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Thursday, 20 August 2009

Brazil – Day 6

The trip carried on unabated.  By Day 6, I was starting to get a bit tired!!  I feel a bit guilty saying that, as we were being royally entertained and kept interested in so many different things.  We started day 6 with a VERY early start, and a VERY long drive to a town called Campinhas – apparently the Brazilian equivalent of Silicon Valley.  There was an accident on one of the motorways, so the bus had to take an even longer way round.  That’s something worth mentioning – the motorways!  There are shed loads of roads around Sao Paulo, and loads of buses, but that’s about it.  Brazil has few railways so as a result that roads are plentiful, wide and rammed with traffic.  Everywhere you go seems to be filled with cars and traffic jams.  When you stop, you’re often confronted with people trying to sell you things, from chocolate bars to (peculiarly) dog leads.  At one point in the week we wondered whether Brazilian people simply drove around and did their weekly shop on the way home.  As you will see in Day 7, there are schemes in place to try and help people overcome the need to do the on-street selling.  Lots of people doing the selling were children, and that was quite difficult to watch.  There was clear evidence of poverty and that’s really difficult to deal with when you’ve got money (even if it doesn’t feel like sometimes).

Anyway, more on that later.  Back to Campinhas … We went to visit an entrepreneur called Fabricio Bloisi.  He founded a company called Comperantime 10 years ago.  He and a university colleague sat down and decided to start a business.  They said that they wanted to create a $1 billion company that would compete with Microsoft!!  (not a bad starting point).  They realised that mobile technology was taking off in Europe and also realising that Brazil was lagging behind, it would be a salient idea to start developing the same technologies in Brazil!  Morgan Stanley produce a document called Tech Trends 2.0 – in 2008, it stated that the growth area would be the use of and development of mobile technology in BRICs (Brazil, Russia, India and China) or the emerging economies.  This is therefore where Comperantime will be focussing its development efforts.  We were told - “mobile technology is the next big thing, not the Internet!”

The conversation then turned to a problem of skills gap.  Fabricio was concerned at the gap between education and business.  This wasn’t in the way I was expecting, but in terms of the skills that people need in order to succeed in business and to contribute to his company.  He talked about his need for workers that know how to learn, that can set themselves personal goals and objectives and can research and work independently.  The most important facet was the need to be self motivated.  What intrigued me here was that he was not that concerned with traditional knowledge, but more the qualities of an individual.  the degree someone gets is less important than their ability to adapt and work to new situations … quite a challenge to someone from a qualification driven structure!  Our school does a lot of good work regarding creating independent learners etc., but is it worth it while the overall aim is getting a qualification??  Surely developing the student to be ready for what comes next is of as much if not greater importance?  This may be slightly controversial, but I’m saying it anyway! 

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Our next visit was rather an odd one, and probably the only time in the week where I was unable to really focus and get anything out of it.  We went to Unicamp, one of Brazil’s best universities and met a couple of professors who were (eventually) keen to talk about education and technology in particular.  The visit seemed a little contrived and there wasn’t really a thrust to it.  It felt slightly one way, and I had to start making notes in order to prevent myself falling asleep.  On the upside, there were some lovely flowers outside!!

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After we’d finished there, we got back on the bus and had a packed lunch of soggy sandwiches (which were welcome) and crisps.  Despite our best efforts, we couldn’t persuade Julia to let us stop at McDonalds.  In truth, this was probably a good thing as we were headed to what was my favourite bit of the trip so far!

We went to visit a CDI school.  CDI stands for Committee for Democracy in Information Technology.  They are a charitable organisation that provides computer equipment and software to schools and communities, providing a “teach the teacher” curriculum to its social enterprises.  They currently have nearly 100 across the world – of which 750 are in Brazil.  We had a brief presentation and then we got to see some computers in action.  We had been due to meet more students, however, the swine flu threat meant there weren’t many around.  We did, however, meet a few students in a room with a few PCs – their teacher was very young at 21 – he was someone who’d been given a chance because he’d take the opportunities provided to him by the CDI.  I’m sad to say I didn’t make a note of many names at this point.  I’d left the nifty notebook I’d been using all week on the bus.  CDI was formed by a guy named Rodrigo Baggio – a computer science teacher (taking after my own heart obviously) … this video clip sums up why the organisation was set up and what it’s been achieving!

