Reflection Paper - Educational System of Mexico

Leonardo Z. Camboja Jr.                                                     Teaching Profession

BEE – 2                                                                            Olga C. Alonsabe, Ph.D.

Reflection Paper – Educational System of Mexico

March 1, 2013

The Catholic Church played a significant role in Mexican education during the Colonial era, which extended from first European contact in the early sixteenth century until the Mexican revolution.The Roman Catholic Church and Spanish crown, on the other hand, wanted to establish a colonial form of feudal privilege and religious dissent. Clearly, the Catholic Church was intent on cultural genocide, often building their churches on sacred sites of the aboriginal idols.Franciscans provided the early education of the Indians and mestizo peasants, which consisted mainly of instruction in Catholicism. The Jesuits and Augustinians, on the other hand, provided the more classical education for Spanish emigrants and the criollos. Vasco de Quiroga, a liberal Catholic judge and Bishop, is credited with starting the first school for the natives, the hospital-school of Santa Fe established on the outskirts of Mexico City in 1531.

Recently, basic education is normally divided in three steps: Primary school (primaria), comprising grades 1-6;the ration per classroom is 28:1, while junior high school comprising grades 7-9 (secundaria); and high school comprising grades 10-12 is 17:1 per classroom.) And the medium language is Spanish. Depending on the school, a bilingual education may be offered from the beginning, where half the day instruction is in Spanish, and the rest is in a second language, for example, English or French.At this level, more specialized subjects may be taught such as Physics and Chemistry, and World History.When the student's age is 15 to 18 years old, students may choose between 2 main kinds of high school programs.Secondary education is divided in two levels: lower secondary, or secundaria, and upper secondary education.

Since 1993 secundaria has become part of compulsory basic education. Lower secondary is structured into three grades and is offered in several modalities, including general, telesecondary, and technical ordistance education. This type of education is offered to children between the ages of 12 and 16 years who have completed elementary school. People older than 16 years of age can obtain secundaria education by attending secondary school for workers or for adults, two other available modalities.The second level of secondary education is upper secondary education; this level of education involves several options and is available to those who have completed compulsory education. There are three subsystems in this category: general upper secondary, which includes open and distance upper secondary education; technical professional education, which trains qualified professional in different fields; and technological upper secondary, which offers the opportunity to obtain professional technician degrees and prepares the students to continue on to higher education. General upper secondary education is offered through bachiller colleges (CB), preparatoria schools, science and humanities colleges (CCH), and incorporated bachilleratos.

In general, in the compulsory school grades, boys and girls are almost equally represented: males, 92 percent; females, 91 percent. However, this balance is upset in the upper grades. Even though the gap is closing, males tend to be represented in greater numbers than females, particularly in higher education. With the exception of vocational, technical, and teacher education, representation of men at all levels of education (including university undergraduate and graduate levels) is higher than women's. Teachers were held in high esteem in their communities, but as the fervor of revolutionary nationalism began to subside, the sense of mission, which motivated many teachers, started to wear off. Mexico does not appear to have a shortage of teachers. Salaries, like in just about any developing country, are low for teachers. In 1998 the entry level, gross annual salary for elementary school teachers in Mexico City was $6,068. Teachers with 10 years of experience earned an annual gross salary of $7,904. These earnings included bonuses, vacations, and other benefits. Jobs in Mexico City are among the best paid. Considering that a campesino in one of the poorest regions may earn the equivalent of about half the entry level salary of a teacher, the profession is no longer seen as prestigious as it once was.