frequency of 30% of the year at the school in order
to renew their licenses. When they visit the school, they participate with the
teacher in student evaluations.
The survey, writing, and drawing activities are also evaluated. The
projects are also taken to the school where the student studies, to be
evaluated by the Portuguese and art education teachers.
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The youths’ accompaniment for those who have already gone through
the project is informal. That is, it is not systematized and it does not occur in
a regular form.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
There is no partnership with any similar organization. The main reason
for this is because of lack of advertising of the project. At times, the school
has appeared in the newspaper, in magazines, and on television stories.
However, people from the community usually find out about the project
from the boys themselves or from a teacher.
The project doesn’t maintain a partner relationship even with the youths’
families. This is because most of the youths come from extremely needy
families and there are few parents who have the means to support the
project, principally in terms of providing resources. The distance of the
farm in relation to the neighborhoods where they live is another reason the
parents do not participate in project activities with their children.
Some of the boys trained by the Erê project have managed to stand
out on the national and international rodeo scene. These youths always
come back to Campo Mourão and when they do they usually bring other
people to visit the Rodeo School.
This spreading of the word often attracts more boys to the school.
Even though spontaneous contributions are sometimes made by the visitors,
none ever brought partnerships to the project.
There is no collaboration on the part of the Mayor’s Office, the state,
or the federal government. Even so, there are still many students and some
people from the community who have placed their faith for governmental
support in a town counselor that they helped elect.
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
Due to the scarce institutionalization of the activities, the project does
not count on a systematized evaluation.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Lack of resources to serve the youths’ necessities and to maintain
the farm school.
There are no existing partnerships, not only with the government, but
with other agencies. This is a huge impediment to developing the project.
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The problem is that the Mayor’s Office doesn’t help the school. If we
need to change a horseshoe they don’t send money for the horseshoe.
Isaias buys the food and it’s just enough for the junior cowboys. The
Mayor’s Office doesn’t help. We feel abandoned here. This is a project
that gets a lot of kids off the street and they don’t care at all. (Focus
group with youths, Campo Mourão/PR)
· Distance between the youths’ neighborhoods and the farm.
There is no collective transportation that takes the youths to the Erê
Rodeo School. Many of them cross around 25 km of dirt road by bicycle or
on foot. It takes an hour or an hour and a half to get to the school.
· Lack of support for medical assistance in the case of accidents, mainly
during training and rodeos.
The teacher cannot do training or rodeos if there isn’t at least a car in
the area to transport any student that might have an injury. Reports
demonstrate the occurrence of serious accidents that did not receive
immediate first aid.
18) Why is it an innovative experience?
· The project is considered to be a success in spite of the precarious
way in which it is sustained. The best demonstration of this is the
youths’ efforts. They confront enormous difficulties to attend the
school. The number of dropouts is also extremely small.
[The project] has everything it needs to work out right as soon as we
have someone’s help. Political help, religious, social. [...] Currently
we’ve got a horse procession, rural tourism, and rural house stays.
This part is really encouraged, the part of the school that deals with
the rural side. (Interview with coordinator, Campo Mourão/PR)
· One community member comments on how much the boys dream
about becoming famous rodeo riders:
You’ve got to nourish this dream, because that’s what stimulates
them. That’s where the inspiration comes from. But something more
solid is created along with this dream and that’s professional
training, education, schooling. (Interview with community member,
Campo Mourão/PR)
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· All of those interviewed recognize the project coordinator’s charisma.
They also believe that the project transforms the lives of the youths
for the better in a wide variety of ways.
Ever since my son came [to the Erê Rodeo School], I thank the teacher,
who gave him encouragement. He thought he was doing well and he
kept on giving him encouragement. He’s someone I’d like the mayor
here and other people from the government to know about. (Interview
with father/mother/guardian, Campo Mourão/PR)
· Nevertheless, education in the project does not include only what the
students learn in the classroom, even though it is required that the
students attend school. The teacher doesn’t concentrate their lessons
only on reading and research activities, although they eventually
promote them. All of the activities developed on the farm are treated
as educational ones. Horseback riding teaches the youths the
importance of taking care of their health and their physical preparation.
It also enables them to learn how to take good care of animals and
creates a cooperative and understanding atmosphere among the boys.
The recreational activities are also seen as educational in that they
promote contact with nature, causing the youth to understand the
importance of preservation of nature. These are just some of the
qualities of the rural school.
I think that in sports, art, and culture, the youth begins to have contact
with himself. So it’s not this imposed thing. He’s going to do what he
likes to do. There’s nothing better than dedicating yourself to
something you like. What this kid is doing takes a lot of good faith. He
feels more valued. It’s this self valorization for the kid. Every step he
takes towards success is a victory for him and with every victory he
starts to have new parameters that he never had before. (Interview
with community member, Campo Mourão/PR)
It helps a lot. The minute he’s got something to do, a research project,
he’s going to start thinking about that research. He’s not going to start
thinking about what he used to do with his friend, if he stopped stealing,
stopped fighting, stopped hitting people [...] We’ve got two contests a
year. This contest could be music, literature, poetry, drawing. This
drawing could be a country design drawing contest – a bull and a
horse. We really did well. The contest was on a state level and the boys
classified well. (Interview with coordinator, Campo Mourão/PR)
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· When asked if the boys in the boys in the Riding School were far
from the risk of involvement with drugs and violence, one of the
parents answered:
Absolutely. The junior cowboys like the school’s teacher a lot. They
respect me, you know. I think this is really beautiful. It’s part of it. You
can see that it’s really reaching them. (Interview with fathers/mothers/
guardians, Campo Mourão/PR)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
According to the results obtained in this study, there are a wide variety
of positive impacts of the Erê Rodeo School in the lives of the youths.
· The kids’ persistence in staying in the program and radical changes
in the group’s lives and mentality.
I think it’s like this. The minute a person starts to like animals, and
you try to help, he’s going to stop messing around with drugs, with
violence.[...]Even here it’s fifty fifty. It’s the animal’s strength against
the person’s head. You have to use intelligence. If he does something
bad, he’s going to get something bad. The more he hits, the more he’s
going to have to be responsible for what he’s done. An angry bull hits
even harder, and that’s bad for the student. From this moment on, he’s
going to see that it’s no good being a rebel, being a marginal. It
doesn’t get you anywhere just fighting or something like that. (Interview
with coordinator, Campo Mourão/PR)
· According to those interviewed, the youths begin to demonstrate
improvement in behavior and posture.
Ah! They change a lot. The first year they have to follow the internal and
external rules. You can see that fewer of them skip class. The student
participates more in school, learning more. They get a lot more out of
school than they did before. The minute they start to live in society, in a
group, they can see that their part gets better. They start working harder
in school. They really evolve a lot. [...] The teachers really comment on
it, they ask what the school is like. They want to participate. (Interview
with coordinator, Campo Mourão/PR)
· Some youths begin to study and others who had stopped going to
school return to the classroom. In addition, encouraging reading also seems
to have had an effect.
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I never studied. I didn’t get the chance. Now, this teacher near my
house is giving me private classes. (Focus group with youths, Campo
Mourão/PR)
The coordinator said that when we don’t have anything to do we’re
supposed to read.[...] I like to read about animals, goats, horse breeds,
goat breeds. I like to read about that stuff. I like to read about how
much milk, what’s the best kind of milk, the best way to make cheese,
sweets. (Focus group with youths, Campo Mourão/PR)
A word we don’t know, that we haven’t heard, that we hear the others
say, he gives us a dictionary to look it up. There are a whole bunch of
dictionaries for us to look up words. (Focus group with youths, Campo
Mourão/PR)
· Quitting the habit, drinking or using other drugs, is also something
that brings about profound changes in the youths’ lives. There is an
improvement in their quality of life and their very mentalities go
through changes.
I study at night and on the weekends I come here and ride horses. It’s
called rodeo. It’s helped me respect people. I gave up cigarettes and
drinking. This helped me a lot and I got involved in the church too.
(Focus group with youths, Campo Mourão/PR)
There’s nothing to do on Saturday. All the guys go to the nightclub.
There’s fights there, drugs, everything happens. But the cowboys that
come here think different. Here there are animals, swimming, that
kind of thing. (Focus group with youths, Campo Mourão/PR)
· The youths are taken away from violence and they are offered options
and resources for a better future.
Consciousness in relation to society’s problems and even interest in
political participation became evident in the answers in the focus group.
One of the principal effects of the project is part of this consciousness. This
effect is a “vision of the future” for the youths, an appearance of perspectives
and expectations for their lives.
Kids are really tuned out. They just want to mess up. They don’t learn,
they don’t think about their future. They don’t think about studying.
(Focus group with youths, Campo Mourão/PR)
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We’re really the guilty ones. The problem is that Brazilians really
have short memories. Fernando Collor, for example. If he ran for
president now he would probably get elected again. (Focus group
with youths, Campo Mourão/PR)
· There’s a positive impact in the schools, even for those that don’t
take part in the Erê project. This occurs because when the students
see their teachers correcting the work the students in the project
do, they become curious and want to know what their classmates
are doing.
· The impact on the way the youth evaluates the importance of his
studies is visible:
[..]That’s why studying is important these days. You can get a good
job, you learn how to talk to people better, you learn how to have
respect. Because studying isn’t just teaching you how to read and
write or add things up. It helps you learn how to think. (Focus group
with youths, Campo Mourão/PR)
· The youths develop a sense of comradery among themselves. They
feel part of a group with an identity. They learn to respect each
other.
Everyone here is each other’s friend. There’s not that wanting to mess
up somebody else’s life. Everybody helps here. Isais helps. If someone
doesn’t know how to tie a knot, you get over there and tie it up. When
some new student gets here, you guide them. It’s like that. It’s always
been like that, ever since the first time. I really hope it stays that way.
(Focus group with youths, Campo Mourão/PR)
· Living with the animals and caring for them and for the farm creates
environmental consciousness in the boys’ minds.
Even the weather is worse today than it used to be. Man has really killed
nature in a big way. The sun is hotter. Because of pollution that ozone
layer opened. Even the water is running out. If we’re not careful there’s
not going to be any water left. In the old days everything was nicer. The
air was purer. (Focus group with youths, Campo Mourão/PR)
Man should be conscious of how to preserve nature. Because these
days people only think about cutting down forests, getting rich,
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contaminating the rivers looking for gold. You can’t do that. No one
cares, for example, if that dam doesn’t have very many fish. They’re
going to go in with their nets and everything.[...]They don’t think about
tomorrow when their children are going to come along to take advantage
of these things. (Focus group with youths, Campo Mourão/PR)
· The success of some youths who become rodeo cowboys who are
even recognized internationally brings people from other regions and other
countries to visit the project.
The thing I’m most proud of is to see a cowboy’s name coming out
in the newspaper, on television. It’s not just that it’s good for him. It’s
that this kid went through here, he was from the school. That’s important.
I see these two or three who are in the United States, getting the word
out on the school. That’s really important. (Interview with coordinator,
Campo Mourão/PR)
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4.8.2 Movimento de Expressão - Artvistas M.D.E.
Hip Hop – (Hip Hop Expressive Movement –
Artvistas M.D.E.)
1)
Name of Organization
(Hip Hop Expressive Movement – Artvistas M.D.E.)
2)
Date of Foundation
1998
3)
City/State
Curitiba/PR
4)
Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5)
Contact
a) Joel Mariano
b) Function: Coordinator
c) Telephone: (44) 9185-3428
6)
Sites Where Activities Are Carried Out
Low-income communities in Curitiba.
7)
Funding Sources
The resources used by the institution originate in the youths who are
responsible for the project and its idealization. These resources are
extremely scarce, as the youths are for the most part underemployed,
badly paid, and live in low-income communities in the city of Curitiba/PR.
8)
Areas of Activity
Art-culture (Hip Hop Movement), and education for citizenship.
9)
Objectives
· To create a counterpoint to social exclusion of children and adolescents
through artistic “movements of expression” and through objecting to
the social reality that is considered discriminatory and prejudiced and
that is experienced by this specific population in low-income
communities in the city of Curitiba/PR.
· To combat the misinformation of the population regarding social and
racial problems. To pass on ecological and political consciousness.
To warn about the danger of drugs, AIDS, teenage pregnancy, and
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violence. To recuperate self-esteem and make an effort to minimize
problems such as hunger and cold.
· To put on the maximum number of community culture projects involving
hip hop (a mix of break dancing, rap music, and graffiti art).
· To provide valorization of elements that are considered fundamental to
society operating well, as in school and even in spiritual questions.
· To enable actions that will get the youths away from a wide variety of
problems, for example, drugs.
10) Target Public
The project’s target is children, adolescents, and youths in situations of
vulnerability and social risk in the low-income communities in the city of
Curitiba/PR.
11)Description and Background
The Artvistas M.D.E. Hip Hop Movement is a non-governmental
organization resulting from the work of adolescents and young residents of
the low-income communities in the city of Curitiba/PR. The activities are
developed with the goal of consciousness raising among the children and
adolescents in the capital of Paraná regarding the problems that reach the
part of society that is exposed to the largest process of social exclusion. In
order to do this, the program uses what is called “street culture”, consisting
of rap music, break dancing, graffiti art, and the DJ, considered to be tools
for social challenge and change.
The hip hop movement in Brazil emerged in the 80s. It was
characterized by joining four elements. These were rap music, break
dancing, graffiti art, and the DJ, traditionally referred to as the disk jockey.
The DJ is responsible for “making the sound”. Without this element the
quality of rap music and break dancing is affected. The principal purpose
of these elements is to object to social problems. This is based on the idea
that it’s essential to work in a collective manner to bring about any kind of
change in society.
In Curitiba, the hip hop movement was called Artvistas MDE, meaning
the Expression Movement of social activists that use art. Artvistas plays
with the words activist and artist. The movement began to get organized as
an institution in 1998, specifically on March 27, 1998.
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12) Personnel
The project motivators have not completed basic education. They have
up-to-date experience in a wide variety of areas. Some of them have
experience in dance, others in musical instruments, others in working with
youths, or in seminars, etc.
The project doesn’t have contracted staff members. The project
motivators are tied to the project on a strictly voluntary basis.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
Through holding seminars and community projects with hip hop with
children and adolescents, the Artvistas group acts incisively in social practices
linked to art. A huge mobilization and social consciousness raising project is
performed through what the group itself calls “attitude”. The group is a
powerful former of opinion in the community and organizes events like actions
for confronting hunger, violence, drugs, teenage pregnancy, STDs, AIDS,
and the environment, among other things.
The group considers itself a family and meets practically every week.
Many of them work together daily. There is not much turnover in the project
as the work demands commitment and dedication. There is no regular
formatting of the activities.
14) Methodology
The project does not have a systematized methodology. However, there
is a criterion for participation according to the directors.
We’ve got this requirement that is like the law of the ghetto. We say it
like this, it’s the language of brotherhood, you can’t be a jerk. It’s a
question of having an attitude, you’ve got to have an attitude to get
into the movement. What’s an attitude? Well, you’ve got to at least
have an opinion. It doesn’t mean much if you just want to get in to
sing, or like if you just want to get in because it’s cool and there are
girls here. Everyone of us here knows our own mind. We’ve got an
opinion. (Interview with coordinators, Curitiba/PR)
The activities are organized in a non-systematic way in the streets of
Curitiba in the form of workshops for rap, break, and graffiti. The youths
that are responsible for the project perform incisive work in orientation and
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consciousness raising for the children and adolescents from low-income
communities in Curitiba. The youths advertise by distributing pamphlets so
that these events can take place. They leave posters in the local shopping
areas and also advertise by “word of mouth” until the day of the presentation.
According to the institution, the hip hop movement is composed of
four basic elements of expression. Rap is the verbal part of hip hop, using
protest songs that illustrate the exclusion in the youths’ daily lives.
Break is the way the youths express themselves through dance
with movements that demand flexibility of the entire body. This is seen
as a direct weapon in the combat against violence, especially physically.
Instead of fighting, the youths can settle their conflicts in dance. It is
defended as the strengthening element of the hip hop movement.
Graffiti is the tool of expression for peace and protest on the city’s
walls, along with spreading the word on what is known as the hip hop
culture. Finally, the DJ is the main one responsible for rap and break,
because they depend on the one who “makes the sound” on the “pick
ups” (sound systems).
Part of the methodological proposal is holding seminars in the community
high schools. These seminars include themes like AIDS, teenage pregnancy,
and violence, among others.
The campaigns that we develop in all areas, in food, we get these food
donations together. And in between, the project in our neighborhoods,
it’s everything. We get the kids to read, we encourage them to read a
book, encourage them to have a library in the periphery. We encourage
them to have a theatre. (Focus group with youths, Curitiba/PR)
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
There is no partnership project except for those with the involved
communities. Nothing is formalized. The only signed agreement refers to
the youths that are currently developing the projects. There are also no
financial partnerships in the Artvistas MDE Hip Hop project. All resources
come from the personal incomes of the youth directors.
The multiplication work is developed in a basic way. One of the
strategies used is xeroxed information pamphlets. Both the families and the
communities have established a systematic partnership so that there can be
good results. For the coordination, it’s essential that everyone participate in
the process.
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16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
There are no evaluations of any kind of the activities developed.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Violence and drug use are among the main problems pointed out in
this experience. These are pointed out as problems in terms of
developing the projects, and it is considered difficult to involve the
kids in a definite way given the social problems they encounter.
Drugs, no work, nothing to do. Where we live there’s nothing to do.
The kids just stay in the street, with bad company, using drugs, learning
stuff that’s bad for them. If we had something like they have in the
Boqueirão neighborhood on Citizen Street... They have a park, there’s
work, courses for the children to get interested in and get off the
street. There’s nothing like that here. It’s a completely abandoned
area here. There’s nothing here, really. (Interview with community,
Curitiba/PR)
Look, leisure activities, truthfully, there’s really not much. I think there’s
really nothing. There’s no leisure space, there’s nothing. That’s what’s
really missing here in our area. You don’t have a soccer field, you
don’t have a park. There’s nothing like that. That’s what we don’t have
here. (Interview with family members, Curitiba/PR)
· Another problem highlighted by the organization is the scarcity of
resources and adequate infrastructure for the projects. There are no
physical spaces for the project and the lack of leisure options makes
the situation even more serious. The community sees itself as helpless
in reference to strategies for combating the violence experienced in
the communities.
No, we had this group, I had this little portable radio. It was really
old. Even though, like I said, I had this little radio that I bought when
my kid was little. I couldn’t buy a big radio, there was just no way. You
could put a microphone on the two little boxes on this little radio.
Then the drum sound came out of one of the boxes and then on the
other one you could plug in the microphone and sing. Then when it
came to the other one’s part, you’d pass the microphone to them. They
still do it that way. We don’t have anything. Nobody helps. Just to give
you an idea, if we go to some event, we pay for the bus out of our own
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pocket. Everyone pays for themselves. If you want to eat and you can’t
get anything decent everyone puts their money together to buy what
we call “the package”. You get bologna and bread and if you can’t
afford bologna you get bananas. Then everyone just sits in some corner
and eats. If there’s enough, you buy soda. (Interview with coordination,
Curitiba/PR)
You get the bus fare out of your own pocket there. If you want to buy
some record to play, to have something, because you can’t buy a CD
now. We’re getting these CDs that are still really cheap that come with
a magazine. Sometimes they’re bootlegs. We buy them so we can have
something to play. We go to these warehouses, to these used stores
that are around that have old records. We do it to spread out a little,
to have some records that you can dance to. When you’ve got two,
three, or ten bucks left over you buy what you can. You just keep
buying and putting it all together to have something and it’s hard you
know, when you can’t even cover transportation costs. (Interview with
coordination, Curitiba/PR)
· Resistance and prejudice against the hip hop movement itself slows
down project results. It is difficult given that most of the time hip hop
provokes equivocal reactions at first. There is for example, the idea
that the movement incites violence. The city of Curitiba was
considered to be prejudiced and excluding by the individuals involved.
The problem I feel is society as well. Hip hop is seen with this different
look. They think that people who like hip hop are violent, on drugs,
marginal. We’ve seen this in different dance clubs, some clubs don’t
open up their space because they think it’s all this, you know? It’s just
that they never get too deep into it. If you were going to do this survey
on the nights, it’s not the people from rap and hip hop that are booked
by the police. So, that’s one of the reasons I’ve been feeling. It’s a
problem, prejudice. And the prejudice here is very polite. (Interview
with coordination, Curitiba/PR)
18) Why is it an innovative project?
· The project has been evaluated by the community as essential and
transforming in the social reality experienced by the youths. Initially
there was resistance on the part of the families, but in just a little
while there was visible recognition in reference to the quality of the
work developed.
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The project has helped a lot of people. Even just because their project
is an interesting project. Look, I couldn’t participate but I took part in
a way. They were putting on this even here. They were singing for
coats. They did this coat program, this food program for the agencies
around here. It was wintertime. You help and you can save a lot of
people. If not they die of cold, or sometimes hunger. (Interview with
fathers/mothers/guardians, Curitiba/PR)
· The project continues to be in a full stage of expansion for the
coordinating youths. They continue to develop events and are
managing to become involved in other communities in the city of
Curitiba more and more.
Wow, we really expanded a lot. I think that here in Curitiba, and we’ve
even been to some city in Paraná, and they really accepted us, even
though they didn’t know us, they really accepted the project. I think
that what we hoped to reach is being reached. There’s a long way to go
for sure, because you always want more, but I think we’ve really
expanded. Man! In all these places, and we’ve gone to every corner of
this city. And you go, like I said, even when you don’t have anything.
Everyone already knows because of the xeroxes. They know what the
movement’s about. It’s this thing of going there and singing and showing
break, showing the dance moves, capoeira. This thing is really becoming
global. It’s really advertised. I think we’re reaching our objective, yeah.
(Interview with coordination, Curitiba/PR)
· The project has been evaluated by all the involved individuals as a
possible alternative for confronting violence.
It’s an alternative for getting out of this situation. These guys that I’ve
known since I was a kid. I’ve been living here in the villa for seven
years. They’re starting a way to make money, to work to help the
community, to help their friends here in the villa. They can see that
their friends are in the same situation, so someone’s got to have an
alternative. Someone has to bow their head and concentrate on God
and get some direction in their life. I evaluate the project as a good
project, truthfully. It was really fast, this project. To get better it’s got
to reach and include more people. We need more infrastructure to do
that. Advertising. So we need a sound system, good sound equipment
from someone, some sponsor, one that really spreads the pamphlets
around. And what we need the most is this: we need transportation
so we can get around because all of this comes out of our pockets.
(Focus group with youths, Curitiba/PR)
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· The community involved with the project is very emphatic when it
comes to its necessity in terms of the hip hop movement and in terms
of being a tool for social transformation.
I think that any activity is important. Any one, whatever it is. Because
the kids are there, having fun. They’re not thinking about violence,
drugs. They’re together. One campaign to end violence is to get the
kids together. It doesn’t matter if it’s soccer or arts and crafts. It
doesn’t matter what type of activity it is. The important thing is to
teach them how to respect each other. From the time they’re little,
respect their similarities from the time they’re little kids, love the
other guy. That’s how you raise a good kid, respecting and loving
the one who’s next to you. Art is a special way to prevent violence, in
my opinion. Art takes the bad things out of your head. For those of us
who got out of crime, we owe it to art. (Interview with community,
Curitiba/PR)
19) Effects of the Experience on Changing the Youths’ Lives
· Extreme changes occur for the youths, and many of those who were
involved in some type of criminal activity manage to definitely get out
of it. Others who were not part of this context in a direct form often
end up in some sort of perverse network as most of these youths
were drug users. With the redemption of their self-esteem these youths
acquire values like good character, among other things. There is
vehement consensus in their speeches, both about getting out of what
they call the “drug world” and getting out of marginality. They speak
of this as a direct result of the process of the Hip Hop Movement
becoming part of their community.
When I started I was on drugs. I was a bad dude. I didn’t respect
anyone. I was not a good person. In the street they didn’t say hi to me
the way they say hi to me today, like a sincere conversation, you
know. There were people that left me out, kind of quiet. ‘Leave him
alone, he’s trouble.’ So, before I got in the project I was like that. But
ever since I started getting to know God’s law, the bible, and the Hip
Hop Movement, the project, and Artvista too, and we went to dance
for the group. We didn’t go to sing, we went to dance. From then on,
thank God, my life has really changed. Changing, thank God, really
for the better. It’s not how I want it to be yet, but that I’m fighting, I’m
still working it out, because like they say, there are these kids around
here who want to change, the ones who think about the future, but
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they don’t act. You got it? Most kids are like that these days, if you
really want the truth. Most of them. A little before the project, I was
like that, but these days, I just ask for a decent job, a family, and to
live the rest of my life in peace, have a home. (Focus group with
youths, Curitiba/PR)
· For the youths, the changes were not only individual, but essentially
collective, as they began to value themselves as social beings. The
argument is that the change is only relevant if it works for the
community, and better yet for society as a whole. This predisposition
to transform the community in a positive way is what makes the
project worthwhile, in spite of the difficulties.
I think a lot of things have changed in people’s minds in our
communities. How our minds work. It’s really changed. It’s because of
this work that we developed, it was a community project, getting our
own resources together with the community. We got coats, food. We did
a campaign on ecology consciousness too and that’s really important.
We had a seed recycling project and we planted little seedlings. We
did that whole garbage recycling thing and we made food that way
too because a fruit tree is food, besides being good for oxygen. We also
fought violence, because the first thing a kid steals in this life is fruit.
Who hasn’t done that? Steal fruit. So, the payment for all this is the
change. It’s a mental and sentimental change too. (Focus group with
youths, Curitiba/PR)
· The family members also demonstrate enthusiasm when they refer
to the changes that have taken place in their children’s lives. This is
true even in what they say in respect to the rescue of religion, which
is an extremely present aspect. They believe that their children have
managed to truly help the family and the community.
Our life really changed a lot in terms of his friendships. He changed a
lot, those friends he used to have...you got me? Sometimes they would
look at me in a way I didn’t like. And now, they just talk about music
and where they’re going to meet, and they run around and get ready,
and go out. Just in this he’s changed a lot. Even the smoking. He used
to smoke his cigarettes and he quit! Quit. He makes his music and
gives advice on what music they should sing. He gives advice to the
others through the songs they sing, you understand? (Interview with
family members, Curitiba/PR)
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· The community also recognizes the changes in the youths’ lives.
Most of all, they recognize the change in relation to violence, affirming
that these youths are the principal target of generalized violence.
They also recognize the intense dedication of these youths in
developing the project for and with the community. The Movement
has been providing alternatives for the community that is faced with
a lack of basic social means. These include leisure space and even
campaigns for the distribution of basic food baskets. These are the
results of the involvement and work of the entire community.
Before, there were gangs here that were always fighting among
themselves. There was a lot of beating up on each other and all that.
And that was a way that we could get ourselves together: ‘Look, let’s
not fight, let’s get in a circle. If you’re better than me, here’s the deal,
I’m going to spin on my head. If you think you’re better than me, you’ll
spin on your back. Then, I’m going to do a mortal on two feet. If you
think you’re better than me, you’ll do one on one foot. So let’s do
choreography now. Ok, one does this dance step thing one way, and
the other goes over there and does another one. So, what I want to say
is that you’re making this culture happen in there without violence. It’s
a healthy thing. (Interview with coordination, Curitiba/PR)
· For the community, the behavior change is a result of the change in
the youths’ perception in terms of their realities. They develop
qualities that have been hidden before, like responsibility, respect,
and creativity, among other things.
The Artvistas Group, I think it’s good, like I already said. I had to talk
about them, the neighborhood is getting better. A little, but it’s getting
better. So, cool, I hope it gets even better. (Interview with community,
Curitiba/PR)
From what I know, today I see them differently. I think what happened
with them, with the group itself, they try to pass this on to other people,
to get out of this drug world, this violence. I think there has been a
change this way. A lot of times we see this little kid, he comes along
and says hi. He talks, he asks questions. I think this is really cool. I
mean, he’s already got this consciousness from the time he’s small
about what’s right and wrong. The kids, the children, they like that.
(Interview with community, Curitiba/PR)
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Today he’s changed. Today he’s got ideas that are totally advanced
ideas. For me this is really good. That’s a big change. For him, for me,
for the whole family. Why did he change? He changed because me, as
his father, I can only think it’s good, because I know he’s on the right
track. He’s looking for a way to cooperate with everyone. And for him
things have changed a lot too. I don’t get all mad at him like that, I
don’t. If he goes out to do something, him and the group, or by himself,
alone, I trust him completely. He can go out. He’s got his people. He
can go out. Sometimes they put on a show. They come back. Of course,
they put on a show so they’re going to come back in the middle of the
night. They have a function there, though. It’s his group and he’s
working with them. They’re responsible. It’s not just some crazy thing.
(Interview with community, Curitiba/PR)
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4.9 São Paulo
4.9.1 Cidade Aprendiz School - Projeto “100 muros”
(The City Apprentice School – 100 Walls Project)
1)
Name of Organization
The City Apprentice School (Cidade Aprendiz School)
2)
Date of Foundation
1997
3)
City/State
Sao Paulo/SP
4)
Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization/Private Civil Non-profit Association
5)
Project Name
Projeto 100 muros (The 100 Walls Project)
6)
Contact
a) Fernando Rossetti
b) Function: General Coordinator
c) telephone: (11) 3819-9225/9226
d) e-mail: [email protected]
7)
Sites Where Activities Are Carried Out
Sao Paulo: Vila Madalena Neighborhood and Brás.
8)
Funding Sources
Bank Boston Foundation, UNICEF, UNESCO, SENAC, Ayrton Senna
Institute, Bradesco Bank, Fiat Automobiles, Nortel, Comgas,
Microsoft, Bandeirantes School, and Cyrela Construction. It’s
important to highlight that approximately 21% of the budget comes
from donations from partners that donate less than R$2,100.00 per
month.
9)
Areas of Activity
Education, art, citizenship, and labor.
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10) Objectives
To establish and spread a new concept of education through the use
of communication technology.
To develop “Pedagogical Learning” that begins with the principle that
knowledge and educational production are not restricted to the
curricular parameters of formal school, where many times education
is dealt with as merely passing on information.
To improve the quality of teaching for children, adolescents, and
youths, with the main focus being on “teaching to know (transforming
information into knowledge), and to do (applying the knowledge),
and to be (having a life’s project), and to coexist (which introduces
the citizenship dimension).” (On site learning)
11) Target Public
Children, adolescents, and youths between 5 and 18 years of age, students
from the public and private school systems, residents of the city of São
Paulo. One of the four steady classes has a project with boys and girls
who are minor offenders from FEBEM ( The Juvenile Detention Center
of Tatuapé/SP) The classes are made of up of both sexes.
12) Description and Background
The Cidade Aprendiz School is a non-governmental organization that
has worked since 1997 from the perspective of quality education for children,
adolescents, and youths through the development and spreading of new
methodologies for teaching and learning. The project developed by the
institution had the initial reference in the book O aprendiz do futuro(The
Apprentice of the Future) (Atica, 1997), of journalist Gilberto Dimenstein,
and is based on the discussion is that “education cannot be restricted to just
passing on information.” The very etymology of the word “aprendiz”
(apprentice) comes from the Latin apprehendere, meaning “holding with
the hands”, and for the institution this is the essence of the entire project –
“to learn something you have to hold it in your hands.” In other words, it’s
essential that the youths learn to transform the information that bombards
them in a general way in learning, and that they learn how to use this
knowledge in their perspectives for the future. These elements should be
linked to a citizenship dimension so that they recognize the importance of
the word “coexist”, valuing the ethics of a society.
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All projects developed by Cidade Aprendiz School have a principal founded
in education for citizenship. New technologies like computers, Internet, television,
and communication media become strong allies in the apprenticeship process.
The youths that participate in the project are students from public and private
schools and they work in the construction of new products of communication
that are associated to the content passed on by the formal school. This brings
larger opportunities for them to turn into future professionals, providing them
with multi-faceted knowledge that improves their chances in the job market.
The institution works with the concept of diversity, an element that configures
the variety of the involved individuals into a whole. Besides having children,
adolescents, and youths as a reference point, Cidade Aprendiz School works
in an incisive way with the entire community. The project involves senior citizens,
educators, schools, professionals, families, businesses, etc. This characteristic
is considered essential for a real reflection on citizenship to exist in conjunction
with social practice.
The projects are developed in a wide variety of activity centers that develop
like minded projects. Each center has a specialty and they are all included in the
Learning Workshop, considered the pedagogical management of Cidade
Aprendiz School.
13). Personnel
The Cidade Aprendiz School team currently counts on approximately
100 professionals from a wide variety of areas. Of this total, approximately
1/3 are under contract, 1/3 are work-study, and 1/3 act on a volunteer basis.
For the selection of professionals, the general coordination of the project
works with interviews and the basic requirement in terms of professional
training is the specific experience of each candidate.
14) Ongoing Programs and Projects
Cidade Aprendiz School currently maintains five centers (houses
where the programs and educational activities are developed). The opening
of a fifth center took place on June, 2001. These are:
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)
Communication Center
Social Design
Street School
Comgas Apprentice
Apprentice Café
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Almost all of the programs develop more than one project. The
exceptions are Comgas Apprentice, initiated in November, 2000, and
Apprentice Café. The Café is different in terms of operational structure,
and has not been implanted yet.
1.The Communication Center works with four projects:
1.1 Apprentice Site – Offers service, information, analysis, and
training for around 5,000 visitors a day. It is produced by
professionals and apprentices in communication, pedagogy,
webdesign, and other areas.
1.2 GD Site – This is Gilberto Dimenstein’s site, which focuses on
the job market and urban issues. The site follows Dimenstein’s
commentaries on CBN Radio.
1.3 Education Magazine – A journalism project is developed by
young university students through the development of texts about
labor, education, and citizenship for the magazine Educação
(Education magazine). Everything is done under the
coordination of specialized journalists.
1.4 Apprentice TV – A project that works with video production,
stories and documentaries in the area of education and
citizenship, researching means for integrating the language of
video and Internet. The activities have been temporarily
deactivated because of lack of financing.
2.The Social Design Center currently has four projects:
2.1 Site Workshop – With a coordination of professionals and
educators, youths work creating sites for NGOs, based on what
the institution calls “diving into the cultural soup.”
2.2 Old Net – Youths teach senior citizens how to access the
Internet. This program provides senior citizens access to “virtual
trips” to museums and newspapers, among other things. The
possibilities are countless. The idea is that both groups notice
the effective possibility of greater coexistence.
