A gestão da educação pública estadual no Rio Grande do Norte: concepções e orientações dos documentos oficiais

Abstract

The general objective of this dissertation, “The management of public education in Rio Grande do Norte: conceptions and guidelines in official documents”, was to analyze the management of public education in Rio Grande do Norte based on the conceptions and guidelines present in official documents, seeking to understand the challenges and possibilities of its implementation in different regional and institutional contexts. To investigate this research, specific objectives were set: 1) Contextualize national education management, considering the current scenario of public policies for the educational field; 2) Analyze the conceptions of education management present in the main official documents, identifying the possible influences on the daily practice of management in public institutions; 3) Study the official documents related to education management in the state of Rio Grande do Norte to analyze the guidelines and policies that promote democratic management in the state public network. The methodological framework was based on historical-dialectical materialism, and the research was based on documentary and bibliographic analysis, which allowed us to go beyond simply quantitative data, exploring the meanings and significance attributed to the practices and discourses related to educational management in Brazil. From this perspective, we sought to understand the historicity of educational policies, analyzing how they were constructed and the interests that guide them, the contradictions between the normative principles of democratic management, made explicit in official documents, and the actual practices in educational institutions, and the interrelationship between the concrete conditions of management and the ideal of an emancipatory and critical education. The results of the research showed that bureaucratic management still prevails in public schools in Rio Grande do Norte, and that the traditional model of school management still persists within these schools. Based on an analysis of the legislation relating to educational management, we highlight a greater emphasis on democratic management, despite the great mobilization since the 1988 Constitution. We believe it is essential to deepen the analysis of the impacts of educational reforms at local level, especially with regard to the effective participation of civil society in school management processes, in order to move towards a truly democratic, inclusive and participatory education.