Venezuela

The educational system in Venezuela has experienced a significant enrollment increase during the last 30 years. This is closely related to the general population explosion that is characteristic of third world nations. Although this population increase can be closely linked to the economic growth due to the oil boom of the 60s and 70s, the rapid growth of the student population has created serious problems in this heavily oil-dependent nation. The government has been ineffective in creating enough jobs and business opportunities for all. Therefore, it is not unusual to find highly skilled professionals taking jobs completely outside their fields, opening up a business or emigrating to a country that offers professional opportunities. The numbers speak for themselves: in 2001 the unemployment rate was almost 20 percent in a developing country where 65 percent of the population is under 35 years of age.

The oil crisis of the 80s and 90s created a big burden on the further growth of the educational system. During this period institutions of higher learning experienced temporary shut-downs because the government failed to deliver back pay or was unable to keep salary increases as previously contracted. As a result professors and instructors would strike. This economic crisis also made it impossible for these institutions of higher learning, which took up to 33 percent of the whole national budget in education, to keep up with the current technologies.

Teachers make an average of $300 dollars a month in a country with "first world" prices for housing and transportation. This situation has created a shortage of teachers and consequently an increase in part-time instructors. The schools hardest hit are those in the provinces where little or no supervision is the norm and where students often go for months without schooling. If the situation has deteriorated for the life of a teacher, it has been proportionately negative for students. The number of children who desert school to go to work has increased. The goal of the new administration has been to raise educational standards and to increase the salaries of educators. Although this has been carried through, the gap between a public and a private school is enormous. Overcrowded or poorly attended public schools are the norm vs. an elitist, expensive state-of-the-art private school. In Venezuela there is now, more than ever, a class distinction between the rich and the poor. The administration of President Hugo Chávez Frías has made an effort to ameliorate the ills of the educational system in Venezuela. The government has increased salaries at all levels and has designed a nationalistic type of school setting in order to create more nationalistic individuals. Chavez's plans have come under attack by critics who consider these reforms as mere political propaganda. Also, some have already predicted failure because of the poor ideological content and the lack of universal value of the proposed curriculum.

Despite this educational crisis, Venezuela stands high on the list of third world countries. About 91 percent of the population is literate, although "dysfunctional literacy," defined as those who how to read but very seldom do, depending on their level of instruction, habits, and job responsibilities, is unofficially estimated to be around 45 percent of the population. Venezuelans read an average of less than four books a year, and are not, in general, a book-oriented nation. Paradoxically, it is for this reason that education is highly valued in this Latin American country where 80 percent of the population lives in poverty.