2.3 Digital Expressions (formerly Portuguese Citizenship) –
develops workshops for critical reading of magazines and
newspapers with youths that work in the production of texts
aimed at other youths in order to provide orientation for the
reading of the same.
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2.4 Alves Cruz – This is a pilot project developed in the Professor
Antonio Alves Cruz State School. In partnership with Cidade
Aprendiz School, this school is experimenting with new education
methodologies. The idea is to apply what the institution calls
“diving into the cultural soup”, where the school, the community,
and various individuals work together.
3. The Street School Center currently develops three projects:
3.1 100 Walls – Art-educators develop art theme workshops with
young students in the public and private schools. The arteducators work with these youths in detecting themes linked to
the question of citizenship and re-create public spaces through
murals made with mosaic techniques.
3.2 Alley School – This is a project that is developed in an “alley”
in Vila Madalena where graffiti is the tool that is used. This
space is considered by the institution and the involved individuals
to be a space of intervention where professionals, apprentices,
and graffiti artists get together on a monthly basis in order to
discuss and improve the new meanings given to public spaces
in the community.
3.3 The Little Street School – This project develops recreational
workshops (capoeira, dance, music, chorus, etc.) with
approximately 40 children. The majority of these children come
from low-income families where they experience social
vulnerability. Practically all of the work is performed by
volunteers.
4.The Comgas Apprentice Program – This program is being developed
in conjunction with the partner schools. It proposes a project of training
and qualification of youth leaderships, focusing on youth protagonists
among the secondary school students in the communities.
5.Café Aprendiz – This project has the goal of becoming a place to
meet and get information in addition to being a future source of
income for the institution. This space will be a mixture of a cybercafe
and a school, aimed at teaching people in the community both how to
access the Internet and how to make the bread that will be consumed
at the café. The idea is that the waiters will be from the university
and will work in providing orientation for the apprentices.
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Due to the wide reach of the project developed by the Cidade Aprendiz
School, and to guarantee even more depth in the characterization of each of
the various activities that take place, the 100 Walls project, which is part of
the Street School Center’s activities, was used by this survey.
The 100 Walls Project works on recreating public spaces in the city of
São Paulo through artistic activities that are essentially developed by young
students from the public and private schools of Vila Madalena. With the
belief that it is possible to develop actions that valorize a feeling of selfesteem and social belonging for these youths who come from the widest
variety of social levels, the project is specifically developed in the area of
fine arts with the use of the mosaic technique. This occurs with the
participation of a wide variety of areas of society, including schools,
professionals, and the community in general. The themes are essentially
directed at citizenship issues. These are linked to an educational, cultural,
and collective project. This project will cover one hundred walls in São
Paulo with theme mosaic panels over a period of 30 months. In eight months
of work, art and citizenship workshops were developed with 25 institutions,
including public and private schools, NGOs, shelters, and FEBEM - the
Juvenile Detention Center. Approximately two thousand people participated
in this project. The final result of these workshops was 18 walls in the city
that were made over with theme mosaic panels aimed at education and
citizenship.
Among the activities developed by 100 Walls, a highlight is the periodic
thematic workshops that are held on art in the Street School center. Other
workshop events are held in conjunction with partner institutions like the
Equipe School. After a first semester of workshops, this school included
the 100 Walls project in its arts curriculum for fundamental education in the
second semester of 1999. The focus of project activities is in creating murals
based on the theme proposals of the youths themselves. They are responsible
for the elaboration of discussions and for nourishing ideas. The main
technique used is mosaic, emphasizing a direct relationship between ethics
and aesthetics. For the apprentices, maybe one of the largest incentives is
the large difference in relation to other educational projects focused on fine
arts in that there is the chance to work with art linked to citizenship. In this
way a concrete product is obtained, one that is recognized and admired by
the whole city.
The activities are divided among steady classes and occasional classes,
with Community Workshops as well. There are four steady classes that
attend workshops in the Street School center twice a week. The meetings
last around two hours for a period of eight months (March to November,
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with vacation in July). Each class has 20 participants, divided into age groups
of 7 to 11, 12 to 14, and 15 to 18 years old. The goal is for each class to
produce two murals a semester, with the exception of the FEBEM/Tatuapé
group, which produces only one mural during the semester.
The occasional classes or workshops that attend workshops in the
Street School or in the headquarters of a partner institution will work for a
total period of eight meetings approximately two hours each. These classes
have a maximum of 20 participants and will produce one mural for the city
as a final product. The number of classes per semester is ten for the first
semester and ten for the second semester. Due to the great demand for the
100 Walls project, no more than two workshops should take place per year
for the Community Workshop project.
15) Methodology
The methodological proposal for this project defends the idea that it’s
necessary to promote interaction between a wide variety of communities in
order to reach the proposed objective. This is the basis for the final product
of the panels that will make over the walls of the city of São Paulo. Project
methodology is used in a process of shared decision making among the
groups. These communities develop the project in a gradual way, always
taking the initial proposal into account along with the knowledge of the
participants and the coordinated activities.
The activities are set up in the following way: There are steady classes
and occasional classes with activities in common that incorporate the
definition process where the selection criteria for the participants are defined,
in addition to the contact with the schools, the definition of the responsible
art-educators, the planning of the opening activities, elaboration of the
registering of activities in the project plan for the first bimester, listing and
buying supplies, and the definition and authorization of the walls.
Community Workshops are also developed, trying to work in conjunction
with the communities on the goals of social mobilization involving consciousness
raising, respect, interest, and care for the city. This focus adds to a better
quality of life for the citizen residing in the city of São Paulo.
16) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The Cidade Aprendiz School counts on a large number of partnerships,
financial and various other types. In addition to the 35 financing partners, the
organization counts on approximately 100 partner companies and liberal
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professionals, like architects and designers who work on a strictly volunteer
basis offering goods and services to the project. There are also partnerships
with other non-governmental organizations, schools from the community,
regional administration, and communication media like the GNT Channel,
Futura TV, the Turma da Cultura (Culture Crew)Program, and the Cultural
Center of São Paulo.
In eight months, the 100 Walls project managed to establish a large
number of partners. Today this number includes an average of 25 institutions
that include public and private schools, NGOs, shelters, and FEBEM/Tatuapé.
In order for a real link to be established with the families, the Cidade Aprendiz
School established the necessity of parental authorization and monitoring as
one of the requirements of participation in the project. This partnership is still
taking place in a non-systematic way. There is a certain fluctuation in the
effective presence and participation of the family. The community in general
– the residents and business members of Vila Madalena – has been considered
a strong partnership in the development of the project.
One example of this type of allied work is the Logos School. The
Logos School currently has a partnership with the 100 Walls project, with
the intention of integrating the project goal more and more in the school’s
proposal. This is taking place with a view towards providing greater
qualification in the school program in the arts field. Equipe High School,
after a first semester of workshops, included the 100 Walls project in its
basic education curriculum for the art department in 1999. The local
community is also looking for information about the project. Fine artists,
liberal professionals, and others have offered to work on the 100 walls
project on a volunteer basis, offering goods and services to the institution.
17) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
Due to the quick pace of the production of the work, with extremely
rapid results, internal evaluation is still performed in an experimental fashion.
Meetings with the group take place each week to record what is being done,
what the degree of involvement is between the classes and the art-educators,
and what the most urgent needs are. There is no installed methodological
process, and there is no information in reference to external evaluations.
18) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Among some of the problems identified by the involved individuals,
difficulties that the students in public schools experience in general
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were emphasized. The public school students found themselves
with the urgent necessity of becoming part of the job market very
early on. The private school students, however, have other
possibilities for extracurricular activities. These include language
courses and sports, etc. The public school students that attend the
project generally focus on their work as a way of investing in the
future. The largest obstacle is in the fact that many students stop
coming to the project when they start to work. They can’t provide
continuity to the 100 Walls project and this causes a lot of turnover
among the participants.
The future is a problem for him. I think it’s because it’s dividing into
sectors now. I think it’s more of a public school concern. I think that
they feel that the teaching... they don’t feel it’s this essential tool where
they can get a base and feel secure about something they’re going to
do. They don’t have the resources to look for things outside, like
English classes. They don’t really have this, so they feel threatened
even from the point of view of the country, of the difficulty there is in
finding a job. (Interview with coordination of the Street School Center,
São Paulo/SP)
· For some of the art-educators, it has been difficult to work in a space
that is considered to be small for the number of students. Because
there is no space for all the youths that seek out the project, the
installations at the Street School center become insufficient for carrying
out the project’s activities.
· Another obstacle that was pointed out was the question of project
sustainability. As the 100 Walls project is a new project that has
just completed its first year, financing is harnessed to the final
deadline for the murals. This deadline is for two and a half years.
In practice, this deadline has caused a certain lack of enthusiasm
in the institution itself, in the family, and mainly among the youths.
They have suffered a certain break in the rhythm of their creative
process. The work is very specific in each group, and some
manage to work faster than others. Another aspect is that the
more the deadline looms closer, the more the visible evidence
becomes that even though a lot of work has been done, there is a
lot to do to make it deeper, and that there is no security whatsoever
in terms of refinancing for the project.
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19) Why is it an innovative experience?
· There is a huge discussion surrounding the violence that is part
of the Brazilian reality. The youths are the main focus of this,
both as victims and as agents. For the involved individuals, the
100 Walls project is considered to be a strategic project in the
combat against violence. Specialists agree that culture, sports,
and artistic activities have the power to examine the imaginative
vision of the youths, offering them aids for social transformation.
Among some of the elements that permeate this imaginative
vision is the question of group identity and language. These are
both strongly rooted in the process of the construction of the
youths’ self-esteem. These elements can be used to increase
the violence of a determined group, or they may be used in a
healthy process of joining society. Faced with so many critical
issues and disturbing questions coming from the biological, social, and psychological development of each youth, it becomes
essential for the educators to channel this potential through
activities linked to play and to art. Carefully based on concepts
like ethics and citizenship, the activities manage to effectively
transform the perception of the youths. They even manage to
change the way these youths live.
These projects focus on the art question because it changes people.
Art transforms. I think that’s more or less what we base the 100
Walls project on. When you work with people’s self-esteem it’s a
way of bringing a little bit of that person out so that it can be
appreciated. It can be put in a place that’s not an exposition, but
it’s not a file or a drawer. It’s something that is recuperating a
space. It’s a space that’s seen. It’s looked at and you can identify
with what you made. This gives you a feeling of belonging. You’re
legitimate. You exist. You work with identity and look! I exist. I’m
here. (Interview with the artistic coordination of the 100 Walls project,
São Paulo/SP)
· The educators defend the idea that it is possible to see a significant
change in the quality of life of the youths in an immediate way. This
takes into consideration the complexity of the city of São Paulo.
I think that the project helps the kid get out of violence since it helps
them get to know themselves. For teenagers to accept themselves they
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need to go through a process where they get to know themselves, what
they like, how to show what they like without getting embarrassed, to
start to get out of that little cocoon. That’s why I think that this learning
process about what’s inside and getting it out there is violent for the
person too. So I think that if the kid can do this, this is the place he can
do it when you get right down to it. With everything he’s gone through,
it’s already a big help if he’s not causing or inciting some type of
violence to himself or some other person. (Interview with artistic
coordination, São Paulo/SP)
· For the youths, the project is seen as an incentive to improving
the quality of life of the community itself, based on ideas about
citizenship. The parents believe that the project has also helped
the youths a lot in various ways. They believe that the project has
been efficient in terms of establishing and strengthening new social relationships.
I think this type of project encourages people to take care of the city.
In my opinion it’s a little bit of everything. It’s not just to decorate São
Paulo, but to include a little bit of art and culture, to learn how to be
a citizen. (Focus group with youths, São Paulo/SP)
I think this thing of this school student with English and sports, it’s
this relationship we already know about, teacher and student, parent
and child. All of a sudden, there’s this different social relationship in
the project. It’s a friend, a relationship with something new. It’s someone
who’s getting out of the school orbit with a social goal, to participate.
It makes a difference, this coexistence. (Interview with family members,
São Paulo/SP)
· The Cidade Aprendiz School is in a frank process of expansion in all
its activities, including the 100 Walls project. The school has been
sought out as a reference point for new ways of thinking about
education all over the country.
To tell this truth, it’s like this. The project has managed to expand, I
think there’s going to be a tendency to expand even more, and we’ve
had these requests from other states in Brazil. There’s a chance for
reproduction of the project in Brasilia, in Salvador, and this is all
after only one year. I think it’s going to grow more, there are even
municipalities in São Paulo, Mayor’s Offices, that want to do it.
(Interview with general coordination, São Paulo/SP)
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20) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· The youths in the 100 Walls project show that after their participation
in the project there has been a change in their perceptions on the
socio-cultural context they take part in. They begin to look at their
reality in another way. When this begins, they begin to discuss some
questions about violence in a more committed fashion. They recognize
violence as a disturbing and present element in their daily lives.
I think you learn a lot of things in this project. I learned how to be a
citizen, I think. Different things that you can seein order to do a project,
to make a mural. You have to do a lot of research for this work here. We
did a lot of research on painting. You learn painting too, you see this
person giving a speech on citizenship, saying a lot of things, it was
cool. I think this kind of project encourages people to take care of the
city. In my opinion, it’s a little bit of everything. It’s not just to decorate
the city of São Paulo, but to include a little culture, a little art. (Focus
group with youths, São Paulo/SP)
· A larger sense of responsibility becomes visible in addition to
valorization of self-esteem and strengthening of group identity. It is
also evident that the youths begin to worry more about the question
of professional training in association with a vision of the future
and the job market. They are concerned with becoming as qualified
as they can through the opportunities that are offered through the
project. This characteristic is specific to the youths that study in
the public schools.
I think that when you get in the project you have the chance to
coexist with other people. You end up understanding the thing. I
never thought that I could change. I thought it was really cool. I
think that it’s not really important what you do in the project. It’s
what you learn. You can discuss things here. Here you’re an artist.
In school I learn how to write, at least in my school, you learn some
things, some lines, but you forget it right away. You do some really
ridiculous stuff. I hated Art Education, so I decided to get in here.
It makes you more responsible. You’ve got something that’s yours.
It’s important to be in the society too. You’re working to produce
something, produce something for society. (Focus group with youths,
São Paulo/SP)
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· There is consensus among the coordinators and educators in the
100 Walls project that a change can be seen in the way these youths
see their respective communities. In the beginning, they demonstrate
a certain lack of enthusiasm for formal school and life in general.
As they take part in the activities, however, this characteristic is
gradually substituted for other things like will power, social
responsibility, etc.
I think the strongest thing to talk about is this apathy with the world,
with the other person. This goes on to the collective feeling, of interest
in the other person’s life, interest in things in the city, interest in
culture, wanting to take part in these things. That’s it. I think that
they create a bigger interest in the city, in the place where they live.
It doesn’t happen just like that. I’m not talking about big changes. I
think it’s a way of looking at things, a focus, way of looking at the
space they live in, at helping others, taking care of this space, you
know? At times they’re not really too big on doing this, but we help,
we get this space and it’s ugly, it’s demolished, I think there’s a change
like that in the way they look at each other. You can even see the
effect. You can see that in the beginning they’re quiet. They look
down. You can see that our population is sad. People say that our
country is a calm, polite country when it’s really a sad country. If you
take these kids when they get here and they kind of come and they
don’t know each other, it’s really low. Then they start getting this
vitality. They’re producing something that’s aesthetic. (Interview with
general coordination, São Paulo/SP)
Some family members that accompany the project’s work in a closer
way directly associate 100 Walls with their children’s growth in various
aspects, including intellectual gains and gains in responsibility. They say
that the maturation process is visible in their children.
The result of this participating in 100 Walls was surprising for me
because I thought that it was really clear for me in this sense. I didn’t
expect much. I got enthusiastic, I thought it was important for him to
participate, but I had no idea that he was going to take so much
advantage of it in terms of growing up, getting more mature. He’s 13
years old, but he grew ten centimeters just this year. It’s this phase
with huge changes. He grew a lot in terms of self confidence. He got
more confident. I think he got so much more mature emotionally. I
attribute a lot of this, all these changes, I attribute it to the project.
I do. I can see this, this growth, this maturing. (Interview with family
members, São Paulo/SP)
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4.9.2 Fundação Gol de Letra (Letter Goal Foundation)
1)
Name of Organization
Fundação Gol de Letra (Letter Goal Foundation)
2)
Date of Foundation
1998
3)
City/State
São Paulo/SP
4)
Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5)
Contact
a) Nelson Vilaronga
b) Function: General Coordinator
c) telephone: (11) 3679-2000/2001
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6)
Sites Where Activities Are Carried Out
Vila Albertina neighborhood, Tremembé district/SP
7)
Funding Sources
Kellogg Foundation, World Childhood Foundation Institute, ABRINQ
Foundation for Children’s Rights, BNDES, Vitae Foundation, and
the Chase Foundation. Around 4% of the total budget comes from
donations from private individuals.
8)
Areas of Activity
Complementary school activity through art, culture, and sports
9)
Objectives
To create instruments that minimize social differences for the
populations of children and adolescents in situations of social risk
through projects in the area of complementary school activity, art,
culture, and sports.
To invest in the training of youths in order for them to become capable
of constructing mechanisms that collaborate in transforming their
social realities.
To guarantee the right to basic social policies like education, health,
culture, and sports.
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To contribute to the development of children and adolescents in
widening possibilities for educational and social insertion through
the programs that complement the youths’ school lives, offering
support activities for schooling as well as artistic, cultural, and sports
activities. The program invests in improving public school and
promoting the family and the community. (From the homepage and
information from the Gol de Letra Foundation.)
10) Target Public
The programs developed by the Gol de Letra Foundation are aimed
at children and adolescents in a socially vulnerable situation as a
priority. They are between 7 and 18 years old and come from lowincome communities. They are residents of Vila Albertina, in the
Tremembé district of São Paulo, SP.
11)Description and Background
The Gol de Letra Foundation develops two programs and one project
aimed at 250 children, adolescents, and youths between 7 and 18 years of
age, during periods complementary to formal school.
The Gol de Letra Foundation is a non-governmental organization that
works with projects in the area of education, culture, social promotion and
mobilization, focusing on children and adolescents from the low-income
communities of the city of São Paulo.
The foundation emerged a year and a half ago. It was the result
of some segments of Brazilian sports becoming sensitized to the
situation of social misery of the country’s children and adolescents.
This occurred specifically in soccer. The next step was to locate some
communities with the necessary characteristics, like the lack of basic
social policies. These included health, education, and assistance, among
other things. Communities with the basic criteria were then sought out
and the projects were put into action. Today the Foundation develops
its programs in the Vila Albertina community, situated in the district of
Tremembé in São Paulo. The Foundation is in the implantation phase
for a second Gol de Letra Foundation in the neighborhood of Itaipu in
Niterói, Rio de Janeiro. Staff has been selected and contracted and
are currently undergoing training.
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12) Personnel
The Foundation has given preference to professionals that have
experience with the third sector in a wide variety of areas. It counts on a
team of professionals with degrees and experience in the area of education,
art, and sports. Selection occurs through an interview with the coordination.
For the sports project, the Foundation has given preference to male
professionals. Focusing on training, the Foundation holds a week of planning
with each involved professional after the selection process, and this is also
a type of training. This week includes discussion of the principles that the
project intends to work with in conjunction with its target public. Courses,
seminars, and conferences are held during the entire year with the intention
of constant training for the staff. Training and qualification are held at the
beginning of each year and in the middle of each semester. This includes
the entire staff, and pedagogical and methodological issues of the project
are discussed. The involved professionals are generally paid, but the project
counts on volunteers from the community and health professionals provided
by the Medical School of São Paulo.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The Gol de Letra Foundation currently develops three programs:
1. The Turning the Game Around Program (Virando o Jogo)
2. The Vila Neighborhood Program (A Cara da Vila)
3. The Community Library Project (Biblioteca Comunitária)
The work is developed daily in the after-school period. The workshops
are held daily, with occasional seminars. Each class includes two workshops
a day and the themes alternate in a way that all students go through all the
workshops every week. On Saturdays, meetings take place in the form of
seminars and workshops aimed at the youths who have left the project
because of age. This is a way of accompanying them in conjunction with
the community.
In reference to the health area, the project has a slightly different
profile from that of other workshops. An action based directly on promotion
of health and prevention is developed. There is a check up every morning
and afternoon, when the health professionals spend ten minutes with
everyone. At first they provide orientation on hygiene, body health, dental
care, basic sanitation, etc. From then on, demand from the community itself
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occurs. For example, at one time there were rats in the community, and the
Foundation held seminars about community garbage. These seminars made
clear the importance of cleaning up and also taught methods of preventing
diseases.
The Gol de Letra Foundation also tries to keep this type of activity
tied to the necessity of using public health services as the time the project
will last is finite. Despite the participants having a health plan, the Foundation
is always trying to maintain a tie to other institutions, directing the families
to search for medicine in the public health service.
14) Methodology
Since its installation in the Vila Albertina neighborhood, the Gol de
Letra Foundation has sought to create a link of trust among the residents,
leaders, school principals, Title Council Board (Conselho Tutelar – these
are government tribunals that deal with the rights of children and adolescents),
and social agencies in order to establish a partnership in the implementation
of its projects and to get to know the necessities of serving the children and
youths better. In this way, the Foundation organized a meeting with the
neighborhood leaderships, organizations, and institutions in the first phase
of implementation of the Turning the Game Around program. These entities
could then recommend and direct children and adolescents in need of the
services offered by the Foundation. The families then enrolled their children
in the selection of 100 children and adolescents, boys and girls, with the
following criteria:
*Live in the area surrounding the project
*Attend school during a time compatible with the program
*Belong to a large family
*Social and familial situation of necessity
*Family salary of up to four minimum salaries
For the Turning the Game Around program, the educational project
was structured in the following areas: physical education; fine arts and
theatre; language and literature; English, and computers.
All of the activities take place in two periods of four hours daily. In
this program, all of the children and adolescents attend all of the activities
during the week. The groups are organized by age. Class A is from 7 to
9 years old. Class B is from 10 to 12 years old, and Class C is from 13
to 14 years old.
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In the Vila Neighborhood program, the classes are organized on
Saturdays, serving adolescents between 13 and 18 years old with the following
activities: Theatre Workshops, Photography, Video, and Music.
The programs work with general themes that include discussions
relating to the daily life of the community itself.
In the Community Library project, 12 youths from 15 to 21 years old
work in the library and receive an assistance scholarship in the value of
R$75.00. Each child, adolescent, or youth in the project receives a health
plan and a scholarship of R$112.00 per month.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The Gol de Letra Foundation counts on various partners that
collaborate in different ways with financing, goods, and services.
Among the financial partners, the Kellogg Foundation, the World
Childhood Foundation, the Abrinq Foundation for Children’s Rights,
BNDES, the Vitae Foundation, and the Chase Foundation stand out, in
addition to the private individuals that support the project. The institution
also counts on support from companies like Unimed Paulistana, which
offers a health plan for all of the children, adolescents, and youths in
the project along with their family members during the period of the
activities. Other companies are the RX Qualix company, which supplies
cleaning products, and Pitt & Brant Communication and Litokromia,
which work in creating the art and printing the graphic material. Cuca
Toys offers toys. Intel/Microtec donates computers. Kappa contributes
with uniforms. Promofarma contributes with medicine. Viação United
Nations donated two buses to the Foundation. The Ourinhos
Supermarket offers discounts to Gol de Letra. There is also a
partnership with the Paulista School of Medicine, which provides the
health professionals that work on the project.
The Gol de Letra project today counts on diverse partners and has
managed to attract more and more new partners and involve the ones that
already make up part of the project. The project has managed to be a
multiplier in this fashion.
The family has been extremely involved in the entire process and is
considered to be one of the major volunteers in the project, developing work
with other families in the community.
Our community here has one really good thing and that’s the family.
Even if the mother doesn’t have the father in the house this kid is
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always going to have an uncle or a grandfather nearby. There’s always
some family reference point. I think that this makes it easier to prevent
diseases, because there’s always someone to help out in some way.
(Interview with health professionals, São Paulo/SP)
The partnership with the local community is essential in order for the
projects to have results. One, the Vila Neighborhood program, also has a
project directed at the youths and adults of the community and consists of
training community agents. The community works intensely on this in
reference to accompanying the youths and their families. This is what first
identifies problems that emerge in relation to the project.
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
The Gol de Letra Foundation carries out a self-evaluation process
with a pedagogical proposal with all involved professionals. One of the main
questions dealt with is the relevance of the work, its validity, and if the
investment has been worthwhile. The evaluation process is still in a beginning
phase in relation to the work with children and adolescents.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· One of the problems pointed out by the educators was the question
of competition the project causes among the boys and girls of the
community. This factor has created a certain rivalry among the youths
that are in the program and those that are not. Another aspect that is
highlighted as an obstacle is in respect to the difficulty of involvement
in valorizing the physical space of the Foundation. For the educators,
at times the youths have not dealt with the space as a privileged
space for possible changes. There have also been some cases of a
lack of commitment to the content developed in the workshops.
They have a certain resistance to understanding commitments. They
have rights but they have responsibilities as well and they know that
taking on these responsibilities is a process. I think that they aren’t
accustomed to this. A lot of times they don’t know how to put this into
practice. There are things that we have to work on all the time, like
this is yours, the Foundation is for you. If you wreck it, if you want it to
stop, destroy everything. It’s like they have this internal anxiety, they
just don’t get it, that this is theirs. The major problem is with them. We
have to know how to approach them, how to stimulate them, how to
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create a commitment that comes from them. Sometimes, you want
this so much that you have to be really careful because if you
aren’t you end up pushing them away instead of getting them to
come closer. These are our challenges. (Interview with educators,
São Paulo/SP)
· Some questions were raised on the problem of health professionals,
in terms of reaching project goals. The health question is an extremely
delicate one. It becomes difficult for these professionals to obtain
good results without fundamental conditions for physical development
and hygiene in the community. There is also the need for developing
projects with the youths that provide fundamental prevention and
orientation in the areas of sexuality, physical development, and STDs/
AIDS. This should occur taking into consideration the intrinsic curiosity
of the youths themselves. In this context other questions would be
approached such as the prevention of teenage and high risk pregnancy,
violence, accidents, and drug use. These are considered to be serious
problems by the community. The main problem resides in the fact
that when the drug question is dealt with, the entire project is carefully
monitored by the drug dealers. The drug dealers directly intervene in
activity operations.
We have to be really careful when we approach the question of
drugs. Even for the Foundation to be safe, and us too, we have to
be really careful. This subject is being studied, it’s going to be
approached, but we have to be really careful because from the
beginning we had this non-formal but watchful authorization from
the drug dealers so we could get started here. Then they started
sending messages through the mothers from the community: ‘they
said that you can work in peace because nobody’s going to bother
you here.’ It’s extremely complicated. The people who were
enrolling last week said ‘look, they told us to tell you that the way
you do things here nobody’s supposed to mess around with you
guys because the project is honest and that’s different than the
schools and the day care centers.’ It’s a community where they
accept this as the figure of justice. If they come here like they’re
justice, if I ask for security from the community. So it’s a social
project. There’s a really high rate of violence around here. We have
to be kind of cocky when we work with this kind of subject with a
community like this. A lot of times the children will come to find out
what’s going on. It’s pretty complicated. (Interview with health
professionals, São Paulo/SP)
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18) Why is it an innovative experience?
· The project has been evaluated by the community as a transforming
element. A feeling of belonging is evident in what they say. The
Foundation has really managed to involve the community and to
become a part of their lives.
The project, at least the Foundation, was a really good thing that
came here. Today there are 150 children in here. The parents
benefited, and one thing that helped the community a lot was this
health plan. It’s really good, the people are really getting good
service. They’re getting service from this health plan, so they’re
really liking it a lot, it’s really been done well. The community
recognizes the value of the project. Because the people I talk with,
the people whose kids aren’t here anymore, they feel like they lost
this opportunity, that it could be their kid who was developing and
getting the benefits that the Foundation provides. (Interview with
community, São Paulo/SP)
· There has been a process of recognition and sensitizing in terms of
the Gol de Letra project’s pedagogical proposal in other sectors of
society, like universities.
What I think the important thing is about this project is that here
within this global dependency, within the third sector, the university
realized that it was important to participate in this project, in the
health movement and in the prevention of disease. There’s an extension
of the university within the community. There’s nothing better than
having this socially based project. It’s a university service, a project
that really involves the community. That’s what I think is important.
The Foundation began in August and we’ve made a point of this since
the beginning, that we’re always acting in partnership. (Interview
with health professionals, São Paulo/SP)
· The professionals involved defend the project as victorious, especially
through the visibility that it has managed. Consequently, the project
has attracted more and more partners among athletes, liberal
professionals, and others. To the extent that it is possible, the Foundation
is always evaluating project continuity. The teachers are always
evaluating the project as well, seeking new frameworks in line with
the methodological proposal.
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I think that there are a lot of people from the community that aren’t
familiar with the Foundation yet, because the neighborhood is really
big. There are a lot of people who are familiar though, and that’s very
cool. There are the health people who come in to attend to the people,
to give seminars. The Art Goal project made the wall with family
participation. I think this makes people have respect, value. At least I
know there’s this concern in the community about taking care of the
Foundation and the number of kids in the program is always getting
bigger. They’re always trying to get involved in new activities, or
bringing a friend. This shows us how good this thing is. (Interview
with educators, São Paulo/SP)
· There is consensus among the involved individuals that the activities
that the Gol de Letra Foundation develops possess huge potential
for combating violence as they offer aids for constructing a new
social perception.
I fight with my students a lot. I talk about sports. They say I only talk
about sports, but they can express themselves through soccer and art.
Aren’t there those people who make music and that music is a reflection
on the violence? You’ve just got to channel this. All of a sudden you
can express the violence in the world though art. Now you get sports
and you use it. So it happens that these kids that go to the stadium, a
lot of the time this thing gets started that the kid is going to come to
the Foundation and become an athlete. That’s a lie. It takes a long
time to become an athlete, there’s a lot to it. So the kid comes here and
learns. Out there he’s going after a world looking for dreams he can’t
get. He’s going to be this fanatic angry fan. He’s going to hit, to fight.
He’s going to become violent and he needs to channel this violence.
(Interview with educators, São Paulo/SP)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· One of the most evident aspects of the effects of the projects in the
lives of the youths is in relation to their vision of school. There is a
process of recognition and valorization of the role of school, of the
tools it can offer, and of the learning process. This also includes more
concern for the future. In their statements it was possible to identify
that the school began to take on a strategic role in terms of offering
roads towards this possible future of social inclusion and opportunities,
especially by getting away from drugs, etc.
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School was the most important thing that happened for me. I had to quit
school to work in the grocery store. So when it’s like that if school
doesn’t really make an effort, doesn’t come after you, from my point of
view if you have to choose between being a student and working first or
finishing school and then working, I’m going to worry about it, because
if you want to go to college you have to finish high school. I’m getting a
lot better with them. I’m learning more. I can study more. Kids like us
learn a lot of things. Theatre is something I never thought about doing.
It’s something I like, too. I’m learning something there and I’m getting
good. The other kids that aren’t in the project stay out in the street, out
in the street with drugs. Yeah, they don’t know anything else. They don’t
know that someone’s looking out for them. For me, it’s gotten a lot
better. (Focus group with youths, São Paulo/SP)
My relationship to school changed. I think it changed. Before I didn’t really
like to read. Now I read even when I don’t have to. There was this literature
test and before, I would have been afraid to take the test and then I would
have forgotten it the next day. I’m a lot better now. If I don’t get a book from
the library... It’s different now, because before most kids went to school just
to get attendance, because until eighth grade you can fail for absences. For
me this thing changed and what really helped me a lot was this library
project. That’s how it happened. Before, I didn’t have anywhere to get a
book to study. (Focus group with youths, São Paulo/SP)
· The family has been able to perceive and accompany the changes in
behavior and advances referring to their children’s education. They
affirm that there has been a redemption in self-esteem, and that their
children are more responsible.
My son is developing a lot in Portuguese and he didn’t know how to
dance or anything. He used to be embarrassed, he was all shy. Now he’s
learning everything, he’s evolving in everything. He knows how to talk to
people now. Before, he was all ashamed to talk to people. Now he’s not.
They have everything here, because there are all these outside people. So
he’s getting to know about all this stuff from outside. It’s not just that dayto-day stuff with that person he knows already. He’s getting to know
different people. (Focus group with family members, São Paulo/SP)
· Even though they recognize the limitations of the programs, the
community considers the arrival of the Gol de Letra Foundation as
having accomplished a wide variety of victories with the youths as
the program’s main target. In the eyes of the community, a redemption
of dignity occurred.
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With the arrival of the Foundation, last year mortality rates here on
the hill dropped 50% because before the Foundation got here, before
these children got in here there was nothing. They went from school to
the corner. I could see it all from the top of my roof. I had a workshop
up there, so I just watched. I could set my watch for seven o’clock
when the drug dealer got there to deliver and the kid was like 12, 13
years old. I mean they’re not there anymore to get the delivery. So the
Foundation getting here was like that, it was like, dignity. I think the
main word to describe it is dignity because if you don’t have dignity
you don’t have anything. You can’t hold your head up and look around
you. You can’t think about looking for a job, or how you’re going to
take care of yourself. I think dignity is the word the Foundation brought.
What the Foundation brought to us is just that. They brought it to the
community, the children, the teens, and the parents. Today there’s this
language that’s almost this teenager who’s a citizen. (Interview with
community, São Paulo/SP)
· In addition to the change in the youths’ aggressive behavior, they have
learned to take better care of their basic means of existence, like health
and education. They have been realizing their status as citizens,
especially. This is a feeling that had been unknown up until now.
The youths don’t hit each other anymore and they’re always neat and
clean. Their hair is combed. They use gel and their hair is always in
place. They aren’t dirty anymore, barefoot. They’re always neat. Before,
they didn’t show any respect. Now they’ve learned. The project is still
new and there’s still this really big objective that has to be reached,
but man, I’d say that 100%, 50% is already on the way, because it’s a
long haul but we’re going to get there. The perspective of these kids
that live here has changed and they pass this on to others. That’s why
when the word gets out that there’s a place available, there’s just this
flood of people in here. Everyone wants a place. The mother that has
a child in Gol de Letra feels that she’s not going to lose her child.
(Interview with community, São Paulo/SP)
· The work developed in the health area has been indispensable in
order for more changes to occur. This work has been managing to
effectively transform the values, the ways of life, and the perspectives
of this group concerning the possibilities for a more dignified life.
