Políticas de educação em Singapura: a relação da qualidade educacional e o desenvolvimento socioeconômico

Abstract

The choice of the research locus and the time frame presented are based on the results achieved by that country in the PISA exams (Program for International Student Assessment), representing the main large-scale educational assessment tool at the international level. Linked to these positive results, Singapore and the other countries of the Asian Tigers bloc, namely South Korea, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, managed to develop their economies in a relatively short period of time, suggesting a relationship between the perceived economic development and the enhancement of human capital built by a quality education, which would lead to social gains and the reduction of inequalities. This topic has been widely studied academically but not addressed in relation to the Asian country in question, highlighting the importance of this research given the possibility of documenting best practices to be implemented in other locations, such as Brazil, which faces various social problems and economic difficulties, compounded by worrying results in large-scale assessments, ranking among the lowest in all PISA assessments since the year 2000. In this context, the present study falls within the sphere of public policy formulation, applying a quantitative-qualitative approach in its research methodology, with a bibliographic and documentary investigation that gathered information from databases and main official websites related to education connected to Brazil, Singapore, and multilateral organizations such as the UN (United Nations), UNICEF (United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund), and the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development). For the construction of this research, official data from Singapore were analyzed, as provided on the pages of the Singaporean Government, particularly on the website of the Ministry of Education (MOE) and the Department of Statistics (SingStat), in addition to information available on the pages of the World Bank and the OECD. In this way, the study aimed to characterize the country's economic development process and its relationship with the construction of an educational system focused on promoting quality education, evaluating this process through three public policy pillars: education financing, teacher appreciation, and educational curricula. As a result, the research demonstrated that Singapore's historical process of economic development was driven by the use of educational policies as a tool for achieving human capital gains, highlighting the relationship between economic development and the quality of education. It is concluded that, despite the divergences and dogmatic oppositions regarding the concept of education quality in the face of market influence, it is clear that the direction taken by Singapore to develop its economy has brought significant social gains to the country, especially in education.