SAN LUIS POTOSÍ, Mexico.- The Observatory of Academic Freedom (OLA) denounced “the standardization of obscenity as a form of socialization” in Cuban schools, a phenomenon that distorts the social function of public education and affects the “trivialization of the basic rules of civility and formal education in many sectors of the population.”
In an article published on its website, the organization appealed to the “sense of responsibility of the faculty and directors” to face the scenario, implementing educational policies based on a multidisciplinary and scientific approach.
The OLA statement refers to a video shared on social media showing a cultural activity by teachers, where a student was singing a reggaeton song with “explicitly obscene” lyrics.
The incident occurred during a morning meeting at the Institute Pre-university “Grito de Yara” (Yara’s Cry) in Granma, and was widely criticized by Facebook users.
The OLA complaint highlighted the silence of the authorities, who did not comment on the activity, but instead quickly disseminated images of other “more formal” events held at the pre-university, in order to clean up their image.
“The song sung by the student is just one more example of these harmful practices within educational establishments. Often, these episodes are instigated by the teachers themselves, who enter teaching as a last professional option after falling behind in the academic scale at the end of the secondary-high level of the education system,” said the observatory.
The educational situation on the island is increasingly deteriorating, marked by a lack of teachers and the poor condition of schools, despite the regime’s attempts to export education as one of its main objectives.
In his fortieth reportwhich examines the progressive distortion of the teaching profession in Cuba from 1959 to the present, OLA recognizes a “process of dismantling democratic pedagogical establishments and their replacement by ‘factories’ of teacher-soldiers, an instrument of indoctrination also directed towards foreign countries.”
For several years now, courses have also been marked by a shortage of stable and competent teachers, which has led to a lack of quality in the educational process.
The provinces most affected by the absence of teachers are Havana, Artemisa, Mayabeque, Matanzas, Sancti Spíritus, Ciego de Ávila and Camagüey, mainly in basic secondary schools and in vocational pre-university institutes of exact sciences (IPVCE).
In this context, during the current academic year, the MINED will host the Regional Comparative and Explanatory Study (ERCE), which measures learning achievements in the Latin American and Caribbean region. The pilot test will be carried out in October and the research will be undertaken in May.