Most of the youths have provided visibility for this entire process.
He starts to be an active agent within the family. There’s a change in
attitude, in behavior. It’s obvious in the way the youths coexist. The
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aggression decreases and their attitude changes in relation to studying.
They have more confidence. They talk to you. It’s the way they approach
you. You can see their attitudes in the beginning compared to how
they are now. The way they take care of themselves, the way they dress,
hygiene. They change completely. (Interview with health professionals,
São Paulo/SP)
· For the professionals involved in the process the change is clearly visible.
It begins visually, with an awakening of self-esteem that is demonstrated
in individual and collective hygiene and health care. There are changes
from the emotional point of view as well, as the youths begin to feel that
they are the protagonists in these changes in their very own realities.
It’s evident that this very deep change occurs. You don’t see any more
runny noses. They don’t eat without washing their hands anymore.
Today, if one of them doesn’t wash their hands, the other one criticizes
them. ‘Look, you got in the lunch line without washing your hands.’
It’s how they look, hygiene, cleanliness, haircuts. They’ve already
gotten used to it. Some things, lice for example, have disappeared.
They themselves will come up to you and say they’ve got foot fungus.
They get here and say ‘Do you think there’s something we can do
about this, look, it’s going to be bad if we take off our shoes.’ They
didn’t worry about that before. They would just come in and take off
their tennis shoes and no one could stand being in the room. (Interview
with health professionals, São Paulo/SP)
There’s this thing that this kid said that’s really important. She was a
really cool kid. Unfortunately she hasn’t been coming this year. She’s
14 already and they start coming back for the other activities but
she’s always in contact with us. She says that because she’s the daughter
of a drug addict, her uncle is on drugs, and because she’s the youngest
in her family she was the one who could break the pattern. It was her
responsibility, because she was aware. She had a chance to break the
pattern and she wanted this for herself and her brothers, that this
plague would end. Those were her words. Because she thought that
she had to get out of the neighborhood for it to stop, for her to be
somebody and then get her family out. Now she thinks that there’s a
way to grow, to get together with the group and change the
neighborhood’s image so that she and her brothers and sisters and
children have better conditions for survival. So I think that they have
to get all the factions together for the neighborhood to change. They
have to respect other ways of thinking, respect the other gangs in a
good way. (Interview with health professionals, São Paulo/SP)
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I think that when you show some interest in them, like we do in this
project, we show them how serious we are about the work, they start to
see this as something interesting. Another thing is their posture, they
learn how to get organized, they learn how to go after things. It’s
really interesting and it’s really important. You see this thing grow.
Their role in the Foundation is to know that there’s a place guaranteed
for them. Independent of attending the request or not, what I’m doing
here is making my request and participating in this discussion,
directing the expansion of this knowledge, this interest. These youths
are going to study and they’re becoming interested in another
profession. (Interview with educators, São Paulo/SP)
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4.9.3 Meninos do Morumbi (The Boys and Girls of
Morumbi)
1) Name of Organization
Meninos do Morumbi (The Boys and Girls of Morumbi)
2) Date of Foundation
1996
3) City/State
São Paulo/SP
4) Type of Organization
Non-governmental non-profit organization
5) Contact
a) Flavio Pimenta
b) Function: Director President
c) Telephone: (11)3722-1664
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites Where Activities Are Carried Out
Morumbi neighborhood and surrounding communities.
7) Funding Sources
Most resources are provided by the Pão de Açúcar Group, the principal
maintainer of the project’s different areas. There are other partners
that offer smaller scale support, such as Credicard, HP, Collens
International, and other non-identified parties.
8) Areas of Activity
Art-culture (music), and promotion of rights.
9) Objectives
Offer instruments that collaborate in a structural transformation in
the lives of children, adolescents, and youths in situations of social
vulnerability, based on activities that involve music, dance, theatre,
and arts in a general manner.
Develop youth protagonists. The project does not expect to transform
the youths into artists, but to enable them to glimpse and construct
possibilities for future social insertion, based on this kind of work.
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Hold music, dance, singing, and theatre workshops with the youths that
attend the project from the perspective of changing their perspectives.
10) Target Public
The Meninos do Morumbi Association works mainly with children
and adolescents in the 5 to 18 year old age group that come from lowincome communities. Residents of the West and South Zones of the city
of São Paulo account for around 90% of the group. The remaining
10% corresponds to middle and upper class youths from the Morumbi/
SP neighborhood and some surrounding areas.
11) Description and Background
The Meninos do Morumbi Association is a non-governmental nonprofit organization of a permanent nature. The Association develops a sociocultural program with the children, adolescents, and youths in situations of
social risk, residents of low-income communities in the West and South
Zones of the city of São Paulo. Its major focus is music, specifically
percussion, followed by dance and singing. These are taught not only for
entertainment, but mainly from the perspective of transforming the context
of social exclusion that this population experiences.
The Meninos do Morumbi Association began informally with small
groups of children, adolescents, and youths in situations of social vulnerability
that began to have percussion classes with renowned musicians, residents
of the Morumbi/SP neighborhood.
Since that time, the project has been experiencing an increase in the
joining of youths from other social classes as well. These youths collaborate
in the development of a heterogeneous project, linked and committed to a
wide variety of levels of São Paulo society.
12) Personnel
The professionals that work with the Meninos do Morumbi Association
have widely ranging backgrounds. Some of them have trained in the artistic
area (music, singing, and dance), and others have experience in education,
psychology, and pedagogy.
Volunteer work is applied in the area of health, and these professionals
include doctors, psychologists, and dentists. The volunteers carry on a more
external project, depending on the available hours of each one.
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The project coordination team is made up of a director, a coordinator
in the artistic area, a conductor, and the percussion instructor. The general
coordinator is a psychologist and the pedagogical director has a degree in
pedagogy.
Other professionals that make up part of the institution’s staff include
teachers from different areas (music, theatre, computers, jujitsu, capoeira,
English, and physical education). The staff also includes scholarship students
that are varied in age and training. There was no information referring to
the selection process of the staff members.
There is a training process for the staff members, but it does not occur
in a systematic fashion. In the project there are constant projects with varied
themes. Not only do the teachers participate in them, but the students and
their family members do as well. The project counts on paid employees and
volunteers. As previously cited, the volunteers that currently work in the
project act in the health area.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The activities developed by the Meninos do Morumbi Association
include artistic-cultural projects, including family, health, community, sports,
and professional training questions. Public presentations are produced
systematically and are considered to be the biggest motivating tool for the
youths. This is true not only because of musical quality, recognized as one
of the main characteristics of the project in the social sphere, but also because
they make up one of the elements that makeit worthwhile for the youths to
be involved in the project.
In this context of the presentations, there are some selection criteria
for participation. Owing to the fact that the band works with instruments, a
minimum number of participants is required for each presentation. On the
average, this has been 80 youths. In addition to this, the project requires
transportation and meals. A specific list is made for each event in order to
choose the participants. According to the institution, the youths have
participated in presentations with recognized artists, played on CDs with
national and international artists, and played in shows and institutional events
for companies, among other activities.
In reference to the artistic-cultural area, the activities are divided among
music workshops with musical instruments, singing, dance, and theatre. In
the field of family and community, resident visits are carried out, in addition
to service and direction towards the utilization of the available services
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network. Meetings with the family are held in an attempt to mediate family
conflicts. The health services developed by the institution encompass
psychological and dental care performed by volunteers that attend in their
own offices through an “hour bank”. These services extend to direction
towards health services and auditory evaluation to detect possible special
auditory needs and specialized attendance when necessary.
14) Methodology
For the structuring of the project, the methodology is founded in the
principles established in the Statute of the Child and Adolescent, Law #8069/
90, following a constructivist line of theory that believes that only through
the development of these youths as protagonists within their realities and
social groups – family, school, the community in general – is it really possible
to intervene in their transformation process.
The principal vehicle of the project is art, which, according to the
founders of the project, enables the development of the talents of the group,
giving them social visibility.
For the implantation of the program, the youths were approached in
the streets and intersections in an attempt to get close to them. This was
followed by a seduction process to later convince them to visit the association
and participate in the activities.
The principal focus of the project activities is the percussion band. All
of the activities that take place essentially converge in the band project,
considered to be the project’s backbone.
A series of fixed workshops is developed, including required
activities like music (percussion, drums, piano, keyboard), dance, singing,
English, computers, theatre, and rehearsals on Saturdays. The youths
that are part of the project have an intensive schedule of activities,
especially because one of the principal criteria for participation is that
the youths must attend formal school. This is true from the moment they
arrive, when the project works on helping the families to get the youths
into school.
The sports project is obligatory and integrates activities like soccer,
jujitsu, and capoeira. The sports are selected according to the identification
the youths themselves have with a particular sport. There are also
workshops in computers, English, and automobile mechanics. This last
workshop is in an implantation phase. All of the workshops are directed
towards professional training.
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The principal focus of the project is the Show Band, considered to be
the entranceway for the other activities that converge in some kind of
participation in the band.
The institution defends the position that its work does not intend to be
paternalistic, reproducing the common discussion of “poor needy youths”.
On the contrary, the youths that enter the project construct a different vision
of the social role and begin to reach clarity on the idea that even if they
come from a class with lower buying power, they’re now part of a prestigious
band and that with this process comes a lot of responsibility.
The workshops that are obligatory are dance, percussion, English,
computers, singing, theatre, and physical training. The project’s fixed
activities operate from Monday through Friday. Rehearsals take place on
Tuesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays. The project begins its activities at 7:30
in the morning and on rehearsal days, it goes until 10:30 or 11:00 p.m. On
non-rehearsal days the activities stop between 8:00 and 8:30 p.m. In addition
to this, there are public presentations that are structured on a monthly
calendar basis.
Part of the utilized methodology is a project for monitoring the
youths and their families. This is considered to be an integrating element
in the process. The project is defined by the coordinator as a “schoolfamily-project.”
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
In addition to financial partnerships with private businesses, the project
counts on an agreement with the Municipal Mayor’s Office of São Paulo
through the Municipal Secretariat of Social Assistance. This agreement
provides partial coverage for human resources, instrument maintenance,
cleaning, and conservation.
The Meninos do Morumbi Association essentially counts on partnerships
for its existence. According to those responsible, the project has been gaining
more and more visibility. Consequently, it has been attracting a larger number
of partners, in spite of the short time it has been in existence. The project
counts on more fixed partners like the Pão de Açúcar Group, which offers
everything from financial resources to press assistance in terms of advertising
the activities. The project also counts on other partners who act specifically
as renowned artists or liberal professionals. Partnership is an extremely
important element for the coordinators and this element can be constructed
in a variety of ways. As this is a recent project the necessity of working to
increase the support network was brought up.
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There are also occasional partners such as Cultura Inglesa. This is a
British English School that does not offer financial support but offers English
classes to the youths in the project. Another partner of this type is Domino’s
Pizza, that supplies pizza for band rehearsals.
The Meninos do Morumbi Association is a founding member of the
Forum Multientidade of the Paraisópolis slum. The objective of this forum
is to enable and increase the project network and the actions that are
developed in the community through joint projects that include institutions
that act in the community like health NGOs, schools, and residents’
associations.
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
There is no systematic method of evaluation. The entire process is
developed through meetings, interviews, and an end of year general project
evaluation. The coordination is trying to make these meetings more regular,
but there has been difficulty owing to the different hours of the specialists
and the teachers, especially because of the large number of staff and projects
involved.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· One of the biggest problems faced by the project from the operational
point of view is the question of financing. There is a demand that
cannot be met caused by insufficient funds and human resources.
· Another aspect identified as a specific problem in the experience is
the pressure and tiredness that the youths begin to feel, owing to the
volume of developed activities. In spite of the youths’ deep
identification with the project and their recognition that there is a
huge opportunity to change their lives in the project, they evaluate
the situation as interfering with other elements in their lives that they
consider essential. These include their families, who complain about
not having any time to spend with their children, not even on the
weekends when the rehearsals and presentations take place.
I think you really have to listen to the kids. Before, the project wasn’t
so big and we had a lot of support in here. They listened to us a lot and
tried to do things that way. We used to complain and they listened to
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us. And now, I don’t know if it’s because it’s bigger, there are a lot of
people, a lot of little kids, we kind of lost our voice. A lot of things
happen here that we don’t like, but we don’t have a say anymore.We’ve
got to just accept it like it is. There are a lot of classes, a lot of things.
On Saturdays it’s a lot. It’s good but... it’s really rushed. You stay here
all day, Monday through Friday, and then Saturday comes and you
want to hang out with your family a little but you can’t. There are a lot
of moms here making a lot of noise. They say that their kid doesn’t ever
spend any time at home anymore. There’s a lot going on, like on
Saturday, you’ve got a lot of classes and then at night you’ve got a
rehearsal. They really kill us. Then the next day it’s Sunday and there’s
still a balada (a bar gathering with dance and music), there’s ballet
and then on Monday you have to go to work. Man! (Focus group with
youths, São Paulo/SP)
· The problem of the intense flow of public presentations is brought up
as well. This overburdens the youths as do criteria for warnings in
school and suspensions.
Every day, every day you have to get up really early and put on the
shows. Sometimes it’s two or three shows a day. Sometimes you get
home late, eat dinner and go right to bed. You can’t even play a little
bit before everybody starts saying ‘Hey, you’ve got to go to bed.
Tomorrow you’ve got to wake up early.” They really get hysterical.
(Focus group with youths, São Paulo/SP)
· The teachers themselves emphasize the question of the lack of
preparation that some of the professionals have for developing
discussions on citizenship. As many of them do not have the necessary
qualifications, they restrict their actions to technical activities – dance, music, etc. At times this ends up compromising the projects.
Today you don’t really have teachers that are worried about the issue
of socializing these youths, focusing on other things, like
communicating through dance. Talking about violence, citizenship,
behavior through dance, through music. Talking about what can
improve, what you can’t do, rules, even this question of violence, how
to have a better life, what you can do to cause this improvement and
how you can explain it to someone else. I think what’s really lacking
today is a class or an agency that’s worried about educating the
educators. (Interview with educators, São Paulo/SP)
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· The criteria adopted for the selection of the youths that travel abroad
were also highlighted by the parents and the youths as a painful and
not very fair process.
I think there’s never been someone who didn’t leave sad, crying. I
think that everyone cries because they get so stressed and they try so
hard to go. All of them had a problem. All of them. I had a problem,
every case is different, but everyone had problems. For me it was the
worst day of the year. It was terrible, they were calling the names in
alphabetical order and my name begins with and E and they were
already on F, and the children are yelling, and you don’t know what
to do. They took this girl out because she was only 12 years old. Jeez!
She cried so much. There were others that couldn’t go because of their
age. One was going to miss his mom too much, that kinds of thing, but
I thought it was really unfair like that, just say they can’t go. It’s better
not to put the name down and not give any hope to that kid or the
parents. (Focus group with youths, São Paulo/SP)
18) Why is it an innovative experience?
· There is consensus among the youths, educators, coordinators, parents,
and community members about the project’s enthusiasm and degree
of emotional involvement. In a general way, in spite of agreement
that there is a lot that still needs to be reviewed and improved, the
project has been evaluated by the involved individuals as an innovative
experience for managing to, among other things, work with concepts
of diversity based on the constructive involvement of a wide variety
of segments of society in addition to collaborating for the individual
and collective growth of those involved.
I love it. I love the work. With the children, with the kids, with the
teenagers. It’s something I do with a lot of love. I like it a lot. I
dedicate myself to it. I think I’m really a mother, a friend. I end up
getting emotionally involved. I like it so much and I think that this
emotional involvement is mature because truthfully they ask me
questions about everything. They talk to me about a million things
that don’t have anything to do with dance. I end up brining this to
the project so I can work in their lives, help them. A lot of things that
maybe they wouldn’t tell others they end up telling me and I end up
doing something that helps in a certain way. (Interview with
educators, São Paulo/SP)
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· The community has considered projects like this as opportunities that
probably wouldn’t exist in another context. It has been gratifying for
the coordinators to be able to see results in the changes in the social
behavior of the boys and girls.
There are changes that the project has managed to provide in the lives
of these kids and there’s the way they demonstrate these changes. They
say it themselves: ‘The project changed my life. Before, I was like this
and now...’ In these now... there’s always this hope, this new posture, this
new look at things. It’s really strong because we hear this in relation to
the families too because for us here it’s a wholesome vision of this person
who’s with us. In terms of the family they belong to, the place they live,
and the group they belong to, the institutions they experience. So, the
whole time, we’re looking at these kids in this integral way. In this
analysis, if it’s a result, there are these different voices from the family
itself. They get here to meetings and they start talking about the project
like a family, like it’s part of their family. That’s what you hear from the
youths in relation to the family. Usually the mom, when she’s asked
‘who’s her family?’ – she says the project. Why? Because the family is
that place where you grow, where you change, and where you cultivate
this hope and the project emerges like a space for hope, opportunity. It’s
a place to open doors, to look towards the future. (Interview with general
coordination, São Paulo/SP)
· The project is important for the family members because it offers
their children the opportunity to participate in activities they wouldn’t
be able to take on financially, in addition to participating in activities
that encourage them and open new perspectives for their futures.
The great opportunities for leisure that are offered to the youths are
a highlight, especially considering that they had no options before.
They teach us, there are a lot of courses there that the parents can’t
afford and they’re giving them for free. I think that this is really
important for children. Get that kid off the street. Not all of them are
on the street, but a lot of them are while the parents work. They don’t
stay at home and watch their kids. Tthis project is really important to
these kids. They learn a lot of really important things. (Interview with
family members, São Paulo/SP)
· Projects like this are defended vehemently by all involved parties as an
essential instrument of social insertion and one that combats violence.
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Having these socio-cultural activities is extremely important so that
the kids can promote discussion, they can question the why of violence,
where violence came from, how it emerged. They can have seminars,
really informative things, re-education activities, activities that come
face to face with the questions of violence, activities that show a different
side, so they can use the energy they have for something besides
violence, because they have a lot of vital energy that if they don’t use
for violence, they can use in another way, to channel all this energy
for another question that isn’t just violence. (Interview with
coordination, São Paulo/SP)
I think that activities like these aren’t going to solve things but they’re
going to help fight not just violence but drugs too. It’s not getting
police officers out there the whole time that’s going to fight it. It doesn’t
happen like that. I think that you have to get into the student’s head
for these things. You have to win them over in some other way. You’ve
got to offer activities that they like, that enchant them, things they get
excited about. Then they see that school as a place that’s a little more
appealing, and I think from there the classes start becoming more of a
pleasure for them. That’s what I think. (Interview with the school
community, E.E. Adolfo Gordo, São Paulo/SP)
· The possibility of building a feeling of “belonging” in a community is
considered to be a distinguishing fundamental mark of the construction
of a better future for these youths.
I think that projects like this, initially, have something to offer these kids. It’s
something they can do, that they can do with pleasure. These activities
have something pleasant but they also work with rules, with limits. They
interfere a lot with the vision these kids have of themselves because the
thing projects like this all have in common is that they work with selfesteem and the identity issue, of “belonging”. Belonging to a team, to a
group, and staying with it. This is an extremely positive effect in relation to
the violence question because if the kid has a sense of himself, if he can
really get to know himself, he will get to know someone else in a different
way. He’ll look at the other person differently. I think that, from that point
on, the new “conversational” spaces open up, these exchange spaces. I’m
thinking about this first violence that’s verbal violence, violence in a look.
Then it goes to physical violence that’s excluding and then these gangs
start up. There are deaths and if the kid can identify himself with a group
where he can share these positive aspects that are changing for the better,
for a better future with new possibilities then without a doubt this is going
to have an effect and he doesn’t need to get into that group where he has to
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use violence to exist, conflict. He still lives with conflicts and differences,
but he starts to accept them in a respectful way where he can change. The
difference isn’t the problem with a new look at things and without a doubt
resolving conflicts through violence starts to diminish. (Interview with
educators and coordinators, São Paulo/SP)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· The project has been evaluated by the involved parties as constructive
and transforming in reference to the social perceptions of the youths
that take part in the activities developed with the institution. A change
in the image that the youth builds about himself and his social role
can be identified. This serves to reveal a reality that was many times
previously unknown. The question of the valorization of self-esteem
as well as responsibility are both extremely visible in contrast to the
aggressive profile that these youths previously had.
Yeah! I did a lot of things. I played ball, I fought a lot with my mom, I told
her to get out because I thought I was right. I hung around with people
who had guns, with the wrong people. I hung out with them no problem.
It was like this, my mom would leave at five to go to work. I would wait for
her to leave and then I would just get out and go. I left the door open,
everything open and I just disappeared and it was full of thieves around
there but I didn’t care at all. I was paying attention to the time when my
mom was supposed to get home and when I thought she wasn’t coming
she was right there behind me with this huge broom. [...] After that I
completely changed my life. When I remember what I was like before, I
used to walk around just like some streetkid. The kid you’re looking at
now, I wasn’t like this, I was just doing nothing, I was ignorant. Just
hanging out like some brat, I used to walk around in these terrible clothes,
like some scoundrel, all dirty. I didn’t say anything that made sense on the
street. I didn’t want to know. I wanted to hit everybody, mess everybody
up. I used to dish Flavio. I didn’t care about who I went after. I would just
throw these kids down on the ground. Then after being ‘this guy’, I started
to realize that it’s not really the way to do things. You’ve got to start
understanding people. I had to take more care of myself and not just start
fighting with everybody in the street. So I started taking care of myself, a
little bit here, a little bit there. And now I’m like I am now. I’m a woman.
(Focus group with youths, São Paulo/SP)
· For the coordination, there is a change in the posture of the youth as
a potential agent of violence and this makes it necessary to work in
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conjunction with the family in order for these effects to become
consolidated. Therefore, in order for this change to really take place,
it’s necessary to act in a broader way.
You can see the change, even in dance. For example, when they get here
they walk around with their heads hanging down. When they get here
their sternum, this place that we call sternum, when you’re a child, a
baby, it’s really, really open. Then you start growing up and it starts
closing up a little. When you fight with someone or you’re really tired,
you tend to lower your head and go inside yourself. When they get here,
they’re like that. When we start working with them we do these dance
projects, this body work, and you can already see in the second week
that the kid’s chest is already more open. This kid is facing the world in
a different way, because even when you’re going to fight you say ‘What
is it?’ When you’re going to fight, the first thing that you do is open up
your chest and confront the person. So really, like this you end up
facing the world, making this different life that’s coming from your own
self-esteem. (Interview with educators, São Paulo)
· The trips for presentations abroad have had a huge affect on the
youths’ behavior.
One of the effects, speaking of effects, is this trip to London. Because it’s
one thing to dream and talk about this dream and it’s another thing to
give some color to this dream, to give it a name. This really has an effect
on them. ‘Look, they already went. I could go.’ It’s really common to
hear the little kids always asking ‘Can I go on the next trip? What do I
need to do to get to go?’ This has been the springboard of the project,
because it’s this dream that’s out there. They feel like they’re walking
towards this dream and that it can become a reality. They come, they
take part. (Interview with administration, São Paulo/SP)
· For the family, and for the educators and coordinators, the project has
collaborated in the maturing process of the youths, who have been
developing their sense of belonging and responsibility more and more.
Now they recognize their identity in terms of an association. They’re
already not just some kid who isn’t anyone’s kid. The kid finds out that
it’s possible, that there are other contexts that are worthwhile, that it’s
important to build different social contexts that aren’t that ghetto thing.
A lot of them change, a lot... really school here is an obligation. We
make going to school obligatory and we send those ones who aren’t
enrolled to school. (Interview with administration, São Paulo/SP)
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4.9.4 Fundação Travessia (Crossing Foundation)
1) Name of Organization
Fundação Travessia (Crossing Foundation)
2) Date of Foundation
1995
3) City/State
São Paulo/SP
4) Type of Organization
Foundation of a Public Nature with Private Financing
5) Contact
a) Joao Vaccari Neto
b) Function: President Director
c) Telephone: (11) 3105-1059/1050 Fax: 232-7437
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
Historical Center of São Paulo: Vale do Anhagabaú and Praça de Sé
7) Funding Sources
The origin of financing for the projects developed by the Travessia
Foundation Project comes from the following institutions: Bank Boston;
Bradesco Bank S/A and Fibra Bank Inc.; Bankers and Financial Labor
Union of São Paulo, Osasco and Region/CUT; UNESCO, Teachers of
Official Education of the State of São Paulo Association SP/CUT, and
Pires Security Services.
8) Areas of Activity
Defense and promotion of the rights of the child and adolescent.
9) Objectives
· Defend and promote the rights of the children and adolescents that
currently live in a street situation in the Center of São Paulo City, through
links with the efforts of the groups of the youths themselves, their families,
public and private service networks, and the communities.
· Carry on direct and indirect actions focused on reintegration with family
living.
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·
·
·
·
Assist in the utilization of services in general, with the principal focus
being on the exercise of basic social rights for each and every citizen.
Create a set of multidisciplinary programs of “crossing”, the name of the
project, that includes working with street education with the children and
adolescents from the perspective of an integral exit for this group and
reinsertion in their families.
Hold pedagogical workshops with the intent of increasing the world of
possibilities for these youths in terms of family living, school, and the
community.
Catalyze the institution’s actions for access to means for basic development
of the youths, according to Law # 8069/1990, in the Statute of the Child
and Adolescent.
10) Target Public
The project works with children and adolescents in street situations in
the Historical Center of São Paulo, Vale do Anhagabaú, and Praça da
Sé. The project works with children and adolescents between 9 years
old and 17 years old and 11 months, with some exceptions of 18 year
old boys.
11)Description and Background
The Travessia Foundation is an organization of a public nature financed
by private capital that works for the defense and promotion of the rights of
children and adolescents in street situations and situations of social
vulnerability in the Center of São Paulo City. The main focus is on defense
for the implementation of the Statute of the Child and Adolescent, Law #
8069/90.
The Travessia project emerged in 1995, during the process of the
consolidation of democracy in Brazil. It was based on a preoccupation with
the situation of social misery of Brazilian children and adolescents, especially
those living in the large urban centers. This preoccupation came from labor
unions, businesses, and institutions working with the communities located in
the Center of São Paulo City so that a wide variety of these social segments
could get together and form a project that would encompass the defense
and promotion of the rights of the child and adolescent based on the
fundamental principals proclaimed in the Federal Constitution of 1988, with
emphasis on article 227 (Travessia Activity Report, 1996/1997).
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[..] It’s society’s obligation, the State’s, and the family’s to assure for
the child and the adolescent, with absolute priority, the right to life,
to nourishment, to education, to professional training, to culture, to
dignity, to respect, to liberty, and to family and community coexistence,
in addition to keeping them protected from all forms of negligence,
discrimination, exploitation, violence, cruelty, and oppression.
This article determines a doctrine of integral protection for the child
and adolescent, treating them as an absolute priority of the State and society.
The Statute of the Child and Adolescent came to be the strongest instrument
of defense of the rights of these children and adolescents used by the
Travessia project. The project recognizes them within their special situation,
which lies in the fact that they are still people in a process of development.
The Travessia project is aware that its role does not provide direct
assistance in the form of specific needs, such as meals and clothes for
these children and adolescents. They do, however, contribute to involving
society as a whole in this process.
12) Personnel
The project counts on paid staff and volunteers. The educators have
university degrees, and some have licenses in a wide variety of areas. As
the work developed by Travessia is multidisciplinary, the diversity is evident
in the training process of the educators. Many of them have training in
social education and service for victims of sexual abuse, among others. For
the work related to the arts field, the project counts on licensed fine arts
art-educators with experience in formal education.
The staff selection process occurs through a theory test on diverse
themes, followed by an interview with the coordination, when an evaluation
is made of each candidate. A university degree is required and professional
experience is considered in the choice.
In terms of training and qualification, the Foundation itself offers courses
for social educators and counselors for each of the program areas.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The action of the Travessia project deals with the following stages:
• Children that already live in the streets
• Children that have recently arrived in the streets
• Prevention
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The Travessia Project Foundation is organized into three areas:
• Defense of Rights
• Promotion of Rights
• Administration and Finance
The main areas of action correspond to the defense and promotion of
rights, included in the programs (continuing action) and the projects (defined
time). Descriptions follow.
Defense of Rights: The Travessia project intends to act in the defense
of rights in a direct or indirect way through the system of guarantees of
rights. Through its respective programs, the project intends to act in the
implementation of the Statute of the Child and Adolescent, using legal,
administrative, and socio-political means.
Programs:
• Education in the Street Program (PER)
• Education, Family, School, Communities and Residence Program
(PEFECM)
• Education, Art, Culture, Sports, and Leisure Program (PEACEL –
Casa do Bixiga)
• Education for the Access to Rights Program (PEAD)
Promotion of Rights: The promotion of rights is essential for the full
exercise of citizenship and it is fundamental to establish partnerships in the
sense of qualifying and mobilizing society for a more committed project for
the improvement of social policies and the exercise of these rights.
Programs:
• Social Communication Program (PCS)
• Social Mobilization Program (PMS)
• Volunteer Program (PV)
Among the activities developed by the Travessia Foundation, the
following are considered to be essential: The Education in the Street Program
(PER); the Education, Family, School, Communities and Residence Program
(PEFECM), and the Education, Art, Culture, Sports, and Leisure Program
(PEACEL). In the meantime, it must be mentioned that it is only through
convergence with other up-to-date projects resulting from specific demands
that the desired results of these actions can be achieved.
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The activities that take place in the street and in the Casa do Bixiga
are structured in weekly periods, Monday through Friday, in the mornings
and the afternoons. At night and on the weekends the boys and girls that
are already off the streets go to their homes or to partner shelters. From
Monday through Friday they participate in educational workshops (visual
arts, music, basic writing skills, sports, etc.) that take place in the Casa do
Bixiga (PEACEL), with the objective of preparing them for reinsertion in
school and a return to their families. The moment they return to formal
school they begin to attend the workshops for extra-school help, alternating
times with the classes. According to their age, they may be enrolled in work
education courses administered by partner institutions.
14) Methodology
Educational intervention begins with the Education in the Street
experience. This initial period promotes the process of “getting off the street”
and culminates with the boy’s or girl’s decision to stop using public space as
living and/or survival space. In this project there is a large investment on the
part of the educators in the construction and strengthening of emotional links
with the youths in educating them. Establishing a situation that favors the
care and trust needed to awaken some kind of learning process is essential
and involves a relationship between the educator and the educated. In addition
to this, these links widen the perspectives of the educated, serving as a home
base for the construction of new emotional relationships and creating the
means that will allow them to break the cycle of living in the street, facilitating
the process of getting out of this situation.
The constant presence of the educators in fixed spaces is as important
as the activity that takes place in the day-to-day life of the project. It assures
the building and consolidation of emotional links that are essential for the
development of the work. With the intention of creating a reference for the
boys and girls that become used to attending each area or region of activity,
having a location where the activities take place is what establishes the
“educational space” of the project. In the case of boys and girls who live on
the street, this signifies the creation of new situations so they can start having
other reference points for coexistence, values, and social practices that assure
a better quality of life. In this way, they are presented to the boys and girls as
alternatives for living on the street. These new reference points stimulate
their interest in getting to know them better, to see and be part of other contexts.
This means that the possibility for change is revealed to them.
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Beginning with the Education in the Street project, the process of
accompaniment and orientation began focusing on the guarantee of
fundamental rights. This project sought to promote the strengthening of
family and community relationships with inclusion in the formal school system
and in the service network (political social policies). However, as a return to
family living is not immediate in the majority of cases, many of the educated
go through a transition period where a gradual approximation of the family
members or guardians and towards the spaces defined for education occurs
as well. In these cases, shelter in agencies becomes necessary as an interim
measure. This measure occurs within a broader educational process that
focuses on the social inclusion of these children and adolescents. In this
transition period, the Travessia Foundation project puts on educational activities
through educational workshops in a protected space with the objective of
encouraging the establishment of emotional links, developing the willingness
to learn and providing a way that a new routine of life can be adapted to. This
includes having schedules and rules to follow. The children and adolescents
attend program activities until they can exercise their fundamental rights in
school, in their families, and in the community. Education in a closed space
happens as one step in the project that replaces education in the street. This
is an important action in the educational project, as it consolidates the passage
from the street to life in the community, as an included citizen.
The educational project seeks to guarantee that the educated has
the possibility to participate in a wide variety of activities that allow
development in different areas, according to article 71 of the Statute of
the Child and the Adolescent:
The child and adolescent have the right to information,
culture, leisure, sports, entertainment, shows, and products
and services that respect their situation as a person in
development.
In virtue of this, the service is carried out through an educational project
developed in workshops that provide educational or leisure activities in a
fixed space at the foundation or in partner institutions. The educated that
participate in the program are guided and accompanied by social educators
in their contact with the family, school life, medical care, and taking care of
obtaining appropriate documents.
During this process, educational work also goes on with the
families through the means of various integrated and complementary
actions like visits and meetings with the family groups. This occurs
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with the objective of generating transformation in the representations
of the roles each participant plays in the family network as well as in
the way they coexist.
Two things deserve mention in the work developed by the Travessia
Foundation with the families of these children and adolescents in street
situations. One is what happens in terms of the way a relationship is established
between the family and the institution. There are many projects that are
developed by different institutions with family groups. Most of the time it is
the family that seeks out the institution, asking for service. In the case of the
Travessia Foundation, there is no solicitation on the part of any family members.
The Foundation gets in contact with the family after work has been developed
with the boys and girls living in the street. This implies a natural initial resistance
or lack of availability on the part of the family members, as the work does not
begin with their request. The second aspect is in relation to the type of problem
that stems from the educational action. In general, the work with the family
groups begins because of an emergency problem having to do with violence,
or a legal conflict, etc. After this, deeper issues are dealt with.
In the Travessia Foundation the educational action begins in most cases
in chronic family problems. These have a lot to do with the way the family
members relate to each other, how they live, and their values, among other
things. Many times the fact that the child is making the street their place of
living and survival does qualify as a great problem for the family. The reasons
for this are many. There are cases where the emotional ties are very fragile
and exclusion is not felt as a loss. There are also situations where the child
living on the street is considered to be a problem in the family, and their
absence at times is almost a relief. In other situations, the living conditions
of the family and the community represent a risk that is equivalent to living
on the street. Finally, the fact is that promoting the inclusion of these children
and adolescents implies an educational action that strengthens the emotional
ties among the family members and generates positive changes in coexistence
relationships.
