Claudia Sheinbaum, the president-elect of Mexico, has been giving signals that serve to clarify what her plans are for the next government. This Sunday, for example, she assured that she will continue the controversial educational project launched by Andrés Manuel López Obrador, called the New Mexican School. The initiative will be accompanied, she said, by a series of new scholarships for all students in public schools, which the future government will stagger over the next two years until reaching three levels in 2026: preschool, primary and secondary. Everything will be under the command of the next Secretary of Education, Mario Delgado, strongly criticized these days for having endorsed Enrique Peña Nieto’s educational reform during the previous six-year term. “He is very closely linked to the teaching profession,” Sheinbaum defended this Monday after commenting that several of Delgado’s relatives were normal school teachers.
It is not clear what the exact fate of education in Mexico will be in the next six years, one of López Obrador’s outstanding debts. Although it does not seem that it will be very different from the one it had in the past five and a half years. Hit by the lag left by the covid pandemic, the educational system faced a reform during this mandate that was ambitious on paper and problematic in practice. The model aimed to teach more through formative fields, than through traditional subjects, and to impart knowledge in a way applied to life and the social context. Because it was more progressive than what Mexico had seen until then, or because it was applied hastily, critics were quick to arrive. The most optimistic now hope that during the new Government, with Sheinbaum being a person from the academy, the project would be reviewed. “No, no,” confirmed the president-elect this Monday when asked about the subject.
“It represents a new educational model based on this peaceful revolution, on the revolution of consciences,” she argued on Sunday when she was on tour with López Obrador and Delgado. The Mexican basic education system covers some 24 million students and 1.2 million teachers, including public and private preschool, primary and secondary schools. Despite affecting so many people and turning the traditional model applied for decades upside down, López Obrador’s reform was hardly debated publicly. Neither were the textbooks, which caused a stir last year among the most conservative sectors. Sheinbaum has now left a certainty on this issue: nothing of what the current government has done will be revised or cancelled in the next six-year term.
“I want to give back to the people of Mexico what they gave me, and for that reason, we are going to continue strengthening public education,” Sheinbaum said on Sunday, after confirming that she will maintain López Obrador’s plans. “Public education is not only about classrooms, the teaching staff, who deserve all our recognition, but we must also support families so that children do not have any problems and can fulfill the dream of public education.” These supports are the financial scholarships. First, adolescents who study in secondary school will receive them, a measure that is expected to begin in 2025. By next year, in 2026, it is supposed to cover all students in the public system.
The management of the scholarships will be in charge of the next Secretary of Education. Delgado came to Sheinbaum’s Cabinet as a kind of reward for having led Morena in an election in which they obtained an overwhelming majority. However, the president-elect has defended the experience of the future official in the matter. “He was already Secretary of Education,” she said in reference to the position he held between August 2010 and March 2012 in the Government of the then Federal District, headed by Marcelo Ebrard. The lack of training and experience has been a constant criticism of the holders of that portfolio in the López Obrador Government. In the last five and a half years, three secretaries passed through there without pain or glory.
Sheinbaum argued this week that the New Mexican School is not just about imparting knowledge, but about transforming people’s lives. To get there, the next Executive will have to navigate the turbulent waters of implementing a new education system. Even those who applaud financial support for students recognize that this is a first step to keep students in the classroom. The other challenge will be to actually teach.
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