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 On an unwalled lot enclosed by barbed wire, Selma Ferreira Rodrigues's shack sheltered her six children, who slept together in the tiny room divided in half by a bookcase and wardrobes. It was the middle of 1995, and her house was located less than 10 square meters from the dam creating the artificial lake Paranoá in one of the poorest regions of the Federal District of Brazil (DF).
Leaving the wooden cubicle after the lunch hour, Steve, the oldest child at age 11, took a bus the 28 kilometers to the federal capital where he worked as a car watcher. He earned a few reais to help his mother, who made her living as a cleaning woman.
The family of Selma's total income did not exceed 300 reais (US$ 134) a month. At that time this was less than that deemed necessary to buy a basket of necessary goods (cesta básica) for four people.
According to National Household Sample Research (PNAD) figures from the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), Selma's family was among the 300 thousand Brazilian families earning less than 60 reais (US$ 27) per capita a month.
Brazilians at this income level allocated almost 35% of their income to food purchases. "I never let the children want for anything, but I got tired of going without eating to feed my kids," she related.
Born in Anápolis, state of Goiás, Selma moved to the federal capital in the 1970s. For a time she lived in the satellite city of Brasilândia and in 1989 set up her shack in Paranoá. After his victory in that year's presidential election, Fernando Collor de Melo distributed land in an attempt to regularize the situation of the hillside squatters near the dams forming the lake.
Selma acquired the 160-square-meter lot. There she constructed her shack and lived with scarce resources until 1995. That year a program was created which would have a direct impact on her family's daily life. Selma Ferreira Rodrigues and her family received benefit number one of the Bolsa-Escola, the country's first income-transfer program linked to education.
The proposal had its 1987 origin during debates in the University of Brasília (UnB) Nucleus of Studies on Contemporary Brazil. Coordinated by Professor Cristovam Buarque, the group discussed solutions for problems related to Brazilian children and adolescents. At one point the discussion turned to the problem of children who did not attend school.
"We were always told, 'The economy has to start growing again to generate jobs and, with their salary, the parents will have school for their children.' I said that this could delay some 20 years or possibly would never happen. Then I thought, 'What could a guy assuming office do? I had an idea: if we need the father to earn money to keep the child in school, then let's give the father money to take his kid to school," recalls Buarque.
In January of 1995, as the new governor of the Federal District, he could implement the income-transfer project imagined years before. In order to discourage migration from other states, some criteria were stipulated for program applicants: the families could not have per capita income greater than half a minimum wage and they had to have at least five years' residency in the DF.
Selma fit the profile. On the Monday designated for inscription in the Bolsa-Escola Program she did not go to work and at five o'clock in the morning she was waiting at the door of the Class 01 School in Paranoá. She and a neighbor were the first in the line that began to form minutes after the cleaning woman's arrival. At eight o'clock the gates opened. Selma presented the necessary documentation - birth certificate, proof of residence, declaration of the school - and left as the Bolsa-Escola Program's first beneficiary.
From that date on, Selma and the other 22 thousand families began to receive one minimum wage a month for keeping their children in school. The majority of the beneficiaries spent the money received on food. Selma's family was no exception, but the first payment helped to begin the installment-plan purchase of a 20" color television set.
Even though the shack remained in the same precarious condition without running water or a sewer connection, the cleaning woman and her children followed, for the first time on their own TV, the era's hit show, the night-time soap "A Próxima Vítima" (The Next Victim), written by Sílvio de Abreu.
Later Selma decided to upgrade her home and transformed the shack into a six-room house. The children got separate rooms: one for the girls and one for the boys. To continue receiving the Bolsa-Escola, Selma needed to remove her offspring from the child labor force and prove they were attending school.
In 1998, the government was paying 138 reais per family, independent of the number of children, as long as all of them stayed in school. Cristovam Buarque explains that the amount was necessary because, had it been less, the children would continue to frequent the streets. "If we pay less, the children prefer to stay in the streets asking for spare change because in Brasília people are generous."
Currently 97.2% of children between the ages of seven and 14 attend school - one of the major conquests in the educational area in the last few years.
When she is not working, Selma follows her children's day-to-day progress. She goes to the school, consults with the teachers and makes certain her children do their homework.
Along with various other families, Selma was excluded from the program in 1999. "When [Joaquim] Roriz took office [as governor], everything got worse." He put an end to all the benefits. It was a difficult time..." Today, she receives help from the non-governmental organization Missão Criança.
Besides the money from the NGO, Selma can count on 45 reais from the Bolsa-Família Program created by the federal government in October of 2003. The Bolsa-Família unified the income-transfer programs (Bolsa-Escola, Cartão Alimentação [food card] and Vale-Gás [cooking gas ticket] into a single register. About five million families have already been enrolled, 20% of them participating in an income-transfer program for the first time.
Today, ten years later, Selma believes that her descendants will have better prospects. "My children certainly will have a future better than mine. I only went to school as far as the seventh grade and all of them will finish their schooling. If I did not have the Bolsa, they all would have begun working early like Steve did."
And it is precisely in the future of these children that the Bolsa-Escola made a difference. In 1995, Selma's oldest child, Steve Ferreira Rodrigues, stopped watching cars when he entered into the Bolsa-Escola Program and could dedicate himself solely to his studies.
He started to use his now-free afternoons to study and play sports. He began practicing capoeira and in a short time was participating in competitions. In 2003, he was invited to give classes in Natal, Rio Grande do Norte State. "If I had continued watching cars, today this wouldn't be possible," he marveled.
Christiane Peres is a Brazilian journalist. This article was originally published as "O primeiro Bolsa-Escola" in Revista Fórum, number 30 - redacao@revistaforum.com.br.
Translated from the Portuguese by Linda Jerome - LinJerome@cs.com.
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138 Reais in 1998 were far more than today 45 Reais...whatever way you count !!!!!
Is this not a Brazilian shame...even more from a leftist President and government ????
Your government have so far a booming economy...and are so proud of repeating how good and smart they are.
Therefore if so little is distributed to the needy...where go all the money ???????
You are richer than in 1998.....right ?
Then why the poors are....pooorer ???????