These two aspects are determining factors in understanding that the
educational project developed by the Travessia Foundation is in essence
one of process, and that the results are the product of a long path that has
been crossed by the families and the educators.
There is a preoccupation in the project today about the process of
expanding partnerships. A specific social communication project was
developed in order to address this issue. Among other things, this program
has the goal of spreading the word on the developed project, mobilizing
society about the rights of the child, and searching out new partners.
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The projects are developed by the institution in a continuous manner.
There is no limit for monitoring the youths that take part in the Travessia
Foundation projects. Meanwhile, there is no start-up for working with youths
above the age of 18 owing to the complexity of the legal situation established
by law in relation to youths above this age. The project has a specificity in
terms of its methodological proposal rooted in the principles of the Statute
of the Child and Adolescent. The youths that have left the project constantly
return to the institution seeking guidance. This allows for the possibility of
their continuous development, ultimately focusing on them as protagonists.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
Based on the methodological proposal of the project, various
partnerships have been formed since 1996. Following are merely a few of
them: Literis Institute of Assistance and Language Research; Walter Bender
Massachusetts; Family Therapy Institute; UNESCO; Brazilian Center for
Analysis and Planning (CEBRAP); São Paulo Metro Company; Eldorado
Shopping Center; Cultura Inglesa; Shopping Light; Don Quixote Project;
Aprendiz Project; Amident; McDonald’s; Rua Direita Store; SESC; Viva o
Centro Association; Center for Community Studies/PUC-NTC; Raul
Tabajara Sports Center; São Paulo Museum of Art (MASP); Museum of
Modern Art (MAM); Museum of Contemporary Art (MAC); Transportation
Museum; SESI Popular Theatre; XPTO Theatre Group; Pombas Urbanas
Theatre Group; Catholic University Theatre (TUCA); Castelo Rá-Tim-Bum
Theatre; Terceiro Milênio; Meninos do Morumbi Association; AABB
Chorus/ Bate-Lata Group, and Unibanco Cinema Space.
Travessia is also associated with agencies and professionals specialized
in street education and the issue of childhood like Axe Project (Bahia);
IEE-PUC (Institute of Special Studies of the Pontiff of Catholic University
in São Paulo) – PUC/SP; Brazilian Center for Analysis and Planning
(CEBRAP); Foundation for the State System of Data Analysis (SEADE),
and the Center for the Study of Violence of the University of São Paulo.
In relation to the work developed in conjunction with the family, there
is a specific program – PEFECM. The perspective of this program is to
strengthen the emotional ties of the family in order for the children and
adolescents to get off the streets, in addition to encouraging the autonomy
of these family groups for the exercise of effective participation as citizens.
The projects count on visibility in the community and the projects are
performed in an indirect fashion (partnerships with community organizations).
Some schools joined the project, as did some shelters.
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16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
In reference to evaluation, the project works with a system of selfevaluation for the professionals, evaluation of cases currently being
accompanied, and evaluation of the methodological proposal utilized. The
periods of evaluation were not in evidence.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Some educators indicate the structuring of the activities as an obstacle.
They consider the activities to be exhausting, which contributes to
low returns for the youths.
It’s eight hours, forty hours a week, and that’s really way too much. I
think it’s too much because you end up not getting as much out of it.
You’re there in this function. You don’t have any time to examine your
work. I think that’s really missing. I also think that when you deal with
this public the work load really can’t be this heavy. This just shouldn’t
be the profile, no way. The ideal would be a maximum of twenty hours
working with them. You would have two teams, one in the morning and
one in the afternoon and you would have certain times. It’s not like this,
I’m not comparing it to a school, but there are some times that you come
and work, and others when you have to reflect on the work, do some
research. It’s not this eight hour thing, just this functional thing. It’s
really heavy. (Interview with educators, São Paulo/SP).
· Another aspect considered by the educators as a problem is the
fluctuating character of the public, which has made the progress and
quality of the work difficult. The youths that participate in the projects
are at times extremely involved but at times suffer relapses.
· Another problem that was highlighted is the partnership issue, in
reference to the difficulty of increasing, reinforcing, or continuing.
They maintain that this is an essential question for the development
of the entire process.
What I think is lacking is having a partnership project in the institution
with businesses that facilitate inclusion in the job market for this kid.
That’s what we don’t have. Because you develop this project with this
kid, you think that the kid is even ready. Of course, he’s not going to be
ready 100%, but he’s ready and we have a problem putting this kid
into the job market. The difficulty we have, the job market, the difficulty
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getting a scholarship, difficulty in professional training courses. We
have to prepare this kid and unfortunately we still don’t have open
doors to offer them. That’s what’s missing. Because that would be the
work complement, the end product. The kid turns 18 years old, are
you going to put him back on the street? It doesn’t make any sense.
(Interview with educators, São Paulo/SP)
18) Why is it an innovative experience?
· Positive evaluation is common among the educators, coordination,
and partners as much for the beneficial effects of these projects in
these youths’ lives as for the necessity of continuity and increasing
this type of project. For them, the transformation in the lives of these
boys and girls is plain to see, especially in terms of getting off the
street and redeeming their citizenship and their involvement with the
family and the community.
The role of cultural activities in this project with the youths, I
think it’s really important to exercise your citizenship. I really do,
because in the hour that one of these kids is studying with me, he’s
leaving a mark, he’s leaving his design, his record. So I think it’s
really important. The activities that you’ve got in the program.
The time you spend there you’ve got to watch the way you act.
There’s a monitor who talks, and there’s a response. This is important
in training an adult, an adult, a citizen, someone who’s an adult
and who has the same rights as anyone else. (Interview with
educators, São Paulo/SP)
· The family members and the communities in general recognize the
continuous efforts of the Travessia Foundation in offering better life
conditions for these boys and girls and their families, not in a
paternalistic sense, but as a collaborator in the process of exercising
their rights, beginning with the basics, like health care, jobs, etc.
They do these activities with the Travessia project that got these
activities together for them in school. They were in school, they went
to school and stayed from seven in the morning until noon, then they
go to the activity and they stay from noon until five, then they go
home. But working for money, well if the kid does pretty well in his
studies for a while, well, it’s going to happen. Two kids already got a
job there. Yeah, they do it there. (Interview with fathers/mothers/
guardians, São Paulo/SP)
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· Both educators and community members maintain that projects like
this help the youths create distance between themselves and a high
rate of violence, both as victims and as agents, once they have begun
to channel the activities in a more positive way.
I think that the way out is to broaden their knowledge. Because at
school you go to school, you’ve got the subjects that are all
programmed, those standard subjects that have always been there
and will always be there. Something here or there is put in, it’s being
done now, but I think the cultural question is the way that these kids
are going to see something from a different angle. They begin to realize
that they can get to know other things through music. It improves
sensitivity, listening skills, and their voices. It makes people listen to
them and this really pleases them. I think that this art, culture, sports
thing really gets to them. It makes them reflect on things. They have
the right to this. This is a right that is acquired by all of us. So you’re
becoming integrated into the world, really, and you’re trying to be a
thinking person so these perspectives will open up, so you can have a
perspective, so you know what you want. (Interview with educators,
São Paulo/SP)
· For the project motivators the activities of the project act as a
complement to formal schooling. This takes place in a subtle and
pleasant fashion and encompasses elements like integration,
socialization, fellowship, initiative, and responsibility. These elements
are considered essential in channeling the vision of the youths towards
values associated with citizenship.
Through the art they work with, their coordination with involvement
with colors. So I think this cultural area... the theatre itself, working
on this kid’s expression, because these kids, all of them have talent. I
think it’s a question of work. And the cultural area really encourages
this. The cultural area redeems this unknown thing for this kid. When
that kid steps up on stage and sees that he has this potential for
playing this certain part... it’s really a victory. So, through these things
he’s going to discover things that he never even imagined existed.
(Interview with educators, São Paulo/SP)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· For those involved in the project, the effects become visible through
a wide variety of aspects in the lives of the youths and their families.
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One of these aspects refers to the question of getting away from
drugs. This aspect becomes one of the strongest elements in the
entire process of change.
One example of life
Now I’m going to show you
The story of a boy
Who only thought about snorting, robbing, killing
He didn’t want to do anything
He just used those drugs
Listen to this streetkid
It was snort or kill
Or end up dead
God only knows when this thing will end
Will end, will end, will end
The Travessia, bro
You can’t just lean back and relax
It’s for the young citizen to study, to work
The Travessia, bro
You can’t just lean back and relax
It’s for the young citizen to study, to work
Hey you streetkid, stop with these fights
Go to Travessia, work out your life
Travessia is a good place
A good example too
Get over here
Get over here
You come too
That’s it!
A good place like this
Nobody’s going to give you
Your friends on the street
They only want the end
Of you
And everything you’ve got
Tiago and Rafael are coming too
In the refrain too
In the refrain too
In the refrain too
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Travessia, bro, you can’t lean back and relax
It’s for the young citizen to study and work
Travessia, bro, you can’t just lean back and relax
It’s for the young citizen to study and work
(Focus group with youths – Rap song from a project participant,
São Paulo/SP)
When I lived on the street I used a lot of crack. Yeah, a lot of crack.
When I saw there was no future in it I had a long talk with myself. Man,
it was all over for me. I had lost my family. I was living on the street
because of crack. A lot of people gave me a lot of advice when I was on
the street. I would stop a car to beg and they would say ‘Come on guy,
you’ve got such a cool face, you’re so good looking, why don’t you get
out of here, this life, begging, using drugs?’ They would talk to me
like this and I would say ‘Man, what am I supposed to do? It’s got to be
like this. If I get out of this life what kind of life am I going to live?’ One
day I was like this, my hair was really long, my clothes were all dirty,
no shoes, I looked in a mirror and I saw myself and I said “God! I look
like an animal. I’m telling you, this is not life for a person. It’s not.
Thank God I’m here at Travessia and I don’t ever want to leave. (Focus
group with youths, São Paulo/SP)
· For the parents, the project has developed a new sense of responsibility
in their children as much in relation to school, for those who study, as
to the issue of drug use or a vision of the future. All of this is the
result of the emotional involvement of the boys and girls themselves
with the pedagogical process that is developed.
Yes, I feel that there has been a change. For example [...] is the most
closed in on himself, but I think that they really have a sense of
responsibility because at that specific time, they’re all waking up like
they’re going to work. They know they can’t miss it, they know that
they have to keep track of time, they know they have to get there on
time. So, I think they’ve got a little responsibility, they do. It’s not like
‘I’m not going today, nope.’ It’s different from before, very different
from school. ‘Go to school!’ ‘No, I’ll sleep some more.’ ‘Go to school!’
‘No, I’ll go later. I’ll get there for second period, I’ll get there, I don’t
know when.’ Not anymore. Today they get up, at 5:30 they’re in the
bathroom so they can leave at 6:30 or 7:00. So I think it gives them a
lot more responsibility. Now they don’t spend all that time on the
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street, because they were in the street. They used drugs. They don’t do
that now. So there’s been this big change. (Interview with family, São
Paulo/SP)
Before, my kids used drugs... crack, pot... everything! Everything but
glue. But when Travessia came along, it stopped. No one uses anything
anymore. I went to that treatment thing... that Alcoholics Anonymous
thing, those things have drugs too... I went a few times and then they
decided themselves: ‘I’m not going to use anymore.’ And that was it. It
was over. Thank God! I got a really good boyfriend too. He’s a good
person. (Interview with family, São Paulo/SP)
· The teaching-learning process utilized by Travessia is also considered
to have helped a lot in the intellectual development of their children in
terms of attitude and mentality, encouraging their creativity and giving
them a better perspective for the future.
The project helps a lot. It helped my kids a lot. It’s helping. I think
they’re more intelligent. Edson drew a Christmas card and won
first prize. His card was made into a poster and it went to an
exhibition. I think it won, too. What I mean to say is that he thinks
about doing these massage courses, these mechanics courses. If
they didn’t have the project, he wouldn’t have been able to discover
these things. It was just the street, the street, the street. (Interview
with family, São Paulo/SP)
Oh yeah, they changed. Before they were really rebellious. Now
they’re better. They were really disobedient before, they’re a lot
better now. I think he changed his way of being, his way. Before he
was all anxious. Everything bugged him. Now he’s calmer. I think it’s
good because it’s something they’re developing. He’s already
forgotten that thing he wanted to do that was wrong. He’s not going
to do that now, he’s already going to do something better. (Interview
with family, São Paulo/SP)
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4.10 Rio de Janeiro
4.10.1 Vila Olímpica da Mangueira (Mangueira Samba
School Club)
1) Name of Organization
Grêmio Recreativo Escola de Samba Estação Primeira de Mangueira
(Mangueira Samba School Club)
2) Date of Foundation
1986 – Mangueira Social Program
3) City/State
Rio de Janeiro/RJ
4) Type of Organization
Private Business
5) Contact
a) Elmo José dos Santos
b) Function: President of the Mangueira Samba School Club
c) Telephone: (21) 2567-4637
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
Vila Olímpica da Mangueira
7) Funding Sources
The financial resources are from private business that invest in social
marketing. Main Olímpico project supporters are Xerox and BMF.
8) Areas of Activity
Education and sports.
9) Objectives
Educate and socialize children and adolescents through sports.
10) Target Public
The project serves children and adolescents from 6 to 18 years of
age who are residents of Mangueira and surrounding neighborhoods.
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11)Description and Background
The Olímpico da Mangeira project is linked to the Mangueira Samba
Club, the traditional samba school from Rio de Janeiro. The project is part of
the Mangueira Social Project, which is an extremely broad project that includes
11 projects in the areas of education, health, sports and leisure, professional
training, and social integration. Together, these programs encompass service
that extends from early childhood to senior citizens, offering the nearly 2,000
beneficiaries, including children and adolescents, a health center, school, wellequipped sports gymnasium, and professional preparation.
The Olímpico de Mangueira project works with sports as an instrument
of social integration, education, physical development, and psychological
development for the youths. As education is the principal objective of the
project, school attendance is required for enrollment in any sports module.
The sports project in Mangueira is divided into two parts. At first, in
1973, Mangueira promoted some activities linked to sports with children
and youths. These activities were unstructured and the environment was
precarious (below a highway). There was no project methodology. Later, in
1987, a new group got together to organize a systematic project with sports
in a sports field in Mangueira. In this way, the Vila Olímpica da Mangueira
project was created in the same form that it operates today. The first sponsor
for the project was Xerox of Brazil.
In the beginning the field was flattened ground. The running track
was improvised as well. So, a lot of businesses and people started to
see a good future for this project, to get these children off the streets.
We got a lot of different partnerships together and from there we
managed to make the project grow, to create this villa like it is today.
(Interview with specialist/project motivator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
12) Personnel
There are two types of professionals working in the Olímpico de
Mangueira project. There are physical education teachers and former
athletes. The objective of this way of working is to harmonize theory and
practice in order to provide a dynamic that will have good sports results.
Due to the success reached by the Mangueira athletes in some of the
modalities, the work of the specialists and instructors is extremely valued.
Many of them state that working in Mangueira becomes a credential in
their areas of actualization.
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Technical criteria are taken into consideration for the selection of new
professionals. There is also a requirement that they have a social conscience
for the project. This means that they understand that the project serves
low-income children, and they also understand that this can cause some
limitations in the service. For example, you cannot require that the youth be
well fed or in good physical condition.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
Athletic Training: Athletic training in Mangueira is affiliated with the
State of Rio de Janeiro Athletic Federation. The past few years have brought
significant results and the athletes have won various national titles. Athletic
training counts on a seven teacher team for the different tests. The following
are highlights: tests of speed, resistance, hurdle races, high jumping (height,
distance, pole vaulting), and throwing (weights, discus, hammer, and javelin).
Female Basketball: Mangueira is affiliated with the State of Rio de
Janeiro Basketball Federation, with participation in various categories of
championships and tournaments. In this module, Mangueira has already
won various titles. Some of its athletes have been invited to take part in
the national team.
Soccer: This is the most popular sport among those offered in the
Olímpica da Mangueira Villa. The field is synthetic and the practice sessions
take place in a wide variety of categories, according to age group. Mangueira
directs some of its juvenile athletes to the large soccer teams in Rio de
Janeiro and there are already some reports of some boys who have
prospered in soccer careers.
Indoor Soccer: Mangueira participates in five categories in the state
championship of this module. The fraldinha or “little diaper” category is the
most sought after, classifying for the finals every year.
Rhythmic Gymnastics: According to the teachers, the objective of
rhythmic gymnastics is “to provide bodily expression through harmony,
flexibility, and grace in movement. It seeks to stylize the body and refine
femininity. To reach this objective, dance movements are used along with
exercises that use equipment: balls, jump ropes, the hoop, and a ribbon.”
Mangueira has already had significant results in Brazil and abroad in this
Olympic module.
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Swimming: Since 1994, Mangueira has offered swimming classes in a
pool at the Nação Mangueirense CIEP. The activities are developed in a
semi-olympic pool and serve over 300 adolescents.
Sand Volleyball: This module includes athletes of a high technical
level and is offered to children and adolescents from the Olímpico project.
The athletes participate in championships and some of them have achieved
significant results in national tournaments.
14) Methodology
The program is widespread throughout the community. Due to this,
there is a limit to the number of places offered. Preference is given to
children and adolescents from the community, but applications from people
from other places are accepted.
Through a partnership with the community the program is publicized
every year through the residents association and through pamphlets
distributed to the youths that work in the ghetto, in Community Health.
[The youths] get here through a wide variety of ways. They come
alone, or their parents bring them. They come from other places,
from far away. There are even middle class kids that come here to
participate in the physical activities. Most of them are here because
of their own interest. They want to do some physical activity,
practice a sport, take a course. The majority come here on their
own initiative, I think. (Interview with specialist/project motivator,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
In the beginning of each year a tool called “pedagogical guide” is
developed containing information on the activities planned for the year. The
direction and goals of each module are established in this guide.
The classes are differentiated by age group. The duration of each
class differs for each module. The child or adolescent must be studying in
order to participate in Olímpico project activities. Monitoring of the students
takes place through the school report card.
Because it’s free, the girl doesn’t pay, so her payment is bringing her
school report card. That’s the only obligation, the only thing we demand
is that they have to study. It’s really well structured here. We have excellent
conditions for the project, so the girls only have the job of coming here to
practice. They have everything here. The demand is really huge, the school
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is always full. There are always athletes looking for openings here.
(Interview with specialist/project motivator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
The student in the Olímpico project is offered integrated service. That
is, the project is concerned not only with sports but also with education,
health, and professional training.
We have psychological care, we have health care, we have extra
school tutoring for the athletes to monitor them, to see how they’re
doing in school. We have a teacher to help them with their
difficulties. So the kid’s not just practicing sports, there are lots of
things for them to get busy here. (Interview with specialist/project
motivator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
As the project is located within Mangueira and because some of the
teachers live in the community, it’s easier to track the youths that go through
the institution. This tracking, however, is performed in an informal way, as it
has to do with community relationships established between ex-students
and their teachers.
There is this monitoring. Because I live in the community the tracking
is like this. You’ve got your life but you look for them. We know that
kid worked with us. We try to see if everything’s ok, if he’s studying or
not, if he’s unemployed. Because there are a lot of athletes that work
with us who are employed here at the project. They have jobs, they’ve
taken courses, so we always have this kind of tracking. (Interview
with specialist/project motivator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
The opinion of those interviewed is that it is difficult to monitor the
youths because of their large number. Because of this, the project motivators
try to accompany the most complicated cases:
We keep track of the ones who are the most complicated cases. It’s like,
these are complicated cases: with a teenager that you know is really
living on the edge, he can just seize up sometime and say “I don’t get
what I think I should get.” So this is going to be tracked, you keep
calling, asking, looking to know. There’s a community agent, a
psychologist, and they keep track of this really well too. Until you
reach a certain point where it just doesn’t work, because there are just
so many kids, there are so many people. (Interview with sports
coordinator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The Olímpico da Mangueira project served as a model for the implantation
of the Olympic Villas of the State Government of Rio de Janeiro. Beyond this,
Mangueira hasn’t yet developed any kind of reproduction of the project. There
was no information on partnership between Mangueira and another samba
school for the development of a social project.
According to institution coordinators, the youths’ families participate in all
activities. As previously stated, the project offers integrated service to the resident
population of Mangueira; therefore, the youths and their families participate
together in the activities.
The Mangueira Nation CIEP maintains the original proposal of full time
education. On one shift curricula equivalent to grade is offered (fifth to eighth
grades). On the other shift there are dance, music, and visual arts workshops,
among others, offered by the Center.
The principal partners of the institution are Xerox in Brazil, the Mayor’s
Office of the City of Rio de Janeiro, Castelo Branco University, Veiga de Almeida
University, Santa Monica Educational Center, Federal Government, State
Government of Rio de Janeiro, SENAI, Roberto Marinho Foundation, First
Juvenile Court Tribunal, Arpoador Bingo, BR-Petrobrás, Abravest, BMF, IPHD,
Embeleze Institute, Leite de Rosas Company, Cisper, Pluna/Fidasa, Brazil Corn
Association, Sintraconst – Rio, Valmari Cosmetics, Raízes Cosmetics, Cristal
Supermarket, Gortin, Japanese Consulate, and Paraná Sports.
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
The project is evaluated in all of its steps through meetings of the
various teams responsible for the activities involving staff from all
levels and the clientele. In addition to self-evaluation, an external
evaluation is performed with the involvement of the partners. (Interview
with sports coordinator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Formal and informal meetings occur to evaluate the actions included
in the project. According to the coordinators, “it is the utilization of evaluation
tools and control of the obtained results that allows us to modify strategies,
alter directions, and redefine goals and actions.”
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
Some youths harbor hopes of getting contracts with big teams and
becoming professional athletes. In some cases, the agency doesn’t have
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the means to become a bridge between the athletes and the clubs. This
causes a lot of disappointment among the youths.
What could get better in this project? If they could have a little more
communication with the athletes. That would make it better, making
contact with some club. ‘Look, you guys have some good players over
there, right? They train there? Yeah. Can you send them over to my
club?’ That could happen in a lot of different ways, projects. They
could get us. Clubs could invite us to go over and meet them. (Focus
group with youths, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
In sports, where Mangueira is more competitive and the team is trained
professionally, some of the youths complain about the heavy schedule of
practice sessions and the lack of leisure time.
It’s like this: ‘No, I can’t go because I have practice.’ It’s a drag! My
friends are going out and they say ‘Let’s go.’ ‘No, I can’t go. I’ve got a
game tomorrow. I can’t go.’ I stay home and watch TV, resting because
I have a game the next day. (Focus group with youths, Olímpico da
Mangueira project, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Project maintenance depends on the permanence of the sponsors. This
is not a self-sustaining project.
It’s because we live on sponsorship here, so I think we’ve got to
always keep the good image of the Olímpica Villa. We’ve got to
always collaborate, work together, always show our good work,
show our service, so the collaborators don’t get turned off. I think
that this is a big victory. (Interview with specialist/project motivator,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
18) Why is it an innovative experience?
All those surveyed give the project a positive evaluation. According to
them, the project has a series of strategic facilities that contribute to the
activities developing well.
· According to the data presented during the interviews, the project
coordinators say that the rate of child-juvenile criminality has
experienced a dizzying fall in the community during the 13 years the
project has existed.
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Because we’ve got a championship project here just in the statistics
that you’ve got through the police in the area. The rate of child
offenders has fallen, you know, through these rates from the Juvenile
Court, through the rates of the kids in school, from the Municipal and
State Education Secretariat. These data tell us that Mangueira is on
a better level than the other needy communities. There’s better life
expectation compared to other communities, there’s a better level of
life. It’s like this: the number of children and adolescents studying,
going to high school in Mangueira is a lot higher than in other
communities, a lot higher. All of these data prove that the project is a
victory. Now you should have seen how anxious the community was in
the beginning. What got them in the beginning? Sports. After sports,
the thing started to have ramifications. (Interview with sports
coordinator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· There are countless cases and reports from youths that went through
the program and reached professional or personal success. As these
people live in the same community, this ends up turning successful
cases into examples and as a consequence it raises the value of the
project for people in the area.
The evaluation is that we’ve managed to help a lot of children. A lot of
them are on track professionally. We’ve got a lot that have already
been directed to soccer, we’ve got a lot of them that are working.
When the father or the kid comes along and says thank you, that’s the
evaluation that we’ve got. There’s been a result. It’s the family that
shows that there have been results from what we’ve been doing. It’s
better than some story coming out in the news that the Olímpico da
Mangueira project is fantastic. (Interview with specialist/project
motivator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· In the professors’ evaluations, the project is extremely successful
as it responded directly to the anxieties of the Mangueira community.
The project allowed the community members and their children to
have access to a space that was being denied to them – sports and
education.
For example, each project has a lot to do with the concerns in the
community. In Tocantins for example. What those people in
Tocantins have already done in that community is play flute, but in
a really precarious way. But ok, let’s do it. Let’s give this flute class
some structure. Let’s get a music teacher, let’s get them to read
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music? Let’s teach them how to play the flute correctly? Let’s explain
the different types of flute to them? Before you know it, you’ve got
a project where you put together a symphonic orchestra, you
understand? But not everyone is going to play in the orchestra. So
you’ve got that kid in the community who doesn’t want to play
music and you get a sports project together, you know, that kid
who already does it... you’ve got to see their concerns. The
Mangueira community’s thing was a sports project. (Interview with
sports coordinator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· Residents recognize that the project gives the youths a chance they
did not have when they were young. The Mangueira project is really
positive for the community in this way.
I think that this is a project. It was one of the best things that happened
here for those of us that live in the community. I even feel flattered
because in my time, when I played sports here, our field was sand. We
didn’t use to have this project. If there had been a project like this when
I was young, maybe today I could have been retiring from a professional
soccer career. I play soccer, I love soccer and it’s something that makes
us residents feel very important, having a project like this for all of us
here. (Interview with community member, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· From the mothers’ point of view, the project is helping to show a
new reality for their children, removing them from criminality as a
consequence.
It’s true, it gets him out of the criminal life, it takes them out because
the young kid, he doesn’t have an occupation, so for those of us that
are poor, well you either stay in the house with your kid or you let him
hang out in the street. And the street, what is it doing with these
children, with these kids? It’s killing everything. So what we’ve got
here is really important. It’s just like my nephew. My nephew, he comes
home from school, has lunch and in just a little while he comes here.
He goes swimming, then he goes home, it’s leisure, it’s an activity.
There are people that don’t have the money to pay for swimming classes
for their children and that’s why it’s interesting here. I think it’s really
good here. (Interview with parent/guardian, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· The accumulated power of sports is very effective in awakening
self-esteem and discipline in the youths. When they’re in the project
they begin to have hope in the future and to dream about tomorrow.
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Today, I play here and I know what it’s like. Training is good.
There’s this snack they give you and it’s really good, everything
here is good. The way it’s set up here makes it good to play. Before,
I wasn’t involved in any sport. I thought it was interesting though
and I came to play. That was three years ago, I think. So I came
here to play and I liked it the minute I started. I still like it now. I’ve
made a lot of friends like this. The Olímpica Villa is already a part
of my life and every day that I play here I have more hope that
someday I’ll be able to be a soccer player. (Focus group with youths,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· The youths themselves recognize that the program is a “free space”,
a place they feel protected from the influence of drugs and criminality.
For those of us that live here in the periphery, in the ghetto, there’s a
lot of criminality. The project really makes a difference because it
takes up a lot of our time. It takes us out of some... well, if you’re just
hanging around like that up there on the hill, something can happen,
all of a sudden you get invited to go [and deal drugs]. (Focus group
with youths, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· The youths feel well treated and respected when they are in the
Olímpica Villa areas. This is an important component when working
with self-esteem.
With the way things are set up here, with these luxuries that we have
here, they are something else. You have the right to go and take a
shower when practice is over. You go over there and get your snack,
your bread, your juice, to replace the energy you used. (Focus group
with youths, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· In the teachers’ evaluations, the project is providing direction for the
lives of the youths, in uniting sports and education.
I think that in the life of the player this project is very important.
Because through sports you get experience, education, and this project
for them, it makes up a part of their lives, because the student starts
here when he’s practically four years old, and he’s already seeing the
best way to live. He’s looking at education so he can graduate and go
out there to a better world. (Interview with specialist/project motivator,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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The work Mangueira does with sports is linked to the great carnival
tradition of Rio de Janeiro. This makes the project a unique opportunity for
the youths in the community. It allows for:
· Play and education as a way of combating violence.
I think that the minute we get these kids busy with drawing, music, and
through music, it’s the best way that we can do anti-violence action.
(Interview with social project coordinator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· Fighting idleness among the youths, offering activities that encourage
them as youth protagonists.
The first thing, the first pretext that exists is to get this child off the street.
This fact is already something. The first thing we try to do is get the child
in the project. The other is to provide content in the project, this work. It
doesn’t matter if you take the kid off the street and have them here with
nothing to do. You have to keep them busy with things that are going to
result in growth in terms of their personality. I really believe this. (Interview
with specialist/project motivator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· Guaranteeing the right to sports defined in the Statute of the Child
and Adolescent.
This project provides all of the rights of the child, the right to sports,
health, and education. So here, in this project, there’s that. If there were
more projects like this one and if all the projects that already exist
always thought about these three basic rights of the child, the right to
sports, health, and education, it would be a good start to help fight
violence. (Interview with specialist/project motivator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
Some of the significant effects on the lives of the youths are mentioned
below:
· Change in behavior and attitude.
There’s a change in everything, in attitude, in the way of talking,
because here, we collaborate a little bit too so that everything works
out, we help the teachers. The kid is a little rebellious so we have to
guide them, ask them not to do this, not to do that. Don’t do that to the
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others, so they come in with this attitude that is totally different after
they start coming a lot, playing sports. Their attitude is totally different.
They come in with this aggressive attitude, with this thing. We know
they’re children and that we have to help them change this attitude
they have. (Interview with community member, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
They start to notice the way their friends act, their classmates, the
teacher starts passing on that thing that we teachers have. Most of us
were athletes. We’ve got experience. So we try to pass that on, what we
were and what we are to the ones who are coming in, getting closer. I
think that with time, every month, they start getting better all the time,
both in the way they behave here and at home. I think this project is
really good. I think it changes the way the ones who are here think,
the ones who are taking part in this. (Interview with specialist/project
motivator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· Change in discipline and social coexistence.
They start to be friends more. It’s this person that gets here, talks, says hi
to everyone. They didn’t do that before. Because I work directly with them
I’m always calling their attention, one of them, and another one, and they
just start to obey more. So, sometimes, they try to fight you back but we
show them that it doesn’t work that way and they start to accept it and
then they start getting into the discipline and that’s the most important
thing. (Interview with community member, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
It really changes their mentality, the way they think. The discipline, he’s
disciplined, he’s a disciplined guy, she’s a disciplined girl. He’s an athlete
and sees himself as an athlete. He’s going to think: I have practice
tomorrow so I have to go to sleep early. I can’t drink because I’ll get a zero
in athletic development, a zero in soccer, a zero in any of the modules. I
can’t smoke because if I do I won’t be able to run. I can’t get involved with
drugs because that will only destroy me. I want to be an athlete. I want to
be somebody. I think that this is what is passed on to him and he changes
by himself really. We’ve had very few experiences with our athletes giving
up athletics and going back to the world of violence and drugs. Just a few
went back to that, really only a few cases, rare cases. (Interview with
specialist/project motivator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· Change in attitude in relation to drugs.
You start to notice that you want what’s good for you. You want to help
that friend that’s drowning, that’s letting himself get taken down the
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wrong way. I even have this friend that was following the athlete
career, playing well, had everything going for him to get somewhere
in life and he just threw away his chance. He got into drugs and when
I’m going down off the hill he starts dissin’ me: ‘Hey look at that, there
goes the player.’ ‘I’m not a player, guy, I just take care of the basics.’
(Focus group with youths, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· It contributes to diminishing the aggressive attitude among the youths.
I think that the one change I’ve had is that before here I was a real
rebel. I hit my brothers and sisters, I beat up on them. My mom says
that I’m not the same person, that I’m another person now. I think the
one change that I had was this one. In school too. I used to fight a lot,
now I’m calmer. (Focus group with youths, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
The difference is really huge. There are kids that participate and a lot
of them come with their parents. The moms and dads get here and say:
‘I brought my kid here so he could participate in the project here, to
participate in soccer, to have some sort of activity because at home
he’s really aggressive with his sister and brother. They punch each
other, they fight. He hits his sister, his brother. He talks back. He doesn’t
want to do anything. Any little thing is an excuse for going out on the
street and playing or playing ball on the corner, in the street.’ So he
stays here and sometimes we look at him and he’s not really into it,
you know, but it passes and he gets together with the kids that are
already here with us and he spends a week, and a little longer, and
you start to notice that he’s calmer. (Interview with specialist/project
motivator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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4.10.2 Comitê para a Democratização da Informática
– CDI (Committee for the Democratization of
Computer Science)
1) Name of Organization
Comitê para a Democratização da Informática – CDI (Committee for the
Democratization of Computer Science)
2) Date of Foundation
1995
3) City/State
Rio de Janeiro/RJ
4) Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5) Contact
a) Roberto Baggio
b) Function: Executive Director
c) Telephone: (021) 5578440
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
National CDI has activities in various locations in Rio de Janeiro.
7) Funding Sources
National Bank for Economic and Social Development – BNDES, Microsoft
Brazil, AMCHAM São Paulo, Arte Viva Cultural Events, Avina Foundation,
Interamerican Development Bank, Dell Computer Corporation Brazil, ESSO
Brazilian Petroleum Ltd., Globo.com, Jurzykowski Foundation, SSI Server
Information Services, Starmedia Foundation, Swiss Re Brazil Services,
Telemar, The Ashoka Society, United Methodist Church, UNESCO, WK
Kellogg Foundation, Xerox Brazil Ltd.
8) Areas of Activity
Computer Science and education for citizenship.
9) Objectives
· Combat digital apartheid using computer science technology as a tool
for citizenship in favor of the transformation of the lives and communities.
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· Teach technology through discussions about the reality of each
community. For example, citizenship, human rights, ecology, health,
sexuality, non-violence, and a wide range of subjects of interest to the
community.
· Motivate the increase in the number of Computer Science and Citizenship
Schools (EICs).
10) Target Public
The project gives priority to youths in situation of social risk in the 12 to
30-year-old age group. However, the schools also serve adults and
children through a special coordination in education.
