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I think is clear for everyone that works here at Campos Salles - for our parents, students
and community - that education happens everywhere and not only in school.
In the past, what we did was to assembly a course that we named "Education and Citizenship".
This happend in 2006, 2007. And we offered the course to every parent and each group
of parents that finished our course (that lasted 4 or 5 weeks) they got to understand
they were part of our community. We showed them the school as it was, from within with
all its problems. We are used to say we showed them our school with all its beauty and with
all its uglyness and our goal was to say to the parents and for the students that the
responsability to change the education was also theirs.
And that the student - he learns way more outside the school than inside. So I think
that from this moment on people started to understand and to enrich, valorize other educational
spaces. For example, here we have only in UNAS (our community-based association), 9
Childrens and Adolescents Centers. So our students they stay five hours in our school
and other four hours in these centers. And as it is an informal educational process these
centers have been contributing a lot to our students learning processes. Outside the school.
And this has also impacted our school and we also impact these centers, in a dialogical
process. Our teachers here at Campos Salles have been
trained to see and understand that educators are not only them, teachers, who are inside
the schools and that today in order for a school to do a good job it has to aknowledge
that the community has a lot to offer and several other educators. Educators that didn't
graduate in pedagogy and in physics, chemistry, language or mathematics but who are educators.
And the school can only do something meaningful if she recognizes these other educators. So
that we can, for example, guarantee as we did here - from one school we were able to
negotiate with the government and build a community center which is fundamental to our
concept of integral/ comprehensive education. Besides the school, the center offers a series
of activities that are educational. So what I see, observing many of our teachers
is that a new teacher is being born in our school. And also a new student. That I think
will be the solution for this educational system in place and that has been causing
a lot of suffering for all.