Avaliações externas de Matemática e de Língua Portuguesa atravessadas pela política neoliberal: reverberações no cotidiano escolar e no currículo

Abstract

The research reported in this dissertation is based on discussions about educational policies, external assessments, and neoliberal rationality. The overall objective guiding the research was to analyze the influence of neoliberal policies on school management and the accountability of teachers for student performance, with an emphasis on the Prova Brasil. This is a qualitative research study, whose dissertation is organized as a multipaper, composed of an introduction, two articles, and a chapter of final considerations. The studies revolve around the problem of understanding how neoliberal rationality influences educational policies, school management, and daily pedagogical practice, focusing on the Prova Brasil. The study reported in the first article aimed to problematize the state of knowledge of Brazilian research on external assessments of Mathematics and Portuguese Language, focusing on the neoliberal rationality that guides such public policies. This was developed through an integrative literature review, based on the analysis of 36 dissertations and theses produced in the Brazilian context. The study reported in the second article aimed to analyze the extent to which the neoliberal narrative implicit in the Prova Brasil assessments reverberates in the daily life and curriculum of schools. This was developed through a case study conducted in a public state school in Montes Claros, Minas Gerais (Brazil), with the participation of teachers who teach Mathematics and Portuguese Language, 5th-grade teachers, school administrators, and students. Data was produced through semi-structured interviews. The theoretical framework is based on discussions about neoliberalism, educational policies, external assessments, curriculum, teacher accountability, and results-based management. The results of the first article show that external assessments, when guided by neoliberal rationality, tend to shift their formative character, operating as mechanisms of control, curriculum standardization, and teacher accountability, strongly associated with the logic of performativity and school ranking, embedded within neoliberal rationality. In the second article, the results indicate that the Prova Brasil goes beyond its diagnostic function and begins to act as a device for regulating pedagogical work and school management, promoting the intensification of preparation practices, the prioritization of Portuguese Language and Mathematics, and the narrowing of the curriculum, in addition to producing pressures, demands, and tensions in the daily school routine, both for teachers and managers, as well as for students. It is concluded that the Prova Brasil, by introducing itself into neoliberal rationality, significantly impacts the curriculum, teaching work, and school organization, reinforcing the need to critically problematize the meanings and effects of these assessments on Brazilian educational policies