11) Description and Background
Beginning in 1993, research demonstrated that only middle-class or
high-income youths were connecting to Internet and that the possibility of
accessing this technology did not exist for low-income youths. In 1993, a
campaign was created that was called “Computer Science for Everyone”.
The aim of this program was to receive donations of computers and give
them to community organizations in slum areas. In July 1994, while an impact
evaluation was performed, it was noticed that the communities were using
the computers adequately, but were doing so without fully using the
computers’ potential because of the lack of an educational process.
For this reason, a Computer Science and Citizenship School (ECI)
emerged in March, 1995 to absorb this new culture of technology with a
specific educational process in the community. The first school was located
in a slum in Rio de Janeiro, on the Santa Marta hill, in the Botafogo
neighborhood. With the success of the inauguration of this first school, more
volunteers and donations appeared. A meeting was called among the
volunteers, and around 70 people appeared. At this time, the Committee for
Computer Science and Citizenship – CDI - was formed. It was the first
NGO in the area of technology in Brazil.
Today CDI assumes the form of a learning center with characteristics
of a social franchise, in the sense of establishing a network of various
franchises spread through Brazil and in some other countries. Each regional
or international CDI is autonomous logistically and financially. The national
CDI, located in the city of Rio de Janeiro, helps the other CDIs through
institutional support.
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Today the CDIs have 217 schools in 217 low-income communities in
32 cities in 17 Brazilian states in the North and the South, in all regions.
Expansion outside of the country also occurred and in 1999 they became
active in Tokyo, Japan. In 2000, through the Americas CDIs, an association
created in partnership with the StarMedia Foundation, Microsoft Corporation,
and the Interamerican Development Bank, CDIs were implemented in
Colombia, Uruguay, and Mexico at the end of 2000. CDI Colombia has 14
schools, CDI Uruguay has 5 schools, and CDI Mexico is beginning the
process of creating schools. In the first semester of 2001, CDIs were being
established in South Africa based in Soweto, and in Angola, Guatemala,
Honduras, and Chile as well.
12) Personnel
The functions of the CDI national headquarters in Rio de Janeiro
are divided in the following way: Executive Director, Pedagogical
Coordinator, who basically takes care of the methodology of the
activities; Project Coordinator, who finds locations for the installation of
the Schools for Computer Science and Citizenship (EICs) and encourages
partnerships with institutions and the communities; Technician responsible
for the maintenance of the equipment and for receiving the donations,
and EIC teachers in different locations in Rio de Janeiro. There is also
a national and international CDI network coordinator that has the role
of uniting all of the CDI offices in Brazil and abroad, based on contact
with the regional coordinators.
The regional CDIs count on the regional coordinators and educators.
The regional coordinators are generally people that have a huge social
commitment and they are normally business people from certain locales
tied to the area of computer science. They work for the project on a volunteer
basis. They receive training and qualification and CDI establishes meetings
in the sense of systematic monitoring of regional CDIs as schools are
established.
The selection of educators is often confused with the selection of the
students, since project methodology is based in training multipliers. All
educators go through a training course and work recycling is constantly
taking place.
CDI counts on approximately 300 volunteers that provide help in the
administrative and educational fields. Few CDIs have a professional structure,
and even the ones that do depend on volunteers in order to function well.
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13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
CDI has a decentralized structure. Each regional CDI is responsible
for the implementation of the EICs around the city where it is located. CDI
headquarters is located in Rio de Janeiro.
National CDI has a wide variety of projects in partnership with other
institutions. They are:
Complementary Project (Avina Foundation – CDI): A project of
financial support complementary to the regional CDIs in Bahia, the Federal
District, and Paraná. The aim is to implement fundraising mechanisms.
Esso/CDI: Collects computers that are recycled and donated by Esso.
Siemens/CDI: Collects computers that are recycled and donated by
Siemens’ offices, in addition to identifying the possibility of implementing
new EICs in the cities of Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Belo Horizonte,
Campinas, Manaus, Recife, Porto Alegre, Curitiba, Salvador, and Brasília
in conjunction with the regional CDIs.
Rio Computer Project: Partnership between CDI, Viva Rio, and the
Interamerican Development Bank, with the objective of developing,
implementing, and evaluating training centers for computer services focused
on technological enterprises in low-income communities.
CDI/TVB Project: TVB Communications provides telephone services
to CDI in this project, making connections to the cities of São Paulo, Belo
Horizonte, Salvador, Campinas, Curitiba, Porto Alegre, Recife, and Brasilia
available for the cost of a local call.
A2R Environmental Funds/CDI: A project for the implementation of
new CDIs in the North and Central-West.
YMCA/CDI Project: The YMCA/CDI project has the objective of
expanding the international CDI network.
INFODEV/CDI (World Bank): A project focused on the strengthening
of international CDIs and the development of the CDI social franchise
package.
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Technological Enterprise Project (Microcredit): A project in
partnership with ESSO, ANCAR, and CADEPAR that makes small loans
of up to R$1,000.00 available with monthly fees of 1.5% for technology
enterprises.
World Vision Project/CDI: A project that focuses on creating new
EICs in communities that are supported by World Vision.
Together Foundation/CDI: A project for implementing EICs in São
Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, connecting them to Internet. The objective is to
provide legal support and furnish resources for CDI operational costs.
Interamerican Development Bank/CDI: A financial support project
for the fortification of the Americas CDIs.
14) Methodology
In order to decentralize the work of CDI national headquarters in Rio
de Janeiro, the creation of regional CDIs was encouraged in the sense of a
social franchise. This is responsible for the opening of schools and is
autonomous administratively and financially. In addition to the regional CDIs,
the project has expanded through partnerships and could be implemented in
various countries. The international CDIs and the regional CDIs all follow
the same methodology institutionalized by the National CDI.
For the creation of regional CDIs, there must be a private individual or
corporation. After contact with CDI, information is sent on how to implement
the project, in addition to a questionnaire to be answered by the individual or
corporation. The first information refers to specific data such as who the
person is and what kind of ties they maintain with the community, what kind
of involvement they have in the business world. This questionnaire is
submitted to the executive directory and the proposal is evaluated. The
moment the creation of a certain CDI is approved, a document that legalizes
the union between the national CDI and this agency is sent to the respective
institution. This document is signed and notarized and registered and the
agency is then qualified to act using the name CDI to look for local
partnerships (financial and equipment) for the creation of schools.
The regional CDI project foresees that EICs create their own selfsustaining system. The CDI enters as a partner who will guide the
methodology, supervise in the project, and aid in the question of equipment
maintenance along the process.
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After a basic structure is set up, the School sends two instructors for
software training and one for a technical course. When these instructors
graduate, they return and get the equipment. The school is then inaugurated
and they receive the workshop methodologies. The methodology passed on
by the institution comes with examples of the projects, the themes, and
questions to unleash discussions using the characteristics of the community.
The schools are accepted as partners based on six principal criteria:
suitability; compatibility; creativity; physical space; demand, and work
developed.
First the institution has to be suitable. They usually come by
recommendation or they know about our project and we look for
information about the suitability of this partnership candidate. They
have to have a proposal that’s compatible with CDI, they have to want
to develop activities focused on citizenship too, and we always look
for a proposal that’s creative, interesting, and that has physical space
that can accommodate and there has to be an existing demand, a
clientele for these courses. (Interview with project coordination, Rio de
Janeiro/RJ)
The political-pedagogical proposal is based on Paulo Freire’s literacy
training method using discussions and reflections on the community’s reality.
In the training of the educators and the students, the technical part intertwines
with the community through dynamic group activities and projects. This is
what allows the community to establish its themes, developing projects in
conjunction with CDI and learning how to use computers.
Classes are divided according to the ages of the students. The courses
are modular, in periods of three or four months, and the student can take
courses for more than a year. The schools also provide continuous learning
for the instructors in the sense of recycling knowledge, generating new
courses in the community. Many students end up becoming instructors.
The project has been developing a partnership with the Center for Job
and School Integration – CIE in order for the youths to be directed to the
job market when they finish the course.
15) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
The regional coordinators of the schools have systematic meetings in
order to evaluate what methodology is being applied in a certain community
and what the demand is for the project in that community.
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Monitoring is performed by project coordination and pedagogical
coordination. Visits to the schools that are being implemented take place.
Generally, the regional coordinators and the instructors are talked to in the
school visits. The project has a file to record the accompaniment and in this
way problems and difficulties are dealt with on site, without much
bureaucracy.
16) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
In its first two years, CDI was supported by partnerships that mainly
supplied physical space and computers, trying to demonstrate that the
project was self-sufficient in the sense of not needing initial costs from
the enterprise itself.
Because it is an enterprise with the characteristics of a social franchise,
but one clearly open to regional particularities, the branch in Rio de Janeiro
maintains a network with the other regional and foreign branches, as a way
of helping and optimizing local results.
In the communities, the partnerships deal with a number of agencies.
Usually these include the schools, NGOs, neighborhood institutions, parochial
houses, various types of churches, businesses, etc. It isn’t enough to have
good structure and project implementation in a certain locale. The community
has to be mobilized as well in order that EIC can enter in a way that will
make the project a success. It’s important to highlight that the open model
allows the project to be adapted to the reality of each community.
In addition to the already cited financial partnerships, CDI counts on a
variety of institutions that support CDI in numerous projects. These include
the Assespro Agency Brazil (Association of Brazilian Software and
Information Services Companies), Real Bank/ABN AMRO Bank, Best
Life, Cadê (Work-study support program), Cultura Inglesa Online, Compaq,
Center for Assistance to the Popular Movement – Campo, Elefante,
Foundation for Childhood and Adolescence – FIA, Brazilian Institute for
Social and Economic Analysis – IBASE, IBM Brazil Ltd., Ipiranga McKinsey
Ltd., Online Legal Opinions, Labor Union for Data Processing Businesses
of Rio de Janeiro – work-study program – SEPRORJ, Siemens, Symantec,
Labor Union for Civil Construction Workers - SINTRACONST/RIO,
Society of Computer and Telecommunication Users – SUCESU, Viva Rio,
and UNESCO.
CDI participated in an active form in discussions in economic and
social forums that took place in Davos, Switzerland, and Porto Alegre, Brazil.
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17) Specific Problems in the Experience
According to the testimonies, the big problem the project faces is related
to fundraising to increase the number of schools.
· Despite the project’s having a number of partnerships, the problem
of funding is still present. This can be seen from the point of view of
an essentially decentralized structure in which each regional CDI
and the computer schools need to provide their own partnerships.
It’s clear that our big obstacle is getting funds so you can increase the
number of schools and generate resources for self-sustainability. That’s
what we need. We’ve got a team of professionals here, people who are
specialized in the specific areas that we need. These people, of course,
need to receive resources to live on, so there’s this constant search for
resources to cover our operational and administrative costs. This is
probably our biggest challenge today. Despite the large number of
businesses we receive support from, we’ve still got this difficulty. It’s a
constant search for these resources. (Interview with coordinator of
regional committees, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Because we’ve got this large number of companies, of agencies that
donate things for us, but unfortunately it isn’t enough for you to serve
all the schools that are waiting for machines. That’s why we get
ourselves going and look for local partnerships in terms of support
for creating schools locally. (Focus group with specialists/project
motivators, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· Another problem to be solved by the project is student dropouts.
This occurs due to the wide variety of socio-economic problems faced
by the served public.
Dropouts happen. Children, for example: they forget to come because
they’re at home alone and they lose track of time. Some of them get these
little systems going: if Joe is whistling, then it’s time for class. The
teenager, because a lot of times the teenager’s head is not really
concentrating on the future. The future is today, it’s here and now, so a
lot of times they start dropping out. Also, there comes a time really,
when they need food on the table, today, and a lot of them have to give
up this idea of taking care of the future for the immediate. And the
immediate is taking care of themselves and many times of their families.
From what I see, and this is no statistic or anything, the dropout rate is
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lower for the adults, because they’ve already got this planning thing, a
reality, and the adults are more focused on this professional training
thing. (Interview with pedagogical coordinator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
18) Why is it an innovative experience?
The evaluations made of the program are extremely positive. The
success of the project consists of the fact that it uses a methodology that
gives value to the ways of living and the cultures of the communities
themselves in order to teach computer science. In addition to this, it is
important to highlight the network established through the national CDI with
the international and regional CDIs, in addition to the partnerships that they
develop with the local communities.
It’s a project that really motivates you. When I got here I’d already
had experience in the social area, because I worked at UNICEF for
12 years. I got a lot of experience in the social area. When I got
here I thought ‘this is going to be just another social project.’ And
it’s not. It’s something that really makes you enthusiastic, because
of what you live through with it. I really go to the schools a lot. I go
to the communities a lot. You see how important it is and the value
people give it maybe because its the only opportunity these people
have. There are a lot of very similar projects today, but CDI might
be the only project where you align computer training with
discussing the community’s problems. That’s why it’s a completely
innovative project. It’s an extremely motivating project. It’s one
you give your heart and soul to. I think that if you talk to anybody
here, they’re all going to have the same feeling. (Interview with
regional committee coordination, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
The way the project was set up is really interesting, first because
CDI... is like a lot of institutions, mainly the bigger ones, powerful
partners, the guy who gets in a partnership with you and later he’s
going to tell you the rules. In truth you really get dependent on this
partnership. CDI works differently. It started differently. How did it
start? First by developing criteria and doing something really
interesting within these criteria. First it started studying who these
partners were, who should it associate with? In what way are you
going to get into a community? So, the program was glad to associate
with the institutions that are out there, suitable institutions that
have been in that community for 20, 30, 40 years. (Focus group with
monitors, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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· Another important innovation of the project is in the fact that learning
computer science is associated with a methodology focused on
education for citizenship.
One of the things that’s extremely important is that you’re studying
a computer course, not like any other course that’s given in school,
a technical computer course that you can see spread all over Rio
and Brazil. It’s that these students get a chance to reflect, to
discuss things about citizenship, about their rights, their
responsibilities. They get to think about their daily lives as
citizens. They can reflect on the changes that might happen based
on identifying the problems. (Interview with pedagogical
coordination, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
The work we develop here, what we’ve got here is a preventive project.
We’ve got partnerships here, and beyond the computer courses, we
pass on information about sexually transmitted diseases, issues of
violence, women, the rights of women workers. We’ve got all this here
too. We’ve got this partnership and we pass this on to the community.
(Focus group with youths, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· Another indicator of the project’s innovation is recognition from
numerous institutions.
With all certainty, our evaluation is that it really worked out. It
was reproduced with quality and it can be expanded with quality.
At the same time we really didn’t get comfortable with this. What
I mean to say is that these days the international institutions, the
big international banks, media agencies like the Times and CNN
say that CDI is a model project in the area of technology applied
to the social issues on an international level. The project is
considered to be a leader in this sense. Now, we haven’t gotten
used to this, we’re constantly working to surpass our own models,
to implement new methods, new ways of working. We want to
always guarantee the quality of our work, so we keep after this
excellence and efficiency. The result evaluations that we do
internally give us this fantastic picture of our situation. We learn
from our successes and learn from our mistakes. We make our
mistakes excellent reasons for working harder for a better project.
That’s our position. (Interview with general coordination, CDI, Rio
de Janeiro/RJ)
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19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· According to the testimonies, working on the training and qualification
of the youths caused the project to indirectly fortify the self-esteem
of the students. Self-esteem ends up being reflected in the youths’
behavior in school. Besides this fact, the project allows the youth to
develop a broader consciousness of the world they live in and the
problems that exist in their communities.
The main basic change is the valorization in self-esteem. He feels valued
and sheltered in a situation he didn’t have before. Because he was a
digital outcast. Then he starts to be a person with this information
that’s really basic today. Today if you don’t have technological
knowledge you’re practically crippled, especially in the process of
modernization and professional training. So it’s a value, his self-esteem
really grows because he knows he’s on the same level with that person
outside. Just looking for a job, just putting himself out there
professionally with technological training, it’s really important. I think
that the main element is the self-esteem we provide for these people
who many times feel excluded, inferior to their peers, just because of
not having the opportunity for professional training in computers.
(Interview with regional committee coordinator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Another thing that I consider extremely important is that 86.5% of
these people say that the course changed some aspect in their lives.
And that’s really important, 86.5% say that the course changed their
lives in some way. This is something that’s really important, it shows
the citizenship question. The reasons for a change in their lives are
varied. For example, they got a job, or a better professional position,
or they had something to do that kept them off the streets, they weren’t
in contact with a bad element, with criminality, etc. There was a change
in behavior in the classroom, or in relation to their family. They went
back to public school after the course. So there’s this big list of reasons
that attest to this change. For us this is really a reason to feel really
happy and it’s also a motive for us to always run after increasing with
quality, perfecting our methods so we can guarantee quality and
excellence in our courses. (Interview with general coordination, Rio de
Janeiro/RJ)
Many of the students that attended the Schools went through a training
and qualification process and are teachers today. Others have been
employed on Internet sites like Elefante, Cadê, and Starmedia.
I think that there’s enough, even some of the teachers themselves who
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were kids that just hung around with nothing to do in the community.
So they were, and then they got this training, and now they’re bringing
what they learned in CDI and passing it on. They’re passing it on to
the community. I think this has been a huge opportunity. (Focus group
with students, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
I think that at least they’re going to think about jobs from a new point
of view, about getting a better job, because these days everything is
computers. It’s all about if you know about computers. Do I know? Yes,
I do. Even if you just know how to turn it on, it could even be that they
don’t want to know if you’ve got a diploma, if you don’t have one do
you know about computers? Yes, I do. The door is wide open. (Focus
group with students, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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4.10.3 Grupo Cultural Afro Reggae (Afro Reggae Cultural
Group)
1) Name of Organization
Grupo Cultural Afro Reggae (Afro Reggae Cultural Group)
2) Date of Foundation
1993
3) City/State
Rio de Janeiro/RJ
4) Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5) Contact
a) José Pereira de Oliveira Júnior
b) Function: General Coordinator
c) Telephone: (21) 2220 7804/2517 3305
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) SitesWhere Activities are Carried Out
Low-income communities in Rio de Janeiro, including Cantagalo, Cidade
de Deus, and Vigário Geral.
7) Funding Sources
Resources originate from a wide variety of institutions like the Ford
Foundation, Brazilian Institute of Innovation in Social Health, M.W.
Barroso, Analysis and Assistance Department of FASE Projects, Mayor’s
Office of the City of Rio de Janeiro, Juvenile Program of the City of Rio de
Janeiro, Municipal Secretariat of Labor of the City of Rio de Janeiro,
Solidarity Community, and Disconildo. Another source of financing comes
from the shows put on by the AfroReggae I and II bands. Each
presentation directs 30% of its profits to the project.
8) Areas of Activity
Art-culture – Afro-Brazilian rhythms, theatre and circus activities.
9) Objectives
· Confront the question of violence in the city of Rio de Janeiro through
cultural activities with youths in situations of social vulnerability.
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·
·
·
·
·
Provide the youths with an alternative in the face of organized crime in
Rio de Janeiro.
Work on the youths’ self-esteem and their participation as youth
protagonists.
Train and qualify the youths for the job market.
Redeem the citizenship of these youths.
Spread, promote, and fortify Afro-Brazilian culture among the youths.
10) Target Public
The project’s target public is primarily made up of children and
adolescents in a situation of social vulnerability, residents of the
communities Vigário Geral, Cantagalo, and Cidade de Deus.
11) Description and Background
The Afro Reggae Cultural Group is a non-governmental organization
that emerged in 1993 as a consequence of work developed by a group
of friends that organized parties in the communities of Rio de Janeiro
with the intention of spreading musical rhythms like reggae. Due to the
success of the parties, an informational newspaper was developed –
Afro Reggae News (Afro Reggae Notícias). The aim of the newspaper
was to spread news on the work of artists tied to black culture. Based
on the repercussion of the newspaper, its creators decided to broaden
the work, developing actions in conjunction with the low-income
communities of Rio de Janeiro.
After the massacre in Vigário Geral, which took place in 1992, when
police in Rio de Janeiro assassinated around 21 residents of the community,
the group began to develop actions in conjunction with the community. The
proposal was to redeem the citizenship and the self-esteem of the young
population through the promotion and fortifying of black culture.
In the eight years of its existence, Afro Reggae has become a point
of reference for projects focused on youth. The project was even awarded
the UNESCO Prize 2000. The group has been invited to present its work
in a variety of countries and with a variety of renowned Brazilian
musicians. The success of the project developed by the group earned one
of the bands a contract with one of the largest recording companies in the
world, Universal Music.
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12) Personnel
The project’s staff has a wide diversity of degrees and experience.
The majority have completed high school. Some have taken technical
courses, while others have graduated from or are currently studying in
university. Many have not yet completed high school.
The project counts on around 41 professionals, and all of them receive
help with costs or direct remuneration. The Afro Reggae Cultural Group
also counts on a scholarship program for the youths who are in training.
The number of scholarships serves an average of 70 enrolled youths. Some
of the professionals that are involved in after school tutoring are volunteers,
but this number fluctuates a lot.
In the selection process of the professionals, experience in relation to
working with youths predominates, many times along with the life experience
of the candidate. The training and qualification of these professionals are
an initiative that is much more personal than institutional. For the youths,
the project develops a training and qualification project in partnership with
other agencies. Due to this investment, today the majority of coordinators,
assistants, and teachers in the projects are youths that began in the Afro
Reggae Cultural Group itself.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The activities developed by the Afro Reggae Cultural Group are
centered on four areas of actualization: Afro Reggae Artistic Productions,
Social Program/Community Cultural Centers, Health Program, and
Communication Program. These serve an average of 300 children and
adolescents that are involved in the periodic activities and 300 more that
participate sporadically in the workshops.
Afro Reggae Artistic Productions has the objective of engaging
resources for the institutional social programs. In 1998, they developed
actions to promote the New Face of the Afro Reggae Band show in addition
to having been responsible for the commercial interests of the show and for
having organized workshops for conception and musical training with special
invited guests. Through Afro Reggae Artistic Productions, the band had the
opportunity to put on a variety of national and international shows, in addition
to appearing in shows with a variety of nationally renowned musicians.
Today the band is made up of 17 musicians, an art director/producer, three
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technicians and a roadie. This is the first band to become professional, with
a contract with Universal Recording Studios.
The Social Program of the Afro Reggae group is developed in the
communities of Vigário Geral, Morro do Cantagalo, and Cidade de Deus. In
this last community, a specific activity was developed focusing on senior
citizens, the Senior Citizen Choir. This project is developed in partnership
with Casa Santa Ana, an entity that acts in daily service for senior citizens.
Raising the Tent is one of the projects of the Afro Reggae Cultural
Group in the Morro do Cantagalo neighborhood. Its objective is to develop
circus technique workshops. This project is developed in partnership with
the FASE NGO Projects Analysis and Assistance Service - SAAP/FASE,
and also with the If This Street Were Mine NGO. This project also receives
technical support from the Cirque du Soleil and Oxfam/Quebec for the
payment of some professionals and for the acquisition of circus supplies for
the workshop.
In Vigário Geral, the majority of the activities developed are for the
Social Program. The Afro Reggae Cultural Center Vigário Legal is composed
of a variety of projects that include workshops in dance, musical theory,
percussion, capoeira, body expression, theatre, and contemporary dance.
Among these projects are Criança Legal, Batuque Legal, Banda Afro Lata,
Banda Afro Samba, Banda Afro Reggae II, Trupe da Saúde and a new
project that is forming, Banda Afro Reggae III. The first project consists of
developing pedagogical and cultural activities with children from 5 to 7 years
of age through literacy training, art activities, and workshops in percussion,
dance, capoeira, and music.
The Batuque Legal Project consists of courses that seek to re-socialize
the youths that live in Vigário Geral through music with a view towards
professional training. The project redeems rhythms and cultural
demonstrations from a variety of states in Brazil. These include samba
from Rio de Janeiro, maracatu from Recife, and congada from Minas Gerais.
This project counts on the support of the Municipal Council for the Child
and Adolescent as well.
The Afro Reggae II band emerged from the demand of the kids
themselves. They wanted to invest in new talent to spread the word
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on the musical work from Afro Reggae. In addition to the Afro
Reggae II group, the project also counts on the Afro Lata and Afro
Samba groups.
In the area of education, Afro Reggae has a partnership with the Ford
Foundation, through a contract with a pedagogical representative and also
after-school help.
The health issue is treated by the group in its third project, named
Health Program. This program was created due to the appalling health
conditions that predominate in the low-income communities in Rio de Janeiro.
The elements that contributed to this situation were precarious nourishment,
deficient basic sanitation, lack of hygiene, drug use, and a high rate of AIDS
and sexually transmitted diseases.
Two projects are included in this program: Kizumba and the Health
Troop. The first consists of an Afro Reggae Health Program pamphlet
on sexually transmitted diseases, focusing on Afro-Brazilian culture. The
Health Troop is composed of youths from the Vigário Geral community.
Through circus and street theatre techniques, this group takes basic
information about health, education, and rights to the community. Through
these activities, themes like violence, drugs, STDs and AIDS, pregnancy,
abortion, and the Statute of the Child and the Adolescent are approached.
All of the work is developed in a playful educational form, and the objective
is to strengthen self-esteem and raise the consciousness of a large
number of youths so that they can reflect on the day-to-day situations
that hinder the construction of an environment that is good enough to
develop a healthy life. 16
The Communication Program is divided into three projects and
has the objective of spreading the word on Afro-Brazilian culture. The
first, Afro Reggae News, is an informative newspaper with 12,000
monthly copies. These are distributed for free in a wide variety of cultural
and social spaces. Baticum Radio is a project developed in partnership
with the Technological Education Center of UERJ (State University of
Rio de Janeiro). UERJ directs a varied cultural program on a variety of
community radio stations. The Afro Reggae communication group also
develops the Afronet project, which corresponds to the Afro Reggae
Internet site and e-mail aimed at artists, NGOs, government secretariats,
and universities, etc.
16
Taken from the Afro Reggae homepage.
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14) Methodology
The project does not require that the youths attend school to enroll in
the workshops. This requirement is made later on, when the youths begin to
be diligent in the activities. The methodological proposal primarily consists
in seducing and winning over the youths, in order to later introduce the
requirements established for the project, for example, school attendance.
[...] they come, they ask for a snack, they hang around and play, one
decides to play ball, another one puts a tape on, they sit, they watch
TV, they’re always hanging around here. Our doors are always open.
(Interview with staff, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
The workshops in dance, theatre, music, and sports operate as something
that attracts the youths to enroll. To the extent that the youths begin to
attend the activities, the teachers seek to involve the youths in the work,
making them feel like a part of the project. This develops a feeling of
“belonging” for the boys and girls in the group.
The number of workshop participants varies according to the demand.
Each adolescent chooses the activity they want to participate in and they
can change workshops in case they do not adapt. The workshops take
place on all shifts, including at night. They take place practically every day,
including Saturdays. There is a great unmet demand owing to the project’s
advertising.
As the youths become involved in the Afro Reggae II, Afro Samba,
Afro Lata, and Health Troop groups, a high degree of discipline and
dedication is required of them, both to the project and to school. The rules
and regulations of the groups are established in a collective form and violation
results in punishment.
The activities are aided by pedagogical and psychological
accompaniment for the boys and girls in the project.
In terms of the cultural content of the activities, Afro Reggae is
concerned with giving value to Afro-Brazilian culture as well as the local
culture produced by the communities involved in the project.
15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
The Afro Reggae Cultural Group is part of ABONG (Brazilian
Organization of Non-governmental organizations). This contact was made
through FASE, a partner agency in the project since its beginning. SAAP/
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FASE has always played an important part in the Afro Reggae Cultural
Group in terms of forming leadership, as much as in actual coordination as
in the new generation of trained leaders.
The families have been involved as volunteers in Afro Reggae Cultural
Group projects. In addition to this, periodic meetings are held with the parents.
The community has also been participating in the program in a voluntary
manner.
It’s extremely important to spread the word on the project and make it
visible in order to broaden recognition for the project in the communities.
I think that the NGO has to get out there, to show itself. It has to show
the results it’s getting. That’s always been our objective. You’ve got to
do it and get it out there. That’s why we have this heavy media thing.
We get the media involved with us. We do it and the media wants it. The
media is looking for new things, things that are coming out, new news
that’s a good thing, that’s really good news. It comes from the quality
of the work. (Interview with coordination, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
This is why the project has a specific communication program with a
wide variety of announcement material. Among these is the Afro Reggae
Newspaper, Afronet, and the Baticum Radio Program. In addition to the
Communication Program, the project develops activities with a wide variety
of musical groups and artists that provide excellent visibility for Afro Reggae.
According to the testimony of the project coordinator, the work developed
by Afro Reggae is highly accepted by the media.
A lot of people here today are from outside the ghetto, because they
see it on television. We get an average of two or three appearances a week
on a national level. That’s a high number for spontaneous media coverage.
We don’t pay... they come because there’s a problem. (Interview with
coordination, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
The group establishes partnerships with a wide variety of institutions
such as Ford Foundation, Brazilian Institute of Innovation in Social Health,
M.W. Barroso, Analysis and Assistance Department of FASE Projects,
IBASE, If This Street Were Mine NGO, ABONG, Cirque de Soleil, Oxfah/
Quebec, Municipal Council of the Rights of the Child and Adolescent, UERJ
(State University of Rio de Janeiro), Mayor’s Office of the City of Rio de
Janeiro, Juvenile Program of the City of Rio de Janeiro, Municipal Secretariat
of Labor of the City of Rio de Janeiro, Solidarity Community, and Disconildo.
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
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No reference was made to evaluation in the experience.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· Afro Reggae presents some difficulties that are directly related to
formal school. In the beginning of the project many adolescents
substituted school with the project as it was not necessary to attend
school in order to participate in the activities. This situation is in
reversion today to the extent that in order to stay in the project it is
necessary to be in school.
For 5 years Afro Reggae worked within an idea that was that the fact
that a kid was in school or not was not given any value. This was an
extremely positive thing at first, because around here you’re up to
your neck in social exclusion. So, on the contrary, we wanted to include,
even if it’s just in the project. So we created this gap. Every day that
went by, the kid got further away from school. Not only did he not
value school, the fact that he didn’t go decreased the value of school
for others. As the kid is a total multiplier, including in relation to
school. So people would say ‘If that guy who’s in Afro Reggae, in
Banda Um, he travels, he’s not in school, well then, school really isn’t
important because he survives, he eats, he wears Nikes’... So this started
getting my attention, this kid really stood out in one way but in another
way, no. It’s like you’re an excellent professional who can’t read the
roll call, for example. So, what kind of construction of citizen process
were we involved in, like what importance did we give to what’s almost
a determining factor: getting this kid into the job market. In 97, we
realized in numbers who many of these kids were out of school [...]
And we started to talk about the fact that school is really important.
You’ve got to go back to school, you’ve got to know how to read, how
to write. You’ve got to finish junior high school, high school [...]
(Interview with pedagogical coordination, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· As they had been out of school for so long, there was some difficulty in
the process of re-adaptation for the adolescents and youths in high school.
In 99, everybody is in school and there’s another problem: How’s
school? We started a movement and in May there was this flight. In
September, another flight. We went to the school to talk: ‘They get
tired and they can’t think ahead.’ So what are you going to do? This
guy has been out of school for 15, 16, 19 years. How am I supposed to
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tell him that eight years goes by really fast? He’s going to think that
I’m lying because there’s no way it goes by fast and that it is one huge
bore. Imagine this guy who’s 15 going to study with this 12 year old
kid. He’s already in this other orbit and everything. That’s the way it
is, but let’s put everyone in school. Let’s bring a school module to Afro
Reggae. Let’s solve this problem. At least for the gang, for the point
gang – Banda I, Banda II, because they are really miserable. (Interview
with pedagogical coordination, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· Another problem identified by project coordination is that good relations
between the formal school and the project depends a lot on the good
will of the principals and teachers. Many times these parties do not
accept the work developed by the institution.
The effort to approach the school is still difficult because each one,
each school works within a project. It might be municipal, serving the
same clientele, but each principal puts their own stamp on the project.
So, we had a really cool experience with CIEP. We took the workshops
to CIEP. It was cool in a lot of ways and one was that the CIEP people
couldn’t do the workshops and a lot of them ran away to do them. It
was a real problem. The second was that CIEP didn’t have any activity
for the full time period, so we put the useful and the pleasant together,
but it didn’t last long. Because we couldn’t work with the teachers.
Because there was this tremendous interest on the part of the students
for the activities, it created this really big conflict. The teachers said
that the students didn’t want to study in the classroom anymore, that
they would rather be in Afro Reggae. To tell the truth, we could sit
down with everyone and talk, but Afro Reggae isn’t there everyday so
why do they have to skip school everyday? Maybe they were running
away before and you didn’t notice it, or maybe they were out of the
classroom even though they were in the classroom physically. And
what did saying this get us? ‘Are you saying that we work wrong? If
you just came to judge – get out in the street.’ So we ended up leaving
this partnership we had with CIEP. (Interview with pedagogical
coordination, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· Another obstacle to be addressed is working with the youths in relation
to gender. In spite of not being the project’s intention, its public is
mainly male. This is due to the fact that the project is offering the
youths an alternative to drug dealing, something that concentrates a
larger portion of males. In addition to this, there is a specificity in
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reference to the attempt to accompany the young mothers that made
or make up a part of Afro Reggae. This is due to the worrisome
dropout rate that stems from the difficulties that the girls feel in
conciliating motherhood with the project’s activities.
18) Why is it an innovative experience?
· The indicators of success for the Afro Reggae Cultural Group can
be seen in the strong unmet demand that exists today in the project.
This is caused by the project’s visibility and the action of the youths
as protagonists, and by the changes in the lives of the boys and girls.
It’s important to emphasize that Afro Reggae works as a counterpoint
to drug trafficking in the communities where it operates.
