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 Out of every ten of the world's best soccer players, at least five are Brazilians. Of all the world's Nobel Prize winners, none is Brazilian. Of the great Brazilian players, almost all have their origins among the poor, while almost all the upper-level professionals come from the wealthy and middle-class sectors of society.
In these times of the World Cup, the TV and radio are broadcasting short biographies of our great players every day. They all share one fact in common: They began playing soccer at four years of age in some sandlot game close to their home, sometimes in the yard of a friend. All persisted in developing their talents. Thanks to opportunity, talent and persistence, they transformed themselves into great stars. In the Brazil of today, twenty million boys play soccer. If merely one of each ten thousand has talent and persistence, in the next World Cups we will have two thousand top-notch players; if it is one in each million, we will still have two complete teams, made up of great stars. The same thing will not happen in science, technology, and literature in Brazil. We will not have twenty Nobel Prizes, not even if we add twenty million girls to those twenty million boys. Because few will enter school at the age of four. They will not have access to the best schools; they will not be able to persist in the development of their talent; they will not have books or computers like they have soccer balls. Brazil has great stars thanks to its taste for soccer, the size of our population and the fact that everyone has access to a ball and to a sandlot game. Up to now, our country has never had a Nobel Prize for Literature or Physics because few Brazilians have access to quality schooling beginning in early childhood, with teachers who are well paid, well prepared and dedicated and have books and computers available in the necessary quantity and quality. The sandlot games and the soccer balls appear spontaneously, or through the efforts of the community and the boys themselves. The school and the computers will be available only if the entire country makes a deliberate effort. No one has become a soccer star through luck alone; this comes about through talent and persistence. But, in Brazil, intellectual development depends, above all, on the child's luck of being born into a wealthy family, in a prosperous city, with a mayor who makes education a priority. The talent and persistence come later because, before that, what a child needs is opportunity: a quality school. Intellectual development depends upon conditions created by the national state: schools, books, computers, teachers. If we had done this fifty years ago, Brazil would be the champion of learning and not bringing up the rear, the position that we currently hold. If we do it at this time, twenty years from now we will have made up for lost ground, and then we will have the chance to win not only the World Cup, but also the Cup of Learning, of knowledge, of science, of technology, of literature. Besides the World Cup trophy, we will have won the Nobel Prize medals. In addition, we will have the capital and the foundation to build the Brazil of the 21st century. Soccer dazzles, but only learning builds. There is, however, a serious impediment to all this: Brazilians have passion for soccer. The victories make everyone emotional; the defeats leave everyone dejected. But the same passion does not exist for education. Weeks ago, the media informed us that we are losing to Haiti in terms of students held back to repeat a school year. Nothing happened; no one felt uncomfortable. Had we lost to Haiti in soccer, our players would have been very poorly received when they returned to Brazil. To win the intellectual medals, it is necessary to have the same passion for school that Brazil has for soccer. Cristovam Buarque has a Ph.D. in economics. He is the candidate of the PDT to the presidency of Brazil in the October 2006 elections. Buarque is also a senator for the Federal District and was Governor of the Federal District (1995-98) and Minister of Education (2003-04). You can visit his homepage - www.cristovam.com.br - and write to him at
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. Translated from the Portuguese by Linda Jerome -
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