This document summarizes a study on a Brazilian public-private partnership program called ProUNI that provides scholarships for unqualified teachers to obtain teaching credentials from for-profit higher education institutions. The study found that while the teachers expressed a strong motivation to complete their training, they had neutral perceptions of program quality and reported a lack of retention efforts. The implications are that teacher education may need to move towards longer internship models like medical residencies to improve quality and that innovation is needed to accelerate closing global education gaps.

1. Improving the Brazilian teaching
force through Public-Private
Partnerships:
An exploration in quality
Stephanie M. Hall

2. OverviewOVERVIEW
1. Background & Importance
2. Study Design
3. Findings
4. Implications & Conclusion
Improving Brazilian teachers
through PPPs:

3. The Problem: Unqualified Teachers
• 47% lack credentials, nationally
• up to 80% in rural areas
2014 National Education Plan: ensure all
teachers are “licensed and highly qualified”
(MEC, 2011)
Under-qualified P-12 teachers in Brazil:

4. The Solution: ProUNI
How it works:
1. private IHEs (non- and for-profit)
2. tax breaks for subsidized admission
3. target population: low-income students
and/or teachers seeking licensure
2005: Brazilian University for All Program (ProUNI)

5. ProUNI: 2005-2014
458,807 lack postsecondary training
12,225 ProUNI scholarships used by teachers
(MEC, 2015)

6. The issue:
ProUNI is a Public-Private Partnership (PPP)
Under this PPP, a highly unregulated market of
for-profit IHEs has emerged (McCowan, 2007).
Year # of private IHEs
1996 711
1999 1,097
2008 2,252

7. Research Question:
How do so-called unqualified teachers enrolled
in a teacher licensure program in a Brazilian for-
profit IHE perceive the quality of the training
they receive?

8. Why is this important?
• High performing systems prioritize teacher
quality.
• Common problem in LDCs.
(Darling-Hammond & Rothman, 2015; EI, 2012; OECD, 2014)

9. Why is this important?
Attempts at addressing educational access and
efficiency through 'market solutions' is a growing
trend (Ball, 2012).
The IHE market, which has grown because of
ProUNI should provide a quality experience
that makes this upgrading of teacher worth it.

10. Theoretical Perspectives
In education policy research, there exists a
tension between social justice and efficiency
(Ball, 1997).
Cost and quality tend to be cut in PPPs for
education (Epstein, 2013).

11. Sampling & Data Collection
Study design: small, qualitative, exploratory
open-ended interviews, Skype (Bogdan & Biklen, 2007;
Sullivan, 2013)
Criteria for participation:
public P-12 teacher
posess no post-secondary degree
enrolled in teacher training at a for-profit IHE

12. Participants
Participant Age
Years
teaching
Years in
coursework
Course
format
1 24 5 4 Hybrid
2 26 8 3 Hybrid
3 27 7 1 Hybrid
4 30 9 1 Distance
5 32 12 3 In-person
6 41 20 1 Distance

13. Findings: Disposition to Persistence
“When I failed to get the scholarship after the
first two attempts, I cried a lot. I felt
desperate, because really, it was a dream and
desire, and now that I am finishing the degree,
for me, it is like a dream come true.”

14. Findings: Disposition to Persistence
“I didn’t want to be the teacher everyone knew
was not ‘highly qualified’.”
These teachers are not unqualified on purpose.
They believe they value higher education more
because they were unable to reach it before.

15. Findings: No retention efforts
“I don’t know who the other
ProUNI students are.”
“I have known a few ProUNI students who
have quit because they found a better job.”

16. Findings: Positive Impact on Teaching
“When I started my job, everything was a little
vague, especially about teaching reading...
Only when I started college, did I feel I
understood my students’ learning. For my
project, I am focusing on phonological
awareness, which is something that helps me
help my kids.”

17. Findings: Positive Impact on Teaching
“I have taken ideas from a class on Saturday
and tried them the very next week.”
“If I have something I am learning, especially
something difficult, I usually also talk about it
with the coordinator at my school.”

18. Findings: Neutral Perception of Quality
Under-qualified teachers of record who
undergo teacher licensure while working full-
time have neutral perceptions of the quality of
their programs.

19. Findings: Neutral Perception of Quality
“My program, it is a typical program, right?”
“I am sure it has a common foundation.”
“I cannot recall anything I hoped to learn that I
have not.”

20. Implications
Has the program actually revealed the value of the
residency model?
Teacher education practices in high performing
systems:
longer internship experiences
medical residency model
reduced contact time in first years on the job
(Darling-Hammond & Rothman, 2015)

21. Implications
Global education gaps will not close for
another 100 years if we continue with the
same policies and approaches.
Innovation is needed to quicken the pace;
such can be tested or found in LDCs.
(Winthrop & McGivney, 2015)

22. Conclusion: Efficiency or
Barriers to licensure are barriers to providing
a high quality teacher to all children.
Future research: Is the qualifying exam the
barrier? Why are take-up rates so low?

23. References:
Ball, S. J. (1997). Policy sociology and critical social research: A Personal review of recenteducation policy and policy research.
British Educational Research Journal, 23(3), 257-275.
Ball, S.J. (2012) Global Education Inc.: New Policy Networks and the Neoliberal Imaginary. London: Routledge.
Bogdan, R., & Biklen, S. K. (2007) Qualitative research for education: An introduction to theories and methods (5th ed.). Boston,
Mass.: Pear A & B.
Darling-Hammond, L. and Rothman, R. (2015) Teaching In A Flat World: Learning from High-Performing Systems.
NY: Teachers College Press
Education International (EI). (2012). Trained teachers for all: Closing the trained teacher gap. Global Campaign for Education:
Washington, DC.
Epstein, W.N. (2013) Contract theory and the failures of public-private contracting. Cardozo Law Review 34(6), 1-46.
McCowan, T. (2007). Expansion without equity: An analysis of current policy on access to higher education in Brazil. Higher
Education, 53: 579-598.
MEC: Ministry of Education (2011; 2015) ProUni. ProUni Portal. http://prouniportal.mec.gov.br/index.php
OECD (2014). Lessons from TALIS. Paris.
Redden, E. (2015, June 16). US For-Profits in Brazil. Inside Higher Ed.
Sullivan, J.R. (2013) Skype: An appropriate method of data collection for qualitative interviews? The Hilltop Review, 6(1), 54-60.
Winthrop, R. and E. McGivney. 2015. Why wait 100 years? Bridging the gap in global education. Brookings Institution.

24. OverviewCONTACT
Stephanie M. Hall
University of Maryland
International Education Policy
halls@umd.edu