The main thing for us is that we have this youth protagonist issue as a
priority, and a huge portion of the programs are and will be directed
and coordinated by the kids who started in the program themselves
six or seven years ago. It’s a constant preoccupation, making the kids
themselves responsible for the institution. One of the kids in the band
today is one of the most qualified people, even on an administrative
management level. And there’s another indicator of success. There are
20, 30 or 40 kids here today that take responsibility for the programs,
or for the Community Center, or take responsibility for some other
area or administrative issue. Another thing is the type of collaboration,
help, or encouragement that they manage. This ends up becoming a
reference for other groups that work with this type of public. They
visit us and look to exchange experiences. Afro Reggae is not this
closed thing, independent of their direct work. I think they’ve managed
to broaden their impact. Another indicator for me is the quality of the
product. Many times, because the project is a social one, quality ends
up being less important. I think that they work a lot and they don’t
want to get applause just because they’re from the ghetto. They want
to get applause as a show of respect because they’re doing something
well. This looks like something that’s almost revolutionary to me, you
know? And as a group they clearly show this success that I’m pointing
out, and that’s believing with no prejudice and that’s what it stands
out for above all – for the seriousness, discipline, and quality – the
simple quality of the show they put on. (Interview with partner, Rio de
Janeiro/RJ)
So what Afro Reggae does most today is get that kid out of the drug
dealing life and show that kid that there’s another life, another road,
a road to dignity. We always try to show that it’s not the easiest way... it’s
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the easiest way is for you to die or go to prison – and there are a lot of
examples of this. I’m going to talk about myself. I never got into dealing
drugs but I’ve gotten beat up by the police, and just because I’ve gotten
hit by the police I was already one who was going to be a drug dealer.
(Focus group with youths, Afro Reggae, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· Afro Reggae provided a huge change in the life of these youths in
both the personal and social area. By participating in the project, the
youths broaden their perspective of the reality they live in. They
begin to become concerned about the conditions of the other youths
in their communities. They also begin to get a glimpse of greater
opportunities for social insertion.
In the beginning I didn’t think like this. My goal now is to buy a car,
put out a CD, keep helping the community, and I think that’s what’s
happening. I think that’s it, really. This thing about multiplying...we
get these other groups going in Afro Reggae, you’re helping, you’re
having more and more influence on things. We’ve got seven groups
now and next year we’re going to have 15. We have to double it, you
got me? That’s what I want, to keep multiplying. (Focus group with
youths, Rio de Janeiro)
It’s like I told you, they have this new expectation of life. They want to
grow, they want to travel and get to know other places, so they keep
participating. Many of the ones who are here had stopped going to
school in fifth or sixth grade. Today they’re part of the coordination
and they have to study, they went back and everything. It’s a huge
improvement. If they weren’t here they wouldn’t want to study, to grow,
to learn how to use a computer, to learn how to type a memo, take part
in a meeting, discuss the project. Not one of them had any idea about
this kind of thing and today they do. They go to all kinds of meetings.
They give interviews. They type all kinds of things on the computer.
(Interview with staff members, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· The youths who attend the project become more responsible in terms
of their obligations, school and time, for example.
Today this kid has a wider view of responsibility. For the work, he
knows that he’s got the responsibility of doing what he has to do, he
knows that he’s got to follow things through, it’s his time, you got it?
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There’s this certain time for everything. So, in the same way that you
learn how to work, you use a little bit of this in your personal life. I
was an extremely disorganized guy. I really made a mess, I fooled
around, I didn’t care about anything. Today I’m this more on time kind
of guy, at work and with my family. That’s why I say that it messes
around with your self-esteem. Because you start to take care of this
more. It’s not just for us, for our day- to- day life. Our ways are changing,
the kids in the community, we notice the differences in one another
ourselves. If you need a good example, it’s one of the kids. (Focus
group with youths, Afro Reggae, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· Through the work with redeeming self-esteem and youth protagonists,
the project was able to show the youths an alternative when faced
with the attractions of drug dealing.
Look, there are some kids in the band who were involved. I don’t say
that I was involved, because I was involved indirectly. I got as far as
being a drug connection. I was set up with a gun and I was dealing. I
stayed down there watching, cutting the drug and everything. I sat in
the drug place with them but I never had a real job. I never got stamped
as a drug dealer, but it’s what I’m telling you. It happened like this. And
there’s this other kid in the band too who ended up in a robbery once.
On the day, the day he was going to be in the robbery, it was like [...] he
called us for this rehearsal with us. He was going to this robbery with
this good friend of mine who’s his brother, and this other friend of mine
And if he had gone to this robbery he would have died. His brother, my
friend, died, and this other friend too. It’s a boy from the band. He was
going to that robbery. (Focus group with youths, Rio de Janeiro)
Later, I started to get to know Afro Reggae through capoeira. When I
was young I was attracted to martial arts. I started going there and
watching the capoeira groups. They would let off fireworks and the
police would come into the slum. I wouldn’t run, I just stood there and
watched with a gun in my belt. The police would go by and I didn’t
even notice, I was watching and I just didn’t notice. So it really got me
involved and I started practicing. Then after I finished class I would
go back to the drug place. The guys would mess with me: ‘Hey man,
what’s going on with you? Are you up there on the wall? Either you
jump down on one side or the other.’ I just kept quiet. So, like my uncle
was the boss so, if I was another person who wanted out, it wouldn’t
be like that, because the person knows where everything is hidden.
But because it was my uncle, the chief, you know, I got out... (Focus
group with youths, Rio de Janeiro)
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The main singer in the Band used to be in with the drug dealers. Today
the guy turned into an artist. He evolved. He got out of drug dealing
four years ago. He’s a real guy, he’s not from fiction. The guy’s uncle
was the boss in the Red Command. He’s a guy from reality. So, when
this guy sings, he’s just so convincing. Even for people who don’t
know he was a drug dealer, because he passes on this huge reality
when he sings. What he’s singing isn’t a lie. (Interview with coordination,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· Many talented musicians have been discovered through Afro Reggae
activities. Today, most of these youths are teachers in the project.
Today there’s a percussion class with a person who was trained in
Afro Reggae, who’s an ex-student. I can say he’s really one of the stars.
Veja magazine called him the most promising musician for the future.
He came out in this story, like, the ‘100 Best’ last year. He was chosen.
He was the most problematic guy in history. This kid was kicked out of
the orphanage, kicked out of school, he didn’t have anywhere to study.
So everyone said ‘He’s already a criminal and stuff like that.’ His mom
even said that. So we took care of him all right. Today, he coordinates
a lot of projects in Afro Reggae, easy. He’s a hell of a guy. (Interview
with coordinator, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· The change in the behavior of the boys and girls of Afro Reggae
serves as an example to the other youths.
He gave this speech in the middle of Holland. Most of them were from
Morocco, and you know if you’re Moroccan in Europe, it really sticks.
So there was this kid who talked to him after the speech and the next
day this kid comes up and turns in 12 guns. It was on the cover of all
these newspapers with him saying ‘I saw this speech and I got all
emotional because these kids in Brazil, in the third world, they live in
this situation, this misery, and they manage to give up dealing drugs,
so why can’t I?’ So what these kids have done in terms of getting
people out of drug dealing, it’s no joke. They engage people, they
move people. (Interview with coordination, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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4.10.4 Grupo de Teatro Nós do Morro (Nós do Morro
Theatre Group)
1) Name of Organization
Grupo de Teatro Nós do Morro (Nós do Morro Theatre Group)
2) Date of Foundation
1986
3) City/State
Rio de Janeiro
4) Type of Organization
Non-profit cultural organization
5) Contact
a) Gotschalk da Silva Fraga and Maria José Santos da Silva
b) Function: Coordinators
c) Telephone: (61) 5124758/ 5124270/ 33220741
d) e-mail: [email protected]
6) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
Vidigal Community/Rio de Janeiro
7) Funding Sources
Project resources were obtained through the Municipal Secretariatof
Culture of Rio de Janeiro, an agreement established from 1997 through
September, 2000. Coca-Cola contributed R$ 20 thousand in permanent
goods for the project in 2000.
8) Areas of Activity
Art, culture, and education
9) Objectives
· Assure access to education, culture, and art to the youths that are
residents of Rio de Janeiro communities.
· Overcome the cultural isolation experienced by the residents of the lowincome communities of Rio de Janeiro.
· Work on the youths’ self-esteem and their identity as youth protagonists.
· Contribute in the students’ professional training to join the job market.
10) Target Public
As the project does not establish an age limit, it encompasses children,
youths, and adults.
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11) Description and Background
The Nós do Morro Group is a non-profit cultural association that
emerged in 1986 with the objective of guaranteeing access to education
and culture to the low-income community of Rio de Janeiro through theatre
arts courses.
I noticed the way these people really didn’t have the possibility to
dream, because access was just too far away. (Interview with
coordination, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Today the project reaches around 350 people. Among them are children,
youths, and adults that are residents of the Vidigal community. The cultural
and artistic center of the community encompasses a wide variety of activities
that include theatre, cinema, scenic arts, lighting, costumes, and capoeira
among other things. Through these activities the project seeks to involve
the students, redeeming their self-esteem and investing in them as youth
protagonists. In its 15 years of existence, the project has become a reference
for activities focused on youth. The project has received an honorable
mention prize from the UN.
12) Personnel
There are 12 to 15 educators participating in the project. In general, the
teachers have university degrees, some in the area of theatre arts. As the group
has already been in existence for 16 years, many of the youths who have taken
the courses are teachers and monitors today and help in the production of the
shows. All of the monitors and educators in the project are volunteers. According
to the testimonies, at times they receive help with costs.
13) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The project develops workshops and classes in theatre, cinema, scenic
arts, lighting, costumes, dance, music, capoeira, theatre history, cinema
history, English, cooking, and literature.
14) Methodology
The coordination holds individual interviews with those desiring to be
in the program. This is followed by a test where the candidate is given a
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text to present to the teachers. This test evaluates the candidate’s
development and observes school performance.
The backbone of the Nós do Morro Theatre Group is theatre. To
complement the students’ training, the project develops workshops and
classes in cinema, scenic arts, lighting, costumes, dance, music, capoeira
theatre history, cinema history, scriptwriting, English, literature, and body
expression, etc.
At first, the youths go through an adaptation phase. One
of the requirements for attending the project is to be enrolled
in formal school. The set of rules must be obeyed by all
members of the group. As it is made up of volunteers, everyone
has to help in cleaning, maintenance, and conservation of the
locale and supplies.
The project counts on a large house for the development of the activities.
This is where the workshops are held and there is a theatre that
accommodates 64 people.
The project develops its workshops and classes from March through
October. The months of October, November, and December are reserved
for rehearsals with the entire cast and the performance technicians
(production, lights, sound, costumes, etc.) There are as many as nine shows
at the end of the year.
In the sense of working with the complete training of the student,
every youth that participates also participates in a technical function.
Every year for the end of the year play there’s this general
apprenticeship. If I’m directing, or writing text, the student will get
together with someone. We always get someone from the group to
do the lights, and another one who’s with us doing costumes or
who’s involved with scenery. This is so they realize that theatre
isn’t just being on stage and acting. You can be backstage doing
something that’s just as important. (Focus group with educators,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
At every enrollment renewal the project gets more students for the
workshops, around 5% a year. As there is no established age limit for taking
part in the project, the students are organized according to age group during
the enrollment period.
In terms of the content of the activities, the group is characterized for
intertwining classic national and international drama texts with survey
projects on local language, presenting day –to-day issues of the Vidigal
residents. This results in acceptance from the community.
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15) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
In developing the project, the Nós do Morro Group establishes a strong
relationship with the students’ families and, consequently, with the community
they live in. Since the beginning of the project, formal school has been a
strong ally, establishing a direct relationship between formal education and
education through art and culture. The school often provides physical space
for the activities.
Through the shows developed in Vidigal, the community has developed
affection for the project and helps in its maintenance when necessary. Many
of the project’s volunteers are residents of the community. This is especially
true for the youths who have already been part of the activities and who are
now working as multipliers.
Due to the visibility of the project and the high quality of the work
developed, many actors and theatre companies seek out the project to develop
workshops. This includes internationally recognized actors and theatre
companies. One example is the Royal Shakespeare Theatre Company.
In 1995, the group received lighting equipment from the British Council
and in 2000, the project established a partnership with Coca-Cola, who
donated R$20 thousand for the purchase of equipment (fax, computer, chairs,
telephone, washing machine, etc.).
16) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
Each student is asked to evaluate their participation in the project in
the beginning of the year during the enrollment renewal period.
In this individual interview we address behavior, the way the student
behaved socially in the group, what the student is contributing, and
what the student is going to contribute to the theatre. What
contribution does the student have to give, what kind of person is the
student at that particular time, doing this kind of work. We take
advantage of this time to say, look, you didn’t do so well in this part,
you didn’t do so well over here, you need to improve in this area. In
socialization, for example, their social contribution was really small.
You’ve got to talk in a way that will get you more friends, more people,
a visitor comes in here and you’re really shy... So this is the time you
can really get specific with the student, broaden their universe but in
a realistic way, so that they can go through the year knowing how to
act, a combination, it’s really a combination. (Interview with
coordination, Nós do Morro, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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In terms of project evaluation, the directors and the monitors hold a
variety of meetings along the year to point out possible problems and outline
strategies.
17) Specific Problems in the Experience
· The biggest problem faced by the project is lack of financing.
According to the coordinators, the project had financing only until
September, 2000. All of the teachers and multipliers are volunteers
and they only receive help with costs when there is financing. In
addition to this problem, the group does not have a staff to take care
of the administrative part and there is a lack of physical space to
meet the demands of the activities that are held.
There have been a lot of problems in these 15 years, from the lack of
space to develop the activities to external violence. The lack of funds
is really shocking. Our strategy has been to send project maintenance
to private and public companies and quality maintenance is taken
care of by us. In 2001, the battle continues to provide continuity to the
project and come up with a more effective sponsor. This would allow
for a more stable financial situation for the group, allowing the youths
that are multipliers to dedicate themselves to the group in a more
integral fashion. This would make the quality of the work more
widespread17.
· Another problem faced by the project is the relationship of the youths
with their families and schools. There are situations that should be
accompanied by specialized professionals (psychologists and
educational specialists), but they end up being dealt with by the
coordination because there are no funds for contracting these
professionals.
Well, the lack of money, the silly things they do, the rebelliousness of
some of them. All of a sudden you’ll have these girls that start wanting
to have boyfriends and we need a psychologist so you act like a
psychologist too. A life psychologist. We use our life psychology
according to what we believe, and we start giving them training in
terms of what we believe, which is the best we can do at that time.
(Interview with coordination, Nós do Morro, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
17
Questionnaire completed by the institution.
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18) Why is it an innovative experience?
The Nós do Morro project has been considered to be a reference in the
area of projects with youths to the extent that it seeks to redeem citizenship,
self confidence, and youth protagonists through art and culture. This is done
with individuals who have been historically discriminated against in society
for being black, of low-income origins, and for having little schooling. The
project respects them as subjects of their rights, dreams, and knowledge.
He’s going to be a cashier, he’s going to be what he wants to be, right?
I don’t think he’s going to have the nerve to be a criminal now, I really
don’t. Because there’s been this building up of this citizen. He’s built it
through what’s taught, through culture, through contact, through
exchange, through discipline, through freedom... So I think that we
work a lot thinking about human evolution, knowing that there’s this
citizen in this environment and that this environment might bring on
unpleasant things but you’ve got these goals for society as a whole.
Because a student from Nós do Morro isn’t going to stick around here
forever. He’s going to move away to Ceará, or the United States, or he
could go to Canada, to France, to Cuba and he’s going to have this
goal for the whole world, for society, for Brazil. He has to have this
inside himself, that he’s a subject and that he can make a social
contribution, a cultural contribution, so he’s a citizen! (Interview with
coordination, Nós do Morro, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
This is a project that really messes with the person’s life. It makes the
person reflect on what they don’t have access to and what they do have
access to, what they’re part of. The project gives you a support structure
so that you feel like you can accomplish something and you feel like
accomplishing something. You feel like you’re being useful somehow
and that with this work you can really change different people’s lives
and that you can be free to express yourself, to find your way, your ideas.
To feel that you can say things, that you can collaborate, add things up,
make change, that you can cry and yell and stamp your feet... This
support structure that Nós do Morro has, man, it’s mine and I think that
that’s what it gave me. Here I have all these things that show me that I
can live in the whole world. I can think about my life. I think this Nós do
Morro project is cool, this way of expressing yourself that’s really
different. It’s no imitation, it’s getting down to it and the life of the gang
that makes this project happen. It’s the effort, we can yell and that’s
because of our project here. I think Nós do Morro is for me. (Focus
group with youths, Nós do Morro, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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Nós do Morro is our story. We built this here. It’s our theatre and today
we really see how much this thing has grown and how it’s really worth
it... Every kid that you see on stage in a show and when the end comes
and the audience starts clapping, that’s the big recognition and you
can really see it’s worth it. You’re getting this audience, people who
are passing on what they’ve learned to the community. So the thing is
just growing. It’s a revolution. (Focus group with youths, Nós do Morro,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
19) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· According to the testimonies, the students’ behavior and attitude
change at home and in their social relationships after attendance in
the workshops and classes. The changes are extremely significant
once they range from small attitudes, like being on time, to their
perceptions of themselves as the subjects of their rights.
I got in because of my mom. I was going to do theatre, but I was going
to do it at the municipal school. That was what I liked and my mom
said hey, I saw something written over there. She was always going by
that big house and she said I saw this application. So I went there and
I tried and tried. What’s changed in my life? I think I changed my
direction. I think, like I was a person who was like, not to be bad or
anything, but I couldn’t respect anyone the right way. It wasn’t to be
bad, and I think that I’m still on the road but I’ve changed a lot.
Because here I didn’t just learn about dance, or literature, or acting,
I learned to live, really. I learned what life is about really. I learned...
( Focus group with youths, Nós do Morro, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Man, it’s this really radical change. It’s this access thing. It goes from
this identification thing that they have for themselves... what kind of
hairstyle I’m going to use, what I want for me, for me as a person, what
kind of personality I’m going to try to have... It’s a change in attitude
at school. It’s understanding what a Portuguese or History, Geography,
or Math teacher is talking about. Because we use communication
here so you’ve got to listen to what the person is saying so that you
can understand what you’re going to do on stage or something else. It
doesn’t matter, you’ve got to listen.. (Focus group with educators, Nós
do Morro, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Me, well, you were talking about a dream, and that really got to me
today. I think that the thing that really moves me is when I see this
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transformation. I really see a lot of transformation in these people
who get in here as children. These kids that you saw in this play, for
example, all of them started here when they were eight years old.
Today they’re teenagers and you see this maturing process. They are
people with this collective ideology that’s already a part of them,
education, respect... Of course sometimes they get out of line and
everything... but, man, it really moves me. It does. (Interview with general
coordination, Nós do Morro, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
For me, it was this thing that... I used to work for this lady, these
people... and always... like everyone here, you see, I want to give
something better, give some comfort for my family. Like for my mom. It’s
just my mom, me, and my brother at home, and I saw that wasn’t getting
me anywhere, and that the only thing that I was going to do was sweep
the floor and clean this lady’s backyard and this wasn’t going to
bring me any kind of information. But I saw that here art can give you
something. It can get your feet off the ground but you’re still conscious
of what you’re doing. This brought me a goal for my life. It’s like Nós
do Morro, a family, friends, a house I take care of, that a lot of people
take care of. That’s my target now, that’s my goal in life, to stay inside
here and give it my best... (Focus group with youths, Nós do Morro,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· This change in behavior is also reflected in the self confidence of
the youths and their identities as youth protagonists. By participating
in the activities, they develop a feeling of belonging to the group and
they emphasize the importance of the project in their lives in terms of
it guaranteeing more opportunities for them in joining society.
Nós do Morro is a cultural revolution in the community, Rio de Janeiro,
and Brazil. It’s known around the world, that it’s a cultural revolution
and that it worked out. That it changed and changes the lives of a lot
of people, that it’s influential in human transitions, you got it? It’s one
of the projects that has the biggest student consciousness raising, you
know. It’s a cultural project, so for me that’s what Nós do Morro is.
That’s what Nós do Morro did in my life, you got it? It gave me access
to things. I’m not rich, but I’m not starving. I’ve got this structure for
thinking now and that’s because of Nós do Morro. It’s this cultural
influence. It’s access, art, and education walking together. That’s what
Nós do Morro is for me, this cultural revolution that worked out. It
worked out and it’s going to work out, whether it has sponsors or not,
it’s going to keep happening. We’re not saving any lives here, we’re
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here to provide access, to pass on culture and information, to share
problems. Nós do Morro is my psychological structure, my cultural
structure. It’s my school more than anything. It’s my school and this is
where I want to learn everything that I have to learn. That’s what Nós
do Morro is for me. (Focus group with educators, Nós do Morro, Rio de
Janeiro/RJ)
I think this self-esteem and self confidence thing of being able to be a
person, I think it’s really important to be part of a group. You’re not
alone. So, for me, it’s really important when I say: I’m L.B., and I’m
part of Nós do Morro. (Focus group with educators, Nós do Morro,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· The project has provided professional training for its students.
Many of the youths that belonged to the project are not only project
teachers today, but they are excellent professionals in the areas
they participate in.
· Because there’s this enormous need for professionals in this market,
this project has been meeting the growing demand for scenery
technicians, lighting technicians, administrators, and producers that
were trained in our way of working. We have some actors and
actresses who are on TV or in the movies. We also have scriptwriters
[that have won prizes], directors, and mainly multipliers for the
continuity of the project. (Focus group with educators, Nós do Morro, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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4.10.5 Viva Rio
1) Name of Organization
Viva Rio
2) Date of Foundation
1995
3) City/State
Rio de Janeiro/RJ
4) Type of Organization
Non-governmental organization
5) Name of Evaluated Project
Educação Comunitária - Telecurso Comunidade and Telessalas 2000
(Community Education – Community Telecourse and Telerooms
2000) and Rock in Rio for a Better World
6) Contact
a) Rubem César Fernandes
b) Function: Executive Director
c) Telephone: (21) 3826 1909
d) e-mail: [email protected]
7) Sites Where Activities are Carried Out
Viva Rio works in around 400 low-income communities in 34
municipalities in the State of Rio de Janeiro.
8) Funding Sources
Resources originate from a wide variety of sources. In the year
2000, 95% of the resources were provided by national sources and
only 5% by international sources. Of these resources, 40% were
financed by public institutions and 60% by private initiatives.
9) Areas of Activity
Education, community development, human rights, and public security.
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10) Objectives
· Encourage and mobilize the population, associations, and businesses
for the development of a more just and democratic society.
Program Specifics:
· To fight the low schooling level of youths and adults who are residents
of low-income communities in Rio de Janeiro through the promotion of
basic and secondary education.
· Strengthen the youths’ self-esteem, redeem their citizenship, and
correct social disparities.
· Prepare these youths to better take advantage of their possibilities
for making a living when faced with the demands placed by technological
advances.
11) Target Public
Viva Rio actions are primarily focused on youths vulnerable to social
risk.
12) Description and Background
Viva Rio is a non-profit non-governmental non-partisan organization
that encourages the mobilization of individuals, associations, and businesses
through the development of peace campaigns and social projects. Today
the organization works with about 400 low-income communities in 34
municipalities in the State of Rio de Janeiro.
Viva Rio emerged in 1993 from a demand for peace from the population
of Rio de Janeiro, due to the atmosphere of insecurity that dominated the
city. Unsatisfactory political relationships, social crises, violence, kidnappings,
economic losses, and tragic occurrences like the Candelária and Vigário
Geral massacres brought about a reaction from the population.
[...] With the call of Viva Rio, the city dressed up in white, stopped for
two minutes of silence, and asked for peace. (Questionnaire answered
by the institution, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
In the beginning, Viva Rio took on the form of a social movement that
united a variety of sectors of society – community leaderships, labor union
leaders, intellectuals, business people, housewives, and others – with the
intention of developing campaigns in order to mobilize Rio de Janeiro society
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for issues tied to peace, education, and citizenship, etc. After many campaigns
had taken place, Viva Rio realized the necessity of developing more concrete
actions in the low-income communities of Rio de Janeiro, and became a
non-governmental organization in 1995.
The organization’s projects are currently concentrated in projects
developed in conjunction with the communities of Rio de Janeiro. The various
projects are divided into four areas of action: Human Rights; Public Safety;
Education, and Community Development.
13) Personnel
Viva Rio counts on a staff of 64 employees. There is a large operations
structure and because of this many projects are developed in partnership
with other agencies. For example, these include Telesalas, that counts on
350 cooperatives, and some institutions contract a professional to take care
of the Telesala everyday.
14) Ongoing Programs and Projects
The Viva Rio projects are divided between campaigns and social
programs.
The campaigns are directed at mobilizing the population of Rio de
Janeiro for themes focused on education, peace, and citizenship. The
programs and social projects are divided into four areas:
Human Rights and Public Safety: Peace for the City; Rights Counter;
Games for Peace; Peace in the Schools; Youths for Peace; Police Training,
Games for Hope, and Community Caretakers for Citizenship.
Education: Community Education; Volunteer Civil Service; Sports and
Citizenship Academy; Community Sports; Little Wolves’ Villa, and Rock in
Rio for a Better World.
Community Development: Neighborhood Gardeners; Viva Rio
Insurance; Vivacred; Computer Club; the New Rio and Rio of Flowers
Habitat project; Carioquinhas, and Fair Trade.
Viva Volunteer: Contributing Volunteer; Cooperative Volunteer;
Business Volunteers; Volunteers Ready for Action; Professional Liberal
Volunteers, and Organized Groups of Volunteers.
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Due to the wide range of the work developed by Viva Rio and in order
to guarantee depth in the characterization of one project among the many
projects in place, this survey used the experiences focused on education for
youths and adults as its main source. These are the experiences that are
part of the Community Education Program (Community Telecurso, the
Telecurso 2000 Project), and Rock in Rio for a Better World.
In 1996, Viva Rio developed a project in the area of education that
was focused on adapting the Telecurso 2000 material for use in the
communities of Rio de Janeiro. The first communities to develop the project
were Borel, Santa Marta, and Cantagalo. Using these experiences in these
communities in 1997 as a base, the project decided to increase the project in
conjunction with the Municipal Labor Secretariat of Rio de Janeiro for 144
communities in Rio de Janeiro. After this partnership with the Labor
Secretariat, other partnerships were developed, both private and public.
This allowed the project to expand, including to other municipalities. In the
two years that followed, with the implementation of the Increase in Schooling
Program, the experience was broadened to reach a total of 225 classrooms
distributed in needy communities in all of the Rio de Janeiro municipality,
serving more than 6,000 students. In February 2000, the Increase in Schooling
Program began to be financed by a private initiative and from that point on
was called Community Telecurso.
15) Methodology
Three large projects are currently developed in the area of community
education for youths and adults: Community Telecurso (100 classes – private
resources); For a Better World (59 classes, with resources from Rock in
Rio for a Better World), and Telesalas 2000 (179 classes, with FAT
resources). The number of classes varies according to the amount of funds
raised. From 2000 to 2001, around 350 classes had been implemented.
In implementing these projects, Viva Rio established partnerships with
community organizations. The agencies were registered and the technical
staff of Viva Rio verified their physical conditions, local demand, and the
organization’s institutional level. If these requirements were fulfilled, a
partnership was established and teachers were made available along with
educational supplies. Pedagogical supervision was also provided for the
course in addition to help with classroom maintenance. The institution
participates with a physical space and equipment for the classroom (including
TV and video), in addition to mobilization of the students).
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The methodology utilized by Viva Rio is supervised by the Federal
Center for Technological Education of Nilópolis. This institution is responsible
for the qualification of students in basic education. In secondary education,
certification is performed by the State Secretariat of Education – Coordination
of Youths and Adults. These institutions are responsible for certification of
the students. In addition to this, they perform an evaluation of the pedagogical
project and of student performance during the course.
The complete basic education course lasts 9 months and the secondary
school course lasts 11 months. The program also includes secondary education
classes in communities, companies, and in the Military Police. The content
includes five subjects: Portuguese, Mathematics; Geography, History, and Science.
These subjects are worked on in the form of modules. In order to finish the
course and receive certification, the student must pass a series of evaluations in
the subjects. Most of the time these tests are paid for by the students.
The Telecurso has its own methodology, with didactic material for the
subjects. The teacher has the liberty of working in the form they think best
and is encouraged to utilize other material like newspapers, magazines, books,
etc. In addition to the teacher, there is a pedagogical advisor that has the
responsibility of providing pedagogical support to the teachers in the
communities. Each supervisor is responsible for 15 classes.
With PAE18 we’ve got this classroom with freedom and action, so each
one, based on the public, changes and creates this method, this
methodology of their own. Of course, it’s based on orientation from
the supervisors and the meetings, it’s built little by little. For example,
though, we’ve got the freedom to show the video in the beginning or at
the end, depending on the content. (Focus group with teachers, Viva
Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
In the beginning of the program’s implementation, the teachers had to
have completed secondary school, preferably with magisterial certificate.
Today, practically all of the teachers have completed secondary school,
owing to the demand of the program itself. The pedagogical supervisors
have degrees in the area of education, with knowledge of telecursos and
experience with the public school system.
16) Networks, Multiplication, and Partnerships
According to the questionnaire answered by the institution, the project’s
innovation lies in its network of alliances, particularly in relation to the
3
The old program was called PAE and is called Community Telecurso today.
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community. In the case of the education for youths and adults through
telessalas projects, Viva Rio counts on a partnership with the Roberto Marinho
Foundation and with community associations and organizations.
The most innovative characteristic of this project was the involvement
of community agencies in a partnership format. These agencies added
to the huge efforts of civil society for increasing the level of schooling
for our citizens. (Focus group with teachers, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Through the alliance network and the campaigns that have taken place
over the last eight years, Viva Rio has managed to reach huge visibility in
society. In January 2001, the Rock in Rio for a Better World campaign was
launched together with the production of Rock in Rio. This concert event
donated 5% to the area of education and 70% of this amount was donated
to the Viva Rio projects. According to the institution, Rock in Rio had 60
classrooms at the beginning of the year. Of these, 50 would be finished in
March with planned renovations. Until this time, however, there was no
budget to guarantee a specific date.
Each area develops partnerships with a variety of participants:
Human Rights and Public Safety: Violence Clinic; Coca-Cola; World
Council of Churches; Public Defense of the State of Rio de Janeiro;
Federation of Industries of Rio de Janeiro (FIRJAN); Ford Foundation,
Roberto Marinho Foundation; International Action Network on Small Arms
(IANSA); Church of Norway; National Social Security Institution (INSS);
Ayrton Senna Institute; Noos Institute; Psychiatric Institute of UFRJ (IPUR);
Ministry of Justice; Ministry of Justice/State Secretariat of Human Rights;
Public Ministry of the State of Rio de Janeiro; Brazilian Order of Lawyers/
Rio de Janeiro (OAB/RJ); United Nations Plan for Development (PNUD);
Military Police of the State of Rio de Janeiro; State Secretariat of Social
Action, Sports, and Leisure – RJ; State Secretariat of Public Safety – RJ;
Municipal Secretariat of Social Development – RJ; Municipal Secretariat
of Labor, Social Service for Industry-SESI; Superintendent of Sports of the
State of Rio de Janeiro – SUDERJ, Justice Tribunal for the State of Rio de
Janeiro/Criminal Sentencing Court, and UNESCO.
Education – Missionary Association of Social Education for Childhood
and Adolescence – AMESIA; Bank of Brazil; Casas Sendas; Municipal
Job Commissions; Solidarity Community; DETRAN; Federal Technical
Chemistry School; Federation of Industries of the State of São Paulo –
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FIESP; Federation of Industries of Rio de Janeiro (FIRJAN); Roberto
Marinho Foundation; National School of Insurance Foundation –
FUNENSEG; Ipiranga Group; Hemorio; Bom Pastor Supermarket; Ministry
of Science and Technology; Ministry of Education and Culture/FNDE;
Ministry of Justice/State Secretariat of Human Rights – RJ; Ministry of
Labor and Job/Worker’s Assistance Fund – FAT; Ministry of Labor and
Jobs/Secretariat of Public Job Policy; Astronomy Museum/CNPq; Nova
Riotel Hotel Establishments Ltd.; Petrobras; SEBRAE; State Secretariat
of Education – RJ; State Secretariat of Labor- RJ; Municipal Secretariat of
Housing – RJ; Municipal Secretariat of Labor – RJ; National Service of
Commercial Training - SENAC; National Service of Industrial Education –
SENAI, and Social Service for Industry/RJ – SESI.
Community Development: National Bank for Economic and Social
Development – BNDES; Bozano Simonsen Bank; British Petroleum; InterAmerican Development Bank - BID; C&A; Committee for the
Democratization of Computer Science – CDI; Solidarity Community;
Consulate of the United States of America; French Consulate; FININVEST;
Federation of Industries of Rio de Janeiro – FIRJAN; Doen da Holanda
Foundation; Roberto Marinho Foundation; Rui Barbosa Foundation;
Electronic Power Plants Center; IBM; International Newcomers Club; Knoll;
Rabo de Saia; Riotur; Santista Foods, Inc.; State Secretariat of Health/RJ;
Municipal Secretariat of Housing/RJ; Municipal Secretariat of the
Environment/Parks and Gardens Foundation-RJ; Municipal Secretariat of
Health/RJ; Municipal Secretariat of Labor/RJ; National Department of the
Social Service for Commerce – SESC; Social Service for Industry/RJ –
SESI; Shering; United States Agency for International Development –
USAID, and Wella.
Campaigns: Akxe Academy; Adonis; Barcas Inc.; Barrashopping;
CET-RIO; Committee for Public Companies – COEP; Company; National
Council for the Municipal Secretariats of Health – CONASEMS; Federal
Post Office of Brazil; Lance Diary; Petros Foundation; Gazeta Mercantil;
Ipiranga Group; Copacabana Palace Hotel; Rio Atlantica Hotel; Ayrton
Senna Institute; Jornal A Colina, Jornal A Raiz, Jornal A Semente, Jornal A
Trombeta, Jornal Extra, Jornal do Brasil , Jornal do Comércio; Jornal dos
Sports, Jornal Novas do Centro de Juventude Cristã; Jornal O Dia; Jornal
O Fluminense; Jornal O Globo; Jornal O Povo do Rio; Jornal O Restaurador;
Jornal O Semeador; Jornal Tribuna da Imprensa; K&V Promotions; Levi’s;
Lumiere; Marcelo Arar Productions and Events; Maxim’s Mills; Modamania;
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Playhouse Events; Rádio Alvorada; Rádio Antena Um; Rádio Assembléia
de Deus; Rádio Boas Novas; Rádio Catedral; Rádio Cidade; Rádio Clube
de Queimados; Rádio Difusora de Duque de Caxias; Rádio El-Shadai; Rádio
Escola Bíblica do Ar; Rádio Guanabara; Rádio JB FM; Rádio Mauá
Solimões; Rádio MEC; Rádio Melodia; Rádio Metropolitana; Rádio Nacional;
Rádio O Dia FM; Rádio Record; Rádio Relógio Federal; Rádio Tropical;
Rádio Tupi; Rádio Universal Copacabana; Rádio Universal Ipanema; Rádio
Autêntica FM; Rádio Ação FM; Rádio Bicuda FM; Rádio Comunitaria
Itaboraí; Rádio Estação Primeira; Rádio Estilo Livre; Rádio Maré; Rádio
Panorâmica FM; Rádio Rio News; Rádio Rocinha; Rádio Santa Cruz FM;
Rádio Transduque; Rádio Transpilares; Itaipava Gas Station Network; Globo
Television Network; TV! Network; State Secretariat of Education/RJ (entire
state education network, 786 schools); State Secretariat of Public Security/
RJ; National Service of Commercial Training - SENAC; National Service
of Industrial Education – SENAI, and Social Service for Industry/RJ –
SESI; SBT-RJ; Shell of Brazil; Rio Sul Shopping Center; Globo Radio
System; Brazilian Television System; Taco; Top Films; Union of Municipal
Directors of Education – UNDIME; UNESCO; UNICEF; Band TV; CNT
TV; TVE; Futura TV; and Record TV.