As we wandered round, we saw the class I’d just mentioned.  We also saw a room sponsored by Coca Cola, where some students were learning about business studies and ICT combined – I was in heaven (and not just because of all the coke themed stuff on the walls)!!  They were using real life case studies to help educate students in some business basics.  I’ve included some pictures below – they show some of the worksheets.  I reckon they could even work in the UK!! (even in Portugese)!  Again, the teacher in this class was incredibly young – you can see him below showing off his textbook!  I had the opportunity to show them where George Spencer School was on googlemaps – I even showed them on the streetmap view, so they could see our language block.  They were disappointed that we don’t learn Portugese … maybe that’s something I should try and get going??  We also met some kids on the street outside, who were unimpressed by our new found fondness for Sao Paulo FC … I explained to them that Leicester City were the best team in the UK, but I’m not sure they believed me (or that the person translating was being 100% polite) …

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We didn’t stop there!!  Despite already being an hour behind, we were offered the opportunity to go and look at another project in another town.  We leapt at the chance, and travelled for another hour to look at a scheme being run that was working on basic literacy, ICT and numeracy skills.  They were working under the banner of Amigos do Planeta (which even I worked out meant Friends of the Planet).  There was a bus, with people learning how to use a computer, an exam hall where people could sit basic skills tests and a computer bank with kids games on it – they were great, I enjoyed colouring in a cat!!  Then, the coolest thing, before we got back to the bus we saw some kids playing football.  We went and joined in – it was brilliant – I’m gutted, that I don’t have any pictures of it, because it was ace.  I even strung a couple of passes together.  Those of you that know me, will know football is not my greatest talent!!  I really enjoyed this encounter, as well as the encounter with the kids earlier in the day.  This was because it gave us the opportunity to actually talk with and be with some ‘real’ Brazilians.  We didn’t really mix too much outside the Leaders’ Quest experience, and that was a shame.  This meant that the moments we did, we really got to treasure!!

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When we got back, we’d managed to blag an hour’s free time – we went down the shopping street.  I bought a couple of Sao Paulo FC shirts, and Uno (you might remember the card game).  I almost caused a diplomatic incident when I noticed that Justin’s purchase had been wrapped better than mine, and as a result mine was rewrapped.  Fortunately, the lady in the shop saw the funny side – I was mortified!!

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After that entertaining trip into the shopping area, we had our final dinner.  This was amazing.  Wine on tap, gorgeous steak, and a pudding table to (literally) die for.  We also had a bit of a ‘revue’ with one or two acts taking place.  This included the Genettes (a group formed in tribute to our own Gene Early).  This was a lot of fun, and a fitting celebration of the time we had.  We had our dinner at A Figueira Rubaiyat restaurant – apparently one of the most celebrated restaurants in Latin America.  There was a 1000 year old tree in the middle of it!  I’m not sure they were ready for a party of around 30 UK teachers and associates, but they coped admirably.  We also took advantage of the opportunity to be slightly smutty (well, you do, don’t you??).  The good news – there’s only one more day to hear about after this, but you might want a hanky!!

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Most important thing from Day 6 – Entrepreneurship and skills.  I’ve been really struck by the need to not simply create students who get the grade, but students who can show initiative and a real sense of direction.  So often, you ask kids “what do you want to do?” and they’ll say “dunno, don’t care” etc.  Part of what we need to do is help kids see that they have a FUTURE.  What they do and achieve in school will determine what that future is.  This is about so much more than 5 GCSEs – it’s about being able to solve problems, being able to work in a team etc.  It’s about being proactive and about being employable.  We have to show students that school matters.  In Brazil only the few get a really good crack at education – if our students maybe understood how lucky they were … ??!??

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