Volunteer Programs: BP Lunch; British Council; Swiss Consulate;
British Embassy; Menonite Church; Ministry of the Family, Senior
Citizens and Youths of the German Government; United States of
America National Safety Council - NSC/USA; Globo Television Network,
and Volkswagen Brazil.
17) The Place of Evaluation and Research in the Experience
All of the work developed is documented. The reports produced by
the teachers serve as aids in meetings and pedagogical evaluations that are
established on a two-week basis.
In addition to the meetings, the program must turn in an evaluation
report for performance of the students in the course when turning in the
financial reports.
18) Specific Problems in the Experience
· One of the major problems of the project is establishing regular
resources to maintain service to the communities. This has generated
interest in increasing the number of sponsors as a strategy.
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There are institutions that can’t manage. You see that out there the
one who is keeping the work going is the teacher, and the teacher is
the one that goes after the student, that sets up the classroom. The
teacher is the one who’s going to get that student when that student is
sick. When the student has a problem, the teacher is the one who takes
the homework to the student’s house. Well, that’s it. Now, of course,
what are you going to do? You try to look for another local institution,
to move the room to if you can. If that’s not possible, if it just doesn’t
exist, then we’re not going to be able to open up the next one, because
we’re not opening up 2,000 classrooms, we’re opening up 100. If we
opened up 2,000, ok, we could work with everyone, with all the
problems that crop up. But, if you work with 100, you can just look
around in these communities, and anticipate 50 students. And there
aren’t more than that because there aren’t enough chairs. Because
you get into the classroom, like we did in the West Zone, and there are
kids sitting in the window. ‘I study here. I need to study, I need to finish
first grade.’ That’s it, so there are these situations that we end up
getting into and you just start giving priority to the spaces that give
something back. The South Zone is really difficult. We can’t do anything
in the South Zone, but in the West Zone, Baixada Fluminense, those
are classrooms with 50 students and well, 40 is too few. Of course a lot
of them want to study but they don’t want to take a test, they don’t
want to stay at home, they don’t like... it’s like this, they don’t want to
watch the soap operas, they like to, well, they’re people of a certain
age, and they’re going to go there and study and when it’s time to take
a test they don’t want to take the test. (Interview with pedagogical
coordination, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· According to the testimonies of the project teachers and supervisors,
lately the number of adolescents that seek out the telessalas has
been growing. This is preoccupying in so far as many times the
adolescents have been trading conventional school for the project,
with the intention of graduating sooner.
In terms of the public that you’re talking about, I think what’s
happening is really bad. Even though most of them are young, the
teenagers are coming more. I don’t agree with this. I don’t think that
the teenager is there in that classroom because of Telecurso, but
because Telecurso only takes nine months. I think that teenager isn’t
going to finish basic education in a traditional school. Sometimes,
man, you stopped, you go back. This kid is 16 years old. They can still
finish. Teacher, I can’t do it. I can’t stand it anymore. So you’ve always
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got this problem and the type of person we deal with here who’s living
through this, there’s just no way. (Focus group with teachers, Viva Rio,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· The majority of the tests are paid for by the students and, many
times, the student doesn’t have the resources. Another difficulty is
that the teacher frequently has to adapt to the daily rhythm of the
students, due to work.
No, and we work it out too, we have a solution for some of these
problems. Like, for example, it’s time to register for the test and the
deadline is the twelfth and the student only gets paid on the thirteenth
and if the student has to pay on the twelfth he doesn’t have time, and
he gets all desperate, so the teacher, to make a direct connection here,
so, he’s going to tell the supervisor first and then they say call this
supervisor, call Maria, call Joe, call this other guy and see what they
can do. (Focus group with supervisors, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
I think that what characterizes the project is the flexibility that we
utilize, because I think around 90% of the students work. Because there’s
an accessible place with a classroom where they can go back and
study, finish basic education, improve their self-esteem, their work, and
even redeem their citizenship, many times they get to the forum at seven
thirty. They’re going straight from work to school and there’s no reason
to get there late and they really feel at ease. There’s this willingness to
go back to study, but if there’s someone who is on the strict side, and
there’s a huge lack of people, so there aren’t any empty places and it
ends up being completely on time, but that doesn’t really happen often
in the project. It can be pouring rain and we’re right there inside.
(Focus group with teachers, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
n spite of the fact that the project counts on volunteer support, there
are still difficulties in increasing this number of people in the community.
In many cases this is due to the intense pace of their lives.
I would love to have all this time and money so I wouldn’t have to
work, so I could just do the project here for the others, to help
work with one or another, to help in one thing or another. It’s just
that I have my schedule. I have to work at a certain time to be
able to earn my survival. (Focus group with community, Viva Rio,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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· There is a disparity in the accompaniment of some students. Some
experience more difficulty in keeping up with the project and they
complain about the supplies. Some teachers state that coming to the
project with no satisfactory school foundation becomes a big problem
in the development of the projects. The project has an extremely
specific dynamic in each theme and this is worked with on a daily
basis and is not extended over several days.
I think that the problem comes up in Math just because it’s really
complicated, in addition to being dynamic. You give that equation
from first grade today, and from second grade the next day. So I think,
and I really experience this conflict, because you know, you have the
capacity as a teacher, you can help that student do what they need to
understand it. At the same time, though, you’re really cheering them
on, and then they get stuck further down the line. I can see it when
they have their doubts. It’s not the student’s fault. (Interview with
teachers, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
But let’s think about this. Let’s take one of these children and put them
way out in the middle of this country, where there’s not a better qualified
guidance counselor. So they’re going to have to hold on, because the
supplies aren’t 100%. If the books were better, it might make a difference
for that person who’s way out in the middle of nowhere. If the information,
if the material were more up to date, if it were improved, it would be better.
For those of us who are here, even for you, you’re all complete, you’re
done, you can relax. You’re going to get out there and do what you want.
It’s just that, for people who aren’t, for people who come with that stuff
from out there, the teacher from the middle of the country who’s going to
deal with senior citizens, with adolescents who study there, he’s going to
have to pass on that material and it gets sort of complicated. (Focus
group with community, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
20) Why is it an innovative experience?
· In a general way, the environment of the telessalas is considered to
be pleasant and familial. This collaborates towards a satisfactory
working atmosphere. Even the mothers, who had difficulty in
participating in the classes because of their children, have more
flexibility and tranquility about their studies.
· According to the questionnaire, the approval rates for the subject
have been very high over the last few years. The best performance
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occurs in Science and Geography (above 90% approval rates), and
the worst is in Mathematics (around 58%). The project, according to
a survey taken, has also had an enormous effect on getting jobs
(around 30%, when compared with the youths that do not attend the
course). The project has also had a huge effect on the life of the
community due to encouraging participation. According to statements,
around 45 to 50 thousand people have gone through the Telessalas.
The huge advantage is that the activities are held in the communities
themselves. In addition to valorizing the community organization, this
also facilitates access to the beneficiaries, reducing costs and the
eventual “shocks” of family obligations.
The History module is going to be put in at the beginning, because
that’s when the students begin to realize that they’re part of this whole
process, and how important that process is. I would just like to say
that Telessala ends up being really important for them, that it turns
into this point of reference in the community. I say this because I’m
there, counting the two projects together it’s the fifth class and the old
students who finish, when I’m teaching I see their heads at the door
waiting so they can participate in that. They start talking about what’s
happening inside and they end up sitting in the classroom. They’re all
mixed up and it’s this constant presence, the ex-students. Tthe ones
who don’t know each other end up getting to know each other out
there. They have this as a point of return. It gives them something
back. What I want to say is that you can see how they miss it. They
finish the course and they start to miss the movement they had in here.
(Focus group with teachers, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
When you talk about the space question in the Telessalas in the
community, look, in all the communities, in every community there’s
the issue of drug dealing, there’s the violence issue, there’s the funk
dance issue, that may not be in your neighborhood, but it may be in
the next one, so like, every community has this reality. Telessala is this
different space there, it’s this different thing in the community. You
come up against something that you don’t agree with, or you disagree
with the question, let’s say, and it’s normal. You get into Telessala and
it’s just not true. When you get into Telessala at least, there’s this
guarantee of that space and that kid is going to be taken in and
people are worried about that kid’s future. That’s us, in this case. So I
think that this space is what gives value to that student. (Focus group
with teachers, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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· Initially the project counted only on public resources. Now it has
been receiving significant support from private resources. Considering
its elevated cost for the beneficiaries, the project is only able to sustain
itself with this kind of support. This includes, for example, the use of
public school buildings and the support of a wide variety of
professionals, such as anthropologists and statistical groups, etc.
21) Effects of the Experience and Changes in the Lives of the Youths
· The students that participate in the project become more secure of
themselves and they also acquire a larger view of social questions
that they are included in. This increases their participation in their
community and in its leadership. Many of the students enter with the
intention of just finishing basic education. As they attend the project,
they begin to dream about finishing secondary school and getting into
a university.
We can get into the world because Telecurso took care of this thing
here. The project changed the landscape in Rio de Janeiro, because
all of the students have more citizenship. They think it’s really nice to
get into the classroom. The teacher is encouraged to show them what
they’re capable of, not to stop. If you’re inside the classroom, you’re
already making a contribution to society. They’re always asking me.
Why should I be a citizen? Well, you’re already a citizen. Aren’t you
studying? Aren’t you passing on what you’ve learned? And then they
start to get this group going to class and all of a sudden I’ve got one,
two, or four, or a group, that group, that sometimes was looked on as
marginal by society. I’ve worked on this project since Viva Rio was
inaugurated, so really, this project is a success. It can’t ever end because
the kid really places his trust in this project. He believes in it. He talks
about the difference in the classroom too. He talks about the difference.
I never liked going to class, but now the teacher makes us laugh and
is more of an ally. So, school is going to show him his rights. (Focus
group with community, Viva Rio, Rio de JaneiroRJ)
· For the teachers, real growth in communication occurred among the
teachers themselves, the institutions, and the communities. The
teachers think that the agents are more open for other lifestyles now.
They think that they are much more interactive in terms of political
issues. They are clear on the fact that the activities are still in their
initial stage, but that the projects have a very important profile in the
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growth of the project. One example would be the situation of some
of the youths that are unable to adapt to other situations. Telecurso
turned them into better students.
This kid took the big entrance exam for Technical School and he got
a 9 in Geography, an 8 in Math. This was the big entrance exam. So
they asked him what high school he came from and he said ‘I didn’t
come from any high school, I came from Telecurso, in nine months.’
And you got these grades? He said ‘It didn’t work out in high school
because I wasn’t interested. I spent ten years in school and I didn’t get
interested in anything. In Telecurso, at least, I was interested in
everything. Math, Portuguese, History, and Science. They’re the basics
and it really gives you continuity later, what they’re doing.’ (Focus
group with community, Viva Rio, Rio de JaneiroRJ)
I see how much they grow, because they get here saying ‘Yeah, I came
here to finish basic education because I have to. My boss is making me
study.’ Then afterwards, I said, no, you have to keep on going, go ahead
with your studies. Today, I see that some of them are already thinking
about high school. Others are thinking about going to university and
when other projects appear that provide job opportunities for them, a
lot of them get into Telecurso, do it, and pass it on to the community as
a health worker, and this really gives me a lot of satisfaction. (Focus
group with teachers, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· The classrooms are composed of students of different ages and
conduct (example, adolescents that are obeying assisted liberty
measures). This allows for affectionate relationships among the
students.
Assisted liberty and the specialists’ reports have been really
complementary and we really feel this. These kids that are in the
program really make a big leap. They put that a lot: ‘there’s no way to
get into school because you’re already marked as this criminal in the
community.’ In one of our classrooms, in the program, this kid gets in
here, and there’s this classroom with one person who’s about thirty
years old, and there’s this man or woman who’s sixty? This relationship
is really affectionate. You get the teachers’ reports and it’s like a
birthday party every month, the birthday party of the month. It’s buying
something for that girl that just had a baby, a grandchild... So, you’ve
got this in this classroom. What I mean to say is that it’s this space for
affectionate relationships and we notice that these kids get into the
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program and they have this significant response, especially these kids.
(Interview with coordination, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
· According to one testimony, the project has also brought about changes
in the lives of the teachers.
This is something that I can’t just throw away, you got it? I think I
really discovered who I am in the PAE project. I worked at a
Petrobras contractor before working at PAE. I worked at Cofape
too and I just couldn’t stand working in an office anymore in front
of the computer. You get there at eight in the morning and you
leave at five in the afternoon, doing the same thing Monday through
Friday. It got really tedious for me. I couldn’t stand it any more. So
I said to myself, my God, I need something new, fast. Today I’m
already in fifth period History and it’s cool. I’m in Gama Filho, and
God willing next year I’m going to finish my paper in my History
course, you know? I think that I don’t have much to say about the
project. Of course the project has its imperfections, like any
educational project, but I think that the battle goes on, to use the
old phrase, you know? I think all I can really say is thanks. (Focus
group with teachers, Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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5
Vocabulary of Meanings
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5.1 Clarifications
The construction of a specific strategic vocabulary can be identified
through the analysis of printed documents, videos, Internet sites, and the
testimonies of project motivators, educators, and youths that participated in
the experiences researched here. This vocabulary intends to support the
practice of ethic-aesthetic foundations. This set of key words that have
gained a differentiated meaning based on their diversity will be highlighted
with the name vocabulary of meanings.
Many intentions guided the strategy of organizing what is presented
here as a vocabulary of meanings. The first concern was to escape
generalities and capture meanings given to some recurring words that
appear in the interviewed individuals’ statements. This was done to clarify
the ways that they overlap and how they express diversity. The separation
or focus of some of the terms or vocabulary should not suggest that they
have been departmentalized. This is true as well in the composition of
small terms or a possible emphasis on certain themes. It is also necessary
to call attention to the fact that a free compilation occurred by putting
together the speeches of various participants and agencies, based on focus
groups and interviews. This might create the impression of a coherent
union, or a harmony of outlooks and values. On the contrary, the recurrence
of the same vocabulary does not necessarily indicate shared understanding
or shared use for all the experiences. Therefore, the study did seek to
represent diversity.
Another intention was to capture what was most mobilizing and which
meanings guided the people – youths, educators, and others – to act in this
field of work. This occurred in a way that broke the simplistic notion that the
poor need only bread, jobs, formal education, health services, and professional
training courses.
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There was not only a search for a thematic analysis, but for the
identification as well of the most recurring pieces of language in reference
to the youths, their problems, and their ways of dealing with violences. In
operational terms, the first intention was to respond to the research questions
such as: what values characterize these projects that deal with youths? To
what extent does their symbolic universe deal with violences and with sharing
values? The idea is to highlight the meanings given to terms and practices by
those interviewed. These meanings are constructions that are part of their
experiences, expressions of their values and their visions of the world.
Thus, a vocabulary composed of terms was organized. This vocabulary
fulfilled its subsequent meaning, which would be “a set of words in one
language”, or “a set of specialized words in any field of knowledge or activity,
nomenclature, terminology” (in Portuguese dictionary Aurelio to the word
vocabulary). Priority was given to meanings, that is, meanings that would be
transmitted to and by the youths and the connotations would be given to a
series of terms that – because they were repeated so much – had become
empty or ambiguous. This was based on the hypothesis that in order to
cultivate lives there has to be insistence on giving meanings to past experience
and taking care the meanings of the words are not lost.
The majority of the terms in this vocabulary are shared among distinct
projects. The subjects of the terms that are highlighted here as the speeches
about the ways the activities are thought of are also terms that are common
in contemporary literature about youths. For example, youth protagonism is
a frequently cited term as well as self-esteem, rights, identity, and citizenship19.
These terms may be dealt with individually, with different references and
distinct experiences being shaped as knowledge in use.
This vocabulary makes up a warehouse of principles that is highlighted
for best characterizing the units of analysis as much as their potential for
influencing behavior, dealing with values, educating through play, art,
interaction, listening, participating in dialogue, and creating in conjunction
with the youths. In many cases the vocabulary is supported by accumulated
knowledge, specialized in a wide variety of areas.
It is important to note that in the selection and layout of this vocabulary
and these small terms, they became more than just isolated references.
Each term or concept becomes intertwined with the others. In this way, for
example, protagonism relates to self-esteem. This in turn relates to respect,
19
See among others GROPPO, 2000; ABRAMO, FREITAS, and SPOSITO, 2000; ZALUAR,
1994, and NOVAES, 1997.
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sensitivity, and changeability, to the place of the other, and to rights and
social responsibility. In addition, cultural and social subjects infiltrate the
debate on art education.
5.2 Vocabulary
5.2.1 Youth Protagonism
It’s common to place emphasis on the youth as the subject of the
activities, observing changes in behavior and degree of satisfaction or interest.
The success of the activities depends on this perspective in many ways.
Youth protagonism allows diversified concerns in this way, especially in
relation to the equation of social relationships such as those that can develop
between generations, youths and educators, and in social spaces.
Youth protagonism is intertwined with a series of other concepts that
are part of a lexicon concerned with qualifying democracy. This provides
these concepts with a meaning that has to do with generations, both in the
sense of being appropriate for a cycle of life, youth, and in the sense of
indicating a moment in history. In this way the youth as a protagonism suggests
self-esteem, a search for belonging, exploration of identity, and affirmation
of citizenship.
The following are some illustrations of how the flexibility of these designs
of the youth as protagonists can be modeled. The following sections further
explore the intertwining of these concepts.
The formation of leadership groups would be one way of stimulating
the youth as protagonists. This is the case of the NGO Cidade Escola
Aprendiz, which invests in the capacity of intervention of the youths in their
communities.
The NGOs Auçuba (Recife), CRIA (Salvador), and Colors of Belém
(Belém), as many others, are concerned with encouraging the relative
independence of the students in the development of the activities of the
projects from the moment they begin to participate. The intention is that the
youths put on shows, collaborate in the artistic training and in the training for
citizenship of other youths and children, and act in other social activities:
We have to provide space for them to put themselves into the space as
youth protagonists, so they can put their ideas out there, so they can
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live these ideas. If this doesn’t happen, they get full of ideas and
frustrated because they don’t have any place to express their ideas.
What they’re learning on a daily basis in the video workshops and in
the production center is close to what they go through in their
communities, because the goal of the center is for the youths to create
a type of little seedlings for community TVs. (Interview with educators,
Auçuba, Recife/PE).
Youth protagonists can also be understood as the managers of their
own lives, as noted in the following quote:
Every year we’re changing, we’re adapting to the new students, and
vice versa. We’re adapting to new times, to maintain the quality of the
work and to make it last. But, beyond the importance of this project
that the youths are doing, we know that their autonomy depends on
the guarantee of survival, being able to pay the rent, pay for clothes,
food, an outing, some leisure. This aspect is important too, because
the guy is going to take on responsibility of his own life right off the
bat. So we fight to contribute to the autonomy of these youths, which
involves having a job and some kind of income. (Interview with
coordination, Nós do Morro, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Youth protagonism, desire, and creativity are dimensions that become
reactivated in many of the projects. For example, in the NGO
Communication and Culture (Fortaleza), the youth is the one that writes,
edits, organizes, and publishes the school newspaper. In this way, the youths’
participation and responsibility are encouraged. The youths are able to
show the result of their work and increase their capacity for expression,
especially in the written language.
In most cases, the youths that attend the workshops and the groups are
encouraged to participate in the process of creation and development of the
developed activities. This allows them to pursue their desire, dream, and
fascination with the show. This requires containing hopes and not contributing
to frustration. This warning is part of the idea of Afro Reggae (Rio de Janeiro).
We have a commitment: This youth protagonism idea has been used
for a long time. And we didn’t even use this name. We mean to turn
them into potential active individuals and we go along putting
everyone on the same level. You have to work with the guy’s dream. If
he dreams of being an artist, you’ve got to work so that he can get
away from this too. Because it’s not this artist factory here, you know.
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The majority of these kids aren’t going to be artists. We do this project
so they can be empowered. (Interview with coordination, Afro Reggae,
Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Youth protagonism can also be constructed for communication that
crosses generations. For example, the Hip Hop Artvistas MDE movement
(Curitiba) is made up of youths that organize themselves, sensitized to the
violence and exclusion that they are exposed to.
Along a similar line, the Curumins Association (Fortaleza) insists on
the motivation of the desire of the youth to leave the street and return to the
family. The youth is seen as the decision maker for his or her own future.
This is a project that also focuses its methodology on the desire and will of
the youths:
If they don’t really have the desire to get off the street and get into
some activity here, we’re not going to be able to get them to stay,
because you can’t do it just by closing the gate. That’s not the way you
can think about getting anything done. (Interview with coordination,
Curumins, Fortaleza/CE)
At EDISCA (Fortaleza), the youths are encouraged to participate in a
variety of decisions in respect to the agency. They are invited to state their
opinions surrounding a variety of themes, from choreography to the way the
furniture is set up in the organization’s headquarters. This makes them feel
privileged, and at the same time responsible for everything that’s going on at
the agency:
They identify with the project. They look at a closet and they think:
‘Hey, I’m the one that painted that closet over there.’ Then in a little
bit they’re going to say ‘I did that.’ ‘I’m the one that drew that.’ ‘I’m
the one that got that game together.’ ‘I’m the one who did the
choreography for my group.’ What I mean to say is that we pass on the
idea that they are capable, so that out there they can build these new
situations that will be favorable to them. (Interview with coordination,
EDISCA, Fortaleza/CE)
The cultural, the social, and youth protagonism are also part of the
speech of Umbu Ganzá (Recife). This agency acts in an area that is
considered to be one of the most violent and poorest in the region. The focus
is on producing social and cultural subjects in order to redeem projects and
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points of references for life based on the potential of the youths, to create
protection against the sea, against the waves of violence that they
experience. This project also bets on these youths to serve as examples,
constructing visions that can be alternatives to the images of the leaders
of violence.
The project emerged from a social experience that incorporated culture
as an element of personal and collective redemption, in addition to motivating
the discovery and construction of a new project of life for the youth:
The youths in a situation of personal and social risk have the need to
connect with the more structured groups in the same community.
Because of their example, because they’re considered leaders, or
because of the recognition for their artistic production, they have the
potential of exercising their effect as youth protagonists and they will
be qualified to be project motivators. (Interview with coordination,
Umbu Ganzá, Recife/PE)
The strategy of having youths teaching other youths and children in
their communities or in the same life situation bestows a feeling of orientation
between generations that is between equals. This occurs with an emphasis
on culture and the reconstruction of ethical values such as solidarity and
social responsibility:
At first our work was with teenagers and youths in situations of personal
and social risk, from the street or tied to the community gangs, through
the means of socio-educational assisted liberty. After that, we felt the
necessity of a breath of fresh air and we worked with teenagers and
youths that had already had some kind of initiation in neighborhood
culture like dance or music groups. The goal was to get these kids to
organize themselves, to exercise their effect as youth protagonists.
That is, for them to become a positive reference point for the first
group. (Interview with coordination, Umbu Ganzá, Recife/PE)
5.2.2 Self-esteem
Both youth protagonism and self-esteem are emphasized as a basic
process for disarming violences, contributing to providing positive meanings
to the youths’ projects for life. This is cultivated through activities in art,
sports, and education for citizenship. Distinct references come into play as
well, as there are many analogous constructions of youth protagonism,
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including the interaction between self-appreciation and gratification for social
recognition.
In some cases the youths of the communities where the projects are
active reveal low self-esteem because of belonging to low-income
communities, having low schooling levels, and experiencing a variety of
discrimination, such as racism.
Self-esteem is part of a long, non-linear process which collaborates for
the encouragement on the part of many projects to prolonged participation
in the activities. Many times gains in self-esteem are only perceived after a
few years of taking part in the experience. There is also the risk of reversal,
depending on the exterior violences experienced.
One of the most notable changes that the youths experience by
participating in the projects is the redemption of self-esteem. This change is
appreciated unanimously among the educators and project motivators, fathers
and mothers, and among the youths themselves. This highlights the fact that
this love for oneself can be contributing to getting away from situations of
risk, like organized crime, violence, and drugs. Meanwhile, the meaning of
loving oneself goes beyond the immediate and the present and becomes
love that is nourished by appreciation of others, in a positive way.
For example, according to the information from the Meninos do Morumbi
Association in São Paulo, the boys and girls who feel themselves to be
inferior in the beginning is deconstructed, so that they feel valued and an
integrated part of the group in a short amount of time.
In the Travessia Foundation in São Paulo, it is emphasized that selfesteem makes up a process of searching to identify, or un-identify imposed
negative symbols. Youths heard from in a focus group describe these changes:
Before I got into the project, I felt like I was just garbage. I felt like an
animal in the middle of the street, because the people made me feel it,
seeing me all dirty. Then some kid would pass by all dressed up and I
would feel even more like garbage. (Focus group with youths, Travessia
Foundation, São Paulo/SP)
Self-esteem, identity, cultural, civil, and social citizenship, and respect
become intertwined in the discussion of the various organizations. This
indicates modulations in social and cultural consciousness.
Self-esteem is this fundamental item. They feel valued in the projects.
They find a space to exercise their artistic potential and to take
advantage of historic cultural spaces in the city too. They learn to go
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to the museum, the theatre, to recognize a monument, to go to a public
square. They begin to have this awareness that these are public spaces,
and they identify them as cultural spaces. It’s knowing that it’s a public
and cultural space and that the access to that space is a right, really.
It’s their right. So their heads really start to change. They change in
the way they utilize their rights to cultural benefits in the city. (Interview
with coordination, Colors of Belém, Belém/PA)
Art transforms these teenagers. It helps them see the world in a different
way. These teenagers get here in the beginning of the semester with
this attitude that’s completely different. They’re aggressive, angry, they
just want to do what they want to do. As time goes by, they start changing
with the work, when they start to get involved, to create something,
something that’s admired by other people, or something that can be
useful in their lives. They start to get interested in the possibility of
becoming artists. When they get older they could be a big singer,
actor, artist or do capoeira. (Focus group with educators, Cidade Mãe
Foundation)
For many of them the self-esteem that comes from the projects provides
a vision of the future and goes against the wave of disenchantment and
‘eternal present’ (Jameson, 1993). For example, one of the main effects of
Auçuba in the lives of the youths is that it influences the youths’ expectations
in relation to the future. This occurs through criticisms of structural economic
barriers inherent to economy with an optimistic vision of the profession they
are learning. They demonstrate dedication in managing to exercise a
profession.
They start to really believe in themselves, and they start to have other
ambitions. They’ve already come up and asked me to have film classes.
(Interview with educators, Auçuba, Recife/PE)
The following statement suggests that self-esteem is better redeemed
when material conditions in life provide support for positive changes.
This means when there are opportunities to develop the potential of the
human being:
What changed was that before, I was disrespected. Today I know how
to give respect and how to receive respect. A lot of opportunities have
come up for me after the Center. There have been courses. I got more
interested in going to school. A job came up. I’ve got more friends. I
could show that I was on that road because I was getting brought into
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it. I showed that I could change and I changed. (Focus group with
youths, Cabo Women’s Center/PE)
In Afro Reggae, coordinators and teachers that work with the boys
and girls (the majority are Afro-Brazilian) make them realize how much
they are subjects of their rights, desires, and knowledge. Self-esteem is
related to hope for the future, for a profession, and to a belief in themselves
in spite of concrete difficulties:
I didn’t used to have any goals at all. ‘Oh, you’re going to go to
elementary school, high school.’ Fine, just to say I studied. But not
now. That’s why I’m saying that working in Afro Reggae got to my selfesteem. Today I want to go to college, you understand? I wanted to be
a lawyer, but now I don’t want to be a lawyer anymore. I want to be
something else but my goal is to go to college, you got it? I know that
the barriers are really big, you understand? To finish school today.
That’s really difficult. (Focus group with youths, Afro Reggae, Rio de
Janeiro/RJ)
Self-esteem is an ambiguous concept, as is the concept of the youth
protagonism. Both may be put into action by cultures of violence as well.
This occurs when the fear of certain behavior translates into admiration and
respect without any respect for the other person. In the vocabulary of the
analyzed experiences, the youths learn different, better references for
discussing meanings in the high-pitched battle between self-esteem for values
for a culture of life and peace and values for a culture of death and violence.
This is suggested in the statement of one youth:
I think that I changed. Before, all I thought about was using drugs. I
didn’t want to do anything. The day I got things, not everything that I
want, but everything I always wanted to be, like part of a rap group,
was the day I saw that I just couldn’t go on the way I was. I think if I
was in the street still using crack I wouldn’t have this chance to be a
singer one day. A chance to be a success one day and a lot of other
cool things like studying in school, going on trips, having fun. (Focus
group with youths, Travessia Foundation, São Paulo/SP)
The concept of self-esteem allied with art, especially with aesthetics,
can be worked on not only in individualized processes with each youth. It
can be worked on in a collective action as well. These lines can be part of a
journey that creates connections between the individual and the collective.
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This occurs when one thing happens as a result of another. The individual
produces, but self-esteem is the result of collective recognition for artisticcultural production or from the pleasure of being someone who knows the
subject, a consumer of art and culture.
In the Cabo Women’s Center (PE), one of the paths of the project is to
insist on sociability, on belonging to the community, in order for the youths to
be respected and make their rights useful for something. This occurs
especially in arguing for the defense of these rights. In order to accomplish
this, they must know their rights. For example, in the gender area, they need
to have information on safe sex and sexuality. In the youth identity area,
they need to know the victories brought about by the Statute of the Child
and Adolescent.
Self-esteem cannot be separated from identity and otherness. On the
one hand, an investment is made in individual rights and the defense of
collective rights, and this reveals concern for others. On the other hand,
self-esteem also encompasses an interactive dimension that requires esteem
from others, that is, being respected and socially valued. In the case of the
girls that participate in the Center, it also means not being identified with as
“marginals” any longer.
The change was that I started being respected by people. When I wasn’t
in the Center project I was called prostitute, pot head. I even got
called whore because they said I ran away from home to go to the red
light district. When people knew I was participating in the group at
the Center they started to respect me. (Focus group with youths, Cabo
Women’s Center/PE)
When I lived in the street, the life I lived, when anyone came around
and asked if I wanted to work and I said I wanted to, someone else
came around and said that that person shouldn’t put me to work
because I was a pot head and I ran around with a thief and if they put
me to work in their home when they left their home I was going to get
my friends to come in and rob them. They said that I was a whore and
that I slept with other people’s husbands, and today I’m showing them
that I’m not what they said. (Focus group with youths, Cabo Women’s
Center/PE)
The artistic cultural activities, through the groups that put on shows,
contribute to self-esteem by allowing the youths to reveal their talents and
work to society.
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I have watched the girls putting on makeup, learning to like themselves
more, giving themselves more value. I managed to see this after the first
dance presentation in public. They really got involved. They were afraid
during rehearsals. It was their first big challenge. Now they go around
asking, when’s the next one? Everyone got all excited, it really got their
self-esteem way up there. They’re showing what they learned and at the
same time, they’re erasing the stories from their past. (Focus group with
educators, Mulheres do Cabo Center/PE)
At EDISCA, self-esteem is used as a tool in the project, in that the
youths are recognized and valued socially. This position can be demonstrated
in the following testimony:
They love to travel. They love to have this success, be in the newspapers.
They love giving interviews, being on television. Next Sunday they’re
going to be on the TV show Planeta Xuxa. Can you imagine what it’s
like having a slum kid be one of the main actors on Planeta Xuxa?
This in terms of their psychology is this fabulous thing. Imagine! That’s
it! Being in the theatre, traveling to São Paulo, being on the cover of
the newspaper in São Paulo. What could be better? Ariano Suassuna
crying at their show. It was on the front page of the newspaper. These
are all moments that are going to be with them for the rest of their
lives. If someone experiences this moment of glory, they’re not going
to want just anything after that. They’re always going to go for the
moment of glory. They get to know what it’s like to be able to be a
success, to be happy, to be recognized. When a child or a teenager
shows that they think of themselves as capable, of getting recognition,
they’re never going to go back to something that’s not good. (Interview
with coordination, EDISCA, Fortaleza/CE)
In the Mulher Vida Collective, self-esteem turns into a quality or a way
of getting centered. This occurs through emphasis on solidarity in terms of
feeling part of a collective and being supported by it. Solidarity among the
women is a highlight, as are respect for differences and ways of going after
things. In the case of teenage women, this means the ability to denounce
violences like rape and being able to criticize traditional repressive conditions
that are part of social interaction in the family universe.
The way the information is passed on is important. You don’t say ‘do
this’ or ‘do that.’ You show her the different paths and you think it out
with her, analyze the path to take and we’re going to look at the
consequences too. One example is making an accusation [in the case
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of sexual harassment or rape in the family]. This is one example, and
we really feel that we can do it when the group says ‘we’re all with
you, I’m with you wherever you want to go’ (Focus group with youths,
Mulher Vida Collective, Recife/PE).
Feelings of respect, self-esteem, and acceptance result in getting to
know their bodies better:
I learned to love myself more. Not that I didn’t love myself before,
but I love myself even more now. I learned to get to know my own
body. I learned about a lot of subjects. It’s information so you get to
know yourself better. (Focus group with youths, Mulher Vida
Collective, Recife/PE)
For them to get up on stage and have an audience watching, there’s
got to be this person, this artist, that’s got to be really comfortable
with their own body. They’ve got to like themselves, to like their image.
So these situations where they appear in public require all this previous
work to make them feel comfortable, to like themselves. That’s the first
step. Any work is going to go through redemption of their self-esteem
and art really helps a lot. But you have to have discipline and mainly
know your limits. (Interview with coordination, Arts and Crafts School,
Salvador/BA)
5.2.3 Belonging
The feeling of ‘belonging’ is a concept that is valorized in the cognitive
universe of the agencies. It qualifies the debate on youth protagonism. The
idea is to encourage the youths to re-shape their references and values and
to identify themselves with the practices, principles, and products of the
projects, placing themselves as a part of the projects. The idea is to encourage
them to see these references and values in the context of a specific time
and to see themselves as part of a community with social responsibilities.
One of the coordinators of the Cidade Aprendiz School states:
The kids feel like they’re participating, acting, deciding together.
And the art, this working method, is really inviting. It allows for
a lot of things, a lot of ways of expression and each one has their
own way. (Interview with coordination, Cidade Aprendiz School,
São Paulo/SP)
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Belonging is an essential concept of the Meninos do Morumbi project
as well. Based on developing these projects, the youths begin to feel part of
a group, committed to art, music, the community, and mainly, to the problems
related to society.
Belonging to a group they identify with, that they feel loyal to, adds to
their identity. For example, they start becoming known as ‘José da Silva’, a
Morumbi kid. They get to know people in the group. They’re recognized
and have freedom to go around and this going around has a special meaning,
opening up relationships, making the youths feel more competent:
Today they’re friends. They’re boyfriends and girlfriends. They go from
community to community. You don’t have these territorial frontiers
anymore. That’s because of the project, because of this getting closer,
this link that they build here. This sense of belonging to the project
establishes a link that opens up new possibilities even if it’s just that
they start noticing that they’re doing something they like, doing
something where they can be seen as competent and discover this
ability. A lot of times it’s the first experience they have with competence
in their lives. And if they start to own this competence, the big challenge
is that they can widen this competence in their lives, in school, in their
families, in life. (Interview with coordination, Meninos do Morumbi
Association, São Paulo/SP)
In the process of building the sense of belonging, one important element
in getting the project going is attracting the youths. For example, because
the Curumins Association in Fortaleza deals with children and adolescents
in a street situation, high turnover is quite common. This occurs because
these youths have difficulty fitting into any type of activity that demands
discipline or following rules. In this way, all of the project’s work is performed
based on the notion that the educators need to “win the youth over.” It’s
necessary to gain their trust and maintain their interest in the project because
if the contrary occurs, the youth will go back to their previous situation.
One of the principal tools for “attracting the youths” is the activities
that allow for educational play, art, sports, and leisure. In the following
statement, the educators describe the process of winning over the youths:
To attract the kids in the street, we have cultural workshops, capoeira,
and in some cases steel drum bands. It’s mainly capoeira and street
theatre that attract them. We take a big screen out into the street and
we’ve got some cameras filming and we start doing a project for
example, about family violence. We start talking with the kid, with the
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teen, and they think it’s really interesting. ‘Look, I’m on TV.’ And they
start running, to get closer, and they start talking to us, they want to
be interviewed, they want to interview, they want to do some sort of
work. (Focus group with staff members/project motivators, Curumins
Association, Fortaleza/CE)
Belonging is also put into action in order to deal with social exclusion,
rejection by the family, and not feeling comfortable in other spaces:
You know that thing of a person who doesn’t belong to a time, or an
environment. That’s how these kids from the poor neighborhoods
feel. Their parents too. They don’t own anything, but that thing
there is theirs. For example, the Municipal Theatre in Rio de
Janeiro or Maracanã Football Stadium, or Flamengo Park [area
of leisure in Rio de Janeiro city]. They’re ours. Those are public
things and I’m the public. But the person is so excluded that these
public things start being for those that have, for those who can
afford a ticket. We’re changing their minds so these things will be
questioned on a daily basis. (Interview with partners, Olímpico
Project, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
5.2.4 Identity
There is a return to the relation between the previously mentioned
concepts and a discussion of identity. For example, in the Meninos do Morumbi
Association, it’s commonly recognized that in order for the project to reach
its primary objective, it is essential for the youths to create an identity within
the proposal. They must identify themselves with the tools that are utilized
and with the activities as a whole.
Music is the determining element in the project for the construction of
a social and individual identity. Music establishes meaning for the work that
is developed in the project and it is through music that other spaces can be
abandoned. These other spaces include consumption or violence and music
is the means that allows for social inclusion.
5.2.5 Identity Consciousness – Race
In the activities of the Creative School of Olodum in Salvador, a concern
for the construction of an identity stands out:
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We just bring everything in about black history so they can valorize
themselves, develop self-esteem, because the system takes it on itself
to not show the importance of blacks, the contribution of blacks in
the construction of Brazil. You don’t see blacks on TV. You don’t see
blacks with the best houses or the best cars. So our concern here is
to show them that they can become autonomous citizens and
construct their own Afro-Brazilian identity and that they can be
recognized for this. (Interview with coordination, Creative School
of Olodum, Salvador/BA)
In Olodum, the discussion of racial identity is tied to national identity
and goes through a process of redeeming history, from the journey of the
Northeastern people to the story of the life of Zumbi, a historical AfroBrazilian hero.
When you tell stories about the journey of a people, of how a society
was formed, there’s room for denouncing what is considered wrong
through art and it’s not that pamphlet theory. It’s a history that is the
history of the youths in the project, of their people. In this age group
from 16 to 21 years old, they are in a process of shaping themselves as
individuals and of shaping their vision of the world. Through the type
of art that we’re offering, with content, we can make their futures
transforming for society. (Focus group with educators, Creative School
of Olodum, Salvador/BA)
Art, artistic education collaborates in the questioning of music that
they hear in the street [a reference is made to a popular song ‘A slap
on the face doesn’t hurt’]. Music that is a reflection of what people are
thinking, but is it what we want to reproduce? Is this the message we
want to convey with our art or do we want a different message? So, to
make art in a way that intends to become part of a revolutionary
process. These are people that are going to be concerned about the
country. (Focus group with educators, Creative School of Olodum,
Salvador/BA)
The question of ethnic conscience is also a central principal of the
NGO Descobrindo o Saber in São Luiz, whose reflection on the relationship
between the social and the cultural is the following:
A lot of people are black, but they don’t put on their file card that
they’re black. They say brown, or light brown. We talk about this
issue with the youths. We talk about racism and the importance of
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loving yourself the way you are, your color, your hair. When the project
was conceived, I thought about these people that are out there: these
kids that are thrown out on the streets. So it was this social concern
and when the children and the teenagers came here, they had to learn
all about this question of culture, of talking about ethics, citizenship,
dignity, everything. So the project was born out of a social question
and it incorporates culture. (Interview with coordination, Descobrindo
o Saber, São Luis/MA)
5.2.6 Citizenship
In the reports on the experiences, the principle of citizenship is restricted
to a broader contemporary reflection, synthesized in the expression of
Hannah Arendt, “the right to have rights” (Arendt, 1954). It also has empirical
varied models, as in right to information, access to cultural benefits,
accumulated wealth, and to expression and developing talents.
In the case of the youths, the reference point is commonly an open
search process, a search in which youth citizenship is not recognized as a
field, which, despite spilling over different dimensions in life, has its own
specificity. Youth citizenship refers to that which is inherent to a specific
generation (in a time and an age cycle). Full citizenship is seen as something
hypothetical. Anyhow, that the youths should fight for the development of
citizenship is defended. Meanwhile, the Projects are concerned with the
next or more immediate questions like survival and its variety of adaptations,
especially in reference to an effort to seek the exercise of citizenship, joining
the social, the civil, the political, and the cultural.
The search for citizenship is important. If they can see themselves as
citizens that have rights, that know they can have an opinion about
things and that they have the strength for this. They can spend their
whole life not doing what they like to do, or not searching for anything,
or not going after an ideal because they didn’t have anyone to say
“look, do it, you can do it, everyone has the capacity to do it.” (Focus
group with educators, Nós do Morro, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
According to the pedagogical coordinator of Afro Reggae, the project
has to worry about the youths’ development of citizenship, taking into
consideration collective references and going from there to the material
quality of the social conditions of existence. The coordinator recognizes,
however, that this perspective of citizenship starts a complex process and
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many times just affirms a specific citizenship – like race – while denying
others. At times this occurs without respect for changeability and leaves
sensitivity for constructing social relations among sexes or gender questions
to the side. To cite some examples:
What kind of citizenship is Afro Reggae talking about? What place do
we start talking about citizenship from, so we don’t run the risk of
offering this future citizen a fantasy universe? The citizen that we
want doesn’t get involved in conflicts. And lives with situations of
conflict that we really don’t want to have inside the project. For
example, a kid who is involved in a violent relationship with his
girlfriend. This is almost inconceivable, unimaginable after this guy
has spent almost seven years in a project like this. This idea of
citizenship is still a really far off idea. I see the day- to- day life that
comes to us here, that people don’t see themselves as citizens. They
can’t make demands, fight, innovate. They’re still really tied to that
‘come and give it to me,’ ‘come on, I’m over here,’ ‘come on over, I’m
waiting,’ position, and not the ‘I’m with you,’ ‘I want to do this
together’ position. (Interview with pedagogical coordination, Afro
Reggae, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Solidarity is another line that is put into action when there are reflections
on citizenship, as suggested in the following testimony:
We try to show them that there are a lot of people in a worse situation.
Let’s get some food together to help. What I mean to say is that I talk to
them about what other people’s situation is like. Let’s go to a nursing
home one day and we go and help. What I mean is that we show that
there are a lot of people who are a lot worse off than they are and that
we can give something to somebody. (Focus group with community,
Viva Rio, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
As previously mentioned, civil citizenship is normally put into action
through studying and debate of the Statute of the Child and the Adolescent
[a legal instrument created by the Brazilian Government with the collaboration
of civil society organizations to defend children and adolescents’ rights].
A wide variety of organizations move away from the perspective of
citizenship through legal rights or rights that are socially distributed by the
State and bet on shaping a critical mass, implicitly defending that civil
citizenship and political citizenship nourish each other in terms of
announcements and criticism of the State. In other terms, the idea is that
participation through political action is a kind of citizenship.
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The people need to know, they have to see themselves a little in
Zumbi[an Afro-Brazilian hero], in what Zumbi did. To know that there
were Indians and blacks on the island and that there were whites who
were involved too, fighting in favor of citizenship, a citizenship that
was almost independent. Because it’s difficult for us to be independent
these days, because everything revolves around politics! Sometimes I
say to the guy: ‘if you don’t like politics, then you can’t complain
about police abuse, you can’t complain about how expensive things
are, because all of this involves politics.’ (Interview with coordination,
Artvistas MDE Hip Hop, Curitiba/PR)
Rights and respect are also essential constructions in projects focused
on education for citizenship, as the educators of the Gol de Letra Foundation
in São Paulo explain. The idea is that each citizen manages to understand
what these concepts mean. Even more, they learn to use them in a specific
social context: ‘These kids don’t know what their rights are, what their
responsibilities are, and that they have to fulfill them as citizens.’
(Interview with educators, Gol de Letra Foundation, São Paulo/SP)
5.3
Fields and Phrases
5.3.1 Culture
The exchange between culture, education, and art is a recurring theme
in the statements related to the experiences.
Culture takes on multiple meanings that contribute to the construction
of a process that comes to be a counteraction to violences, for example: 1)
as a way of being in life – identity for interaction relating individual and
collective identity; 2) as a way to guide the connections between the ethic
and the aesthetic, and 3) as another culture, how to be in a critical position
and how to legally fight for rights:
Culture is a tool that allows women and men to get to know themselves,
to strengthen their individual and collective identities and to learn
through education and play, in addition to building concepts of ethics
and aesthetics. Culture is a pedagogical instrument for collaboration
for the community organization and political organization of the
youths. (Interview with coordination, Umbu Ganzá, Recife/PE)
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In distinctly different experiences, the goal of identification with the
roots of culture, with popular culture, is highlighted. This identification occurs
many times only through oral traditions, which are accessed through national
cultural sources. Along this line, history, dance, and music are explored.
Various experiences in Pernambuco, for example, have workshops and form
artistic groups that use maracatu and cordel literature (popular books by
Northeastern writers made using cheap materials, displayed at fairs, hanging
along a cord). In Salvador, street singers and poets are sources of workshops
for composition of theatre plays, while capoeira and maculelê attract youths
that also receive lessons on Afro-Brazilian culture. Other experiences focus
on documenting the history of the communities, as is the case at Viva Rio:
We are developing a project working with the community’s memory,
with the leadership organizations. We’re going to organize this historic
memory through a survey with the youths, developing their observation
capabilities, searching for data on the communities. (Interview with
coordination, Viva Rio, Rio/RJ)
There is a ‘national intangible heritage’20 that contributes to alternative
references to the market culture, to those that are commercially stimulated
by the official media and even by the schools. This is stated by the youths
from the Cidade Aprendiz School: At my school, you don’t see a Brazilian
Culture party, but you’ve got a Halloween party and that’s from a culture
that has nothing to do with us. You don’t honor your origins.
The artistic and educational play activities normally integrate the projects
on the level of language for citizenship, with the intention of stimulating
creativity and freedom of expression.
In some cases, culture is sustained in terms of the meaning of the
activities more than by the activities themselves. They are means related
to an end, with the goal of education for citizenship. Therefore, evaluations
on the artistic quality of the organized activities, that is, evaluations that
follow standards in the arts field are not appropriate. Meanwhile, there
are agencies like EDISCA and the Recorder Orchestra in Cuiaba, MT
that associate the idea of culture – to be and to become in life – with
20
“Our generation inherited a wealth of tangible and intangible cultural resources that includes
the collective memory of communities of the world over and provides meaning to identity
during a time of uncertainty. The intangible heritage [differently than tangible resources] has
not been so lucky. If it is true that all of our forms of cultural inheritance are fragile, the
immaterial goods that are lodged in people’s hearts and minds are even more so... The past
has truly become a ‘foreign country’ [David Lowenthal] (CUELLAR, 1997, p.231).
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erudite art. The intention is to hold ballet and classical music classes that
are oriented by criteria of professional training on a high artistic level for
youths from low-income areas.
Culture as a way of being in life3 takes on multiple lines of action, and
is not restricted to simply passing on an inheritance. Culture is dynamic
and many of the statements reveal the intention of producing creating
beings. In this way it serves as common ground among those interviewed
in reference to creativity.
Following this line of thought, culture would also be a movement against
unexamined reproduction of habits and customs. This would include those
that mean blind obedience and routine practices of authoritarianism among
generations. These examples can be seen in the families and the schools and
this means violences for the youths. Violences like these suffocate criticism:
The role of the cultural activities in working with these youths is to
stimulate their creativity, their liberty of expression, the question of
citizenship, when a person is composed of rights. As long as their
creativity is stimulated, there’s also a space opening up for choice.
These kids are so needy in terms of choices, of space, and when their
creativity is stimulated, all of a sudden they are able to develop better
criteria for making choices for their lives. (Focus group with educators,
Mulher Vida Collective, Recife/PE)
The opening up of spaces for learning and making access to cultural
information more democratic is another meaning that is present in the
speeches. It is what the project motivators from the governmental organization
PACA in Camaragibe/PE emphasize when they state that one of the aims
of the project is to widen the youths’ horizons. They discuss and act out
situations where they touch on reason and emotion, making the youths
sensitive to fantasy and affection.
The intangibility of culture (Cuellar, 1997) is recognized, bringing with
it recognition in society as important for the reconstruction of meanings of life
among the youths. This also takes on essential valorization of knowledge that
is most powerful in negotiations for work and the production of goods and
wealth. That is why, in some cases, there is a larger request for courses like
computer science. This is detrimental to the other courses like dance, music,
and art in general. This fact justifies the strategy used by PACA and other
agencies, combining computer lessons with other types of knowledge:
21
About culture, among others, see GEERTZ, WILLIAMS, 1992 and CERTEAU, 1993)
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We noticed resistance to the focus on culture in society. It’s like if you
needed to learn what Computers, Portuguese, and Math are about
because that’s going to get you somewhere in life. But not culture!
Culture is abstract. Culture is subjective. This is all imaginary. The
collective goes through this. So we’ve got to work on the youths’
sensitivity, putting the importance of technical-cultural knowledge
towards the needs of the market and to transform their lives. It’s a really
difficult job. (Focus group with educators, PACA, Camaragibe/PE)
From this perspective, you have to work in a gradual way. When the
youths get here they want something more immediate: ‘Let’s do that
project.’ ‘Are you going to turn on the computer now?’ ‘Is it on
already?’ They are anxious about the computer. They don’t want to
know if you’re going to talk about culture, about gender issues for
instance. No way! First it’s computers. And based on the most specific
theme you do the best work with them, really working on their
imagination, on theirs and ours. Daily life has a lot of power. It’s
concrete. It’s real. It’s bread, a house, a school. Fantasy isn’t really
explored in that day- to- day life. You have to work on recuperating
their imagination through the use of fantasy. (Focus group with
educators, PACA, Camaragibe/PE)
The following statement, according to the PACA specialists, indicates
how the relationships between the social and the cultural take place:
Without culture, the youth becomes an object. The youth is provided
with technical tools, but there’s no viewpoint on the world, coming
from his point of reference. Culture allows you to see yourself as an
individual, as a being. It brings out information from within him.
Another common reference when discussing culture is the question of
citizenship, referring also to social exclusion. The idea is to expose the youths
to cultural benefits and activities that are different from the ones they are
used to. However, there is also an instrumental meaning that goes back to
culture in the sense of guaranteeing possibilities for social mobility, in that
culture is stimulated by their studies:
Culture has a characteristic of shaping the citizen in a way that he
gets to like studying. A person with no culture, with no cultural
information, who has no idea of the need to specialize in an area, in a
profession, or even in an area of art. (Interview with partners, Olímpico
Project, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
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To be young is to be directed to education, this phase of youth is the
phase where they’re learning how to be educated, and to have access
to entertainment. The only entertainment they have is funk parties,
because if they’re not encouraged, there’s nothing to stimulate them
to have access to another type of culture. (Interview with coordination,
Olímpico Project, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
Offering cultural activities is another common ground mentioned in the
interviews. This includes the statements made by the youths themselves. It
is primarily the mothers and fathers that emphasize the positive quality of
the experiences in keeping the youths busy, taking them off the streets.
[The project is] one more opportunity, mainly because the parents,
well they are certain that we’re going to practice. We’re not doing
other things. We’re not messing around with drugs, in the streets,
doing nothing. That kind of thing. (Focus group with youths, Olímpico
Project, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
5.3.2 Deconstructing cultural prejudice: capoeira
Testimonies collected in the governmental organization Cidade Mãe in
Salvador/BA and in the School of Arts and Crafts in Salvador/BA about the
ways and changes in the apprehensions about the meaning of capoeira
[originally a martial art from the Afro-Brazilian culture] in the youths’ lives—
a youth exposed to violences in areas of poverty. These testimonies illustrate
the idea of chains of knowledge and the importance of specific moments
and cultural stimuli in the lives of these youths. Testimonies highlight the
intercommunication that can be developed among cultural activities,
knowledge about the values of citizenship and formal knowledge. The effect
established when a chain of knowledge is promoted with links that stimulate
one another should be noted in the following statements.
In addition, turning to capoeira, a martial art that is part of the roots of
Brazilian culture, identified as “something of blacks” by many in Salvador,
might mean confronting prejudice, but also deconstructing prejudice in
programs against violence.
Capoeira was seen as a violent activity, but any person can see that
my kids are really calm these days. They don’t fight and it’s through
capoeira that they have managed to relate to other people. They’ve
got capoeira as an art. Capoeira that they learn in life helps take them
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out of these violent places. If they’re in here, I’m not worried about
their safety. With a program like this, you can got to work knowing that
when you get back your kid is going to be there. In the street, they hang
around and get tempted to use drugs, to start stealing. And with
capoeira, they are respected in the community. (Focus group with
parents, Cidade Mãe Foundation, Salvador/BA)
The recurrence of capoeira contributes for deconstruction of codes in
the gender system, and of division of roles by sex, and race, including what
comes from whites and what comes from blacks. Women are doing
capoeira, in spite of the idea that it is just a sport and an art for men.
5.3.3 Street Culture and Graffiti
“Street Culture” is an expression that runs through projects that work
with youths that live on the street and in low-income communities, where
the street is a place for excellence in socialization. It is the place to be and to
become for the youths.
Street culture is also a sign of the creation of the groups themselves, as
in the case of the hip hop movement. This movement is the intersection
between rap, break, graffiti, and the DJ and is used from the perspective of
denouncing social problems. In fact, street culture is a culture of
denouncement. It is a culture to shock, and to overthrow. It is just one of
many cultural languages of the groups of youths.
Street culture has the potential to reassign public space as a space for
entertainment and sociability. This creates a counterpoint to the common
association of the street as a place for violence. As mentioned on numerous
occasions in this study, getting youths off the street or keeping them occupied
is commonly mentioned, specially by parents, as a way to free them from
danger. They refer to the public or the street as a danger when young people
could be indirectly vindicating the right to public space through street culture.
Artistic, cultural, and aesthetic values are passed on to the youths,
seeking to transform their vision of the world and to give value to this change
in perception and to their own work. This occurs in relation to artistic graffiti
expressions that are permeated with contradictory social values. Some
consider graffiti to be a form of art and others consider it to be a form of
vandalism. In the Arts and Crafts School, for example, one way of diminishing
the graffiti vandalism in the school was to encourage the graffiti art. This
indirectly stimulated care for the schools. Many experiences work along
these lines, using graffiti as an artistic expression:
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So at the end of this workshop, you make a comparison between
graffiti vandalism and graffiti art. In the workshop they even learn
about the aesthetics of art. They work with figures and symbols,
proportion. So you get these two works and you see the change,
even in the final classes. They like to participate, they like to be
there, to seduce the spaces, to do something artistic, aesthetic
appreciation, that’s it. They like to interact with these spaces, so
one of the project’s goals is to establish interactive spaces where
the kid can really participate, really integrate, really develop and
recognize that there are different types of graffiti or graffiti art,
that is, with different meanings. (Interview with educators, Colors
of Belém, Belém/PA)
5.3.4 Languages
The majority of the projects form their own cultural languages. This
makes each project unique and close to the characteristics of the target
public and the needs and potential of their communities.
In many of the organizations, there is also a preoccupation with
knowing the written language, the official codes. The organizations try to
serve as bridges between formal school and the projects. For example,
this includes after school tutoring or taking project activities into the schools.
Art and culture are also strategic languages for professional training
in many of the experiences. They also serve to stimulate critical thinking
and choice making:
It’s important to let the kids have a different language. Mass
communication media is all around. These kids are always in contact
with it, not necessarily in a positive way. So we try to promote contact
with other things to stimulate them, things like video, music, theatre,
and photography. But in a more critical way, showing them that every
time we do a project we have something to say and show and there’s a
reason for it. We have a lot of kids that say: ‘When I get out of here I
want to take a theatre course,’ Others talk about photography. They
want to work. And that’s what we’re trying to do, to awaken this
possibility of thinking about other projects in their heads. To get them
interested in other courses and to make them get in contact with reading
and writing. (Interview with educators, Gol de Letra Foundation, São
Paulo/SP)
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5.3.5 School and Art-Citizenship
In a number of the projects, there is the idea of working with a new
conception of school, a new way of thinking about school where the
educational process is not just restricted to what happens within the school’s
walls, but that the learning process can be complemented with other activities.
The idea that the project is an alternative to school is rejected, insisting on
the idea that the project is a complement to school.
In many cases school takes on a fundamental role in the projects. The
main idea is that the school can be a transforming element within the
community. In addition to contact with the pedagogical community and the
tracking of the youths in school, some projects, like CRIA, develop artisticcultural activities with the teachers and discuss the importance of accepting
and encouraging critical thought in the youths as well as some behavior that
is considered disrespectful.
For CRIA, this point of view encourages the school to adopt new teaching
and learning methods, in addition to stimulating public policy for youth. The
coordinator of the institution emphasizes that: The public school is ours,
we want to institutionalize experiences that initiate in civil society, there
will always be a place for this kind of link, but it’s not easy.
An effort is also made to reactivate the youths’ interest for formal
education in the projects. There is insistence on the social necessity for
formal education. Many youths, for example, come to the project Viva Rio
intending to just complete basic education because it’s a requirement in
the job market. With the development of the NGO’s activities they begin
to value the process of school knowledge and the opportunities that this
offers them. The youths also recognize that disenchantment with formal
school can not be calculated according to the quality of the school only. It
also has to do with a loss of value in terms of joining the job market. I ask
myself, why go to high school? I’ve got to work, you know? I can’t
really see what getting a high school degree is going to do me in
terms of making money. In the job market you have to have experience
so it’s hard for someone who never worked. The majority of those
interviewed worry about the place school occupies in the youths’ citizenship
and artistic cultural training, and they consider formal education to be
important. The projects share a pre-requisite of attending school for the
youths to participate in the activities and many of the projects monitor the
youths’ school performance. Nevertheless, the relationship between the
youths’ experiences in the world of civil society and the public schools is
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not easy. There is commonly criticism about the ways the teachers and
youths relate to each other, the distance that exists in relation to their
cognitive and emotional universe, and the total lack of knowledge about
what the youths like and want:
The Brazilian school doesn’t have the ability to educate. The school
just passes on information and the youths have to take care of
themselves. In school they say ‘don’t do this,’ but they don’t explain
why you shouldn’t. They say this to the kid: ‘you can’t spray graffiti on
that wall.’ And he comes back with: ‘but I feel like it and the school is
mine, isn’t it? It’s public. It’s ours, isn’t it?’ Nobody told him why he
shouldn’t spray graffiti, or even more, that he could do it in another
way. (Focus group with educators, Radio Margarida, Belém/PA)
Art gets the kid through what’s strongest in him, the most defining thing
It’s got to do with emotion, passion, and energy, and unfortunately the
school is just unable to deal with this, it doesn’t understand this. Art lets
all that energy out and it’s work that reaches the kid in a natural way.
There’s a lot of enjoyment. The kid that works with video for example.
For him, the equipment itself, the language, it’s fascinating, mainly
because the low-income kid has almost no access to technology. So, to
produce a video, he’s got to study a lot of things that aren’t boring to
him because he wants to do it. This gives him motivation, and that
motivation makes him more disciplined. It makes him take responsibility.
He learns how to talk. He learns a string of abilities that make him want
to develop, and he starts to take shape. It’s the same thing with dance.
There’s this formal language, this passing on of knowledge. In school
they just don’t have this effort, this motivation. (Focus group with
educators, CRIA, Salvado/BA)
The artistic-cultural activities demand a learning process in terms of
citizenship. The kids can be educated through art, taking into
consideration that many times they experience difficulty in formal
school. Through dance, though, they start to develop these skills and
they even start to have better performance in formal school. (Focus
group with parents, Cidade Mãe Foundation, Salvador/BA)
5.3.6 Art Education
This is a basic field, a field of activity for the majority of the surveyed projects.
It is also a field that demands a lot of creativity and care in order for education not
to suffocate, not to discipline components of art like irreverence and freedom:
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In addition to the aesthetic character of art, and of art’s educational
role, there’s the fact that the kids speak in the plays. They demonstrate
attitudes, habits, and values. The educators are always asking
questions, provoking, reflecting on their behavior, their habits, and
on how they deal with their bodies, in preventing diseases, and with
responsibility in sexual relations, etc. (Focus group with educators,
CRIA, Salvador/BA)
There is worldwide discussion on art and art and education. Educating
through art is a trend that is expanding. You bring education about in
a playful way, a light way. Then, based on this, you work with potential
and self-esteem, especially in this class, this gang that doesn’t have
much access to these kinds of things. (Focus group with educators,
Circus School, São Luis/MA)
5.3.7 Between Expression and Discipline
Although artistic activity attracts the youths and values freedom of
expression, the demands of the discipline, rehearsals, and repetition are as
necessary as the exercise of the artistic activities. This demands cultivating
a method on the part of the project motivators and teachers, who highlight
resistance to these concepts among the youths in the distinct experiences.
This requires that they make necessary negotiations and respect the time –
the rhythm of the youths – in a process:
The kids have problems keeping quiet and concentrated, with an
attitude that makes them open to learning. But in terms of reception,
it doesn’t bother them if they have to sing the same song for an hour,
for two hours, in music and singing class. Or if they have to play
percussion. The way I got them to keep quiet is to encourage them as
producers, as active agents. So one way is to encourage them to sing
for as long as possible. (Focus group with teachers, Olodum, Salvador/
BA)
Another thing that can be seen in many of the boys and girls is
understanding that the required discipline and concentration make them more
critical of drugs. They start to reflect about this contrast between being an
artist and using drugs:
Kids that used drugs managed to realize that the day they used this or
that it didn’t work. Because he had to cross the tightrope, for example.
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So he had to make a choice. Naturally, the idea that you have to have
discipline to be an artist helped make them conscious of this. Even for
physical issues, just physical issues, I mean, it’s a physical effect against
what you need and this becomes very clear too. (Interview with
coordination, If This Street Were Mine, Rio de Janeiro/RJ)
5.3.8 Art and Education of and for Participation
Affection, dialogue, and knowing how to listen are the ingredients
highlighted as basic in communication with the youths. These dimensions
are not always taken into consideration in processes of formal education
and in family relationships:
CRIA is the big listener, because youth, a big portion of society, suffers
a lot from not having anyone to tell their worries to. There’s no place
for this. School doesn’t offer this kind of place for the youth to be
heard, to listen to the needs of the youth, to stay open to letting these
youths start discussing issues of interest to them. Here at CRIA, they
have a place for discussion. They are raising issues that are in their
lives, in their day- to- day lives. They can’t direct this vision towards
things that have to do with themselves, with their personal development
as human beings, they have to start working with this really early.
This transformation in the phase of youth to adult is really speeded up
at times. What CRIA has that’s unique for me is that it’s not just about
being a transformer. I feel like I’m being transformed all the time. The
teaching concept here has been surpassed by the learning concept.
People never feel trained, ready, they’re always learning new things,
growing and expanding their possibilities. (Focus group with
educators, CRIA, Salvador/BA)
It’s commonly agreed in specialized literature about youths and among
those interviewed that the language of art is closer to their reality. Art is a
field that even allows for contact and exchange between generations.
Generations meet in the cultivation of liberty, beauty, and also criticism. Art,
therefore, assumes a number of different positions in that emphasizing
participation does not necessarily qualify content:
Because art has a lot of different angles. There are those who prefer
tragedy. Not us, tragedy is what we live on a daily basis. We take the
tragic and turn it into criticism, and then we just go on from there. We
talk about child exploitation, lack of citizenship, of infrastructure, of
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sewer systems. So we put on a play about what’s wrong and what’s
right and about what makes up our Christian culture. And for this
culture there has to be balance in life. The kid identifies with this, ok,
there’s something conservative and something liberating about it.
(Focus group with educators, Radio Margarida, Belém/PA)
5.3.9 Art Education: The Circus
The circus begins in play and activates self-esteem and social
responsibility. The circus school collaborates in opening up doors to knowledge
and to the practice of studying, of discipline. It socializes with beauty and it
reaches the soul. It is a complete art – dance, music, sports – and it requires
balance, discipline, and a lot of concentration.
The proposal of the Picolino Circus, for example, is to allow for
integral intervention in the youths’ lives. It combines different types of
artistic activities and actions in the field of personality and behavior,
stimulating solidarity:
The circus, when it gets to a child or to a teenager, it affects balance,
or it affects nerve, or it affects courage. It affects solidarity in a
concrete way, and it affects a lot more too. In all the classes, you see
someone leaping and someone holding on. If the person who is
holding on lets go, the other one gets hurt bad. So it’s a question of
trust, of exchange, of solidarity being important. These are
dimensions with multiple effects. You learn how to react when you’re
walking on a wire that’s two or three meters above the ground. And
you’ve got to really walk it. So you have to find your balance, and
something inside you changes. These circus elements are really
strong. We are discovering, along the history of Picolino Circus, all
the possibilities that the circus offers for transformation. The person
is a person and the circus is a highly individualistic activity, although
it is a highly group activity. Because the group only works if the
individual is ok and this changes the individual because he has to
take care of himself. If the circus artist is walking the tightrope,
juggling, or making a pyramid, or hanging from a trapeze, these
activities affect his/her whole psychological structure. This is the
way we work too. Based on the individual, on allowing the individual
to demonstrate his/her limit, his/her time. So we don’t have any
already established time limit, like one year and you either pass or
fail. It’s not like that. Each one that comes to us follows his or her
own rhythm and that’s basic. A lot of them get here and they’re 17, 18,
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19, 20 years old and they quickly respond to the circus and they’ve
got a place here. The circus takes them under wing and protects
them, it’s like this protector of diversity. (Interview with coordination,
Picolino Circus, Salvador/BA)
5.3.10 Rights and Limits
Ethics parameters involve collective and individual rights when
recognizing collective rights imposes limits on the individual. With this
way of conceiving of citizenship, art and education nourish each other,
moving away from the common point of view of some organizations that
work in the cultural field with youths. These institutions leave the
importance of insisting on the educational construction of art in the
background. They leave learning about what it is to be and become in
society and to value that in the background as well.
Art is just like a glove, or better yet, a hand, because art opens the
mind to a vision of the world. Because what happens a lot,
especially here in the neighborhood, is that the kids only get to
know this world based on the reflections we make beyond this,
because this is the reference point that they’ve got. It’s the
neighborhood, it’s violence. Their games are violent. They fight a
lot among themselves and they’re looking to let off some steam in
art. We use choral singing. Of course the bigger goal is that they
sing, but there’s a whole history along the way. There’s this resocialization process in terms of relationships. Respect, listening
to others, attention, the question of knowing when to start and
when to stop. These are limits that they don’t know about. Art gives
them a vision of the world and of limits. And what’s most important
is that it stimulates their individual consciousness, their
possibilities for living, for beauty. They can admire themselves with
sounds and colors. It’s a collective consciousness. (Focus group
with educators, Cidade Mãe Foundation, Salvador/BA)
We, the educators, are extremely demanding. Because artists are
extremely demanding of themselves. It’s the basic description of the
artist. The way we work with them is in accordance with this
parameter and the kids get into the rhythm of it, the strictness, this
training discipline. There’s a search to rise above, but also to
recognize limits. (Interview with coordination, Arts and Crafts
School, Salvador/BA)
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5.3.11 Cultural Citizenship and the Exercise of Social
Criticism
In a number of different experiences with the youths that focus on
themes of citizenship, the preoccupation with not onl