A University of the State of Rio de Janeiro study based upon the 2000 Census shows that only one in 50 adults who call themselves, black, mixed race or indigenous succeeds in completing college. One out of every ten white Brazilians over 25 years old has a college diploma.

Antônio Carlos de Alleluia still remembers his time as a mechanical engineering major in the UFF (Universidade Federal Fluminense—Federal Fluminense University. He was the only black student in the class and a white student persistently tried to impede his participation in the study groups.

The son of a washerwoman and a carpenter from the Vidigal favela in Rio de Janeiro, Alleluia, at 53 years of age, is in the COOPE (Coordination of the Engineering Graduate Programs) doctoral program at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.

He is still the only black student in the class. And he relates how two women department employees obstinately blocked him from speaking with his faculty advisor.

“All the other students were there. I couldn’t enter. It was always like that; it’s still like that.”

The Rio engineer’s story is educational for an understanding of the Brazilian university. It is a place of the elite, and a place of white people.

A study by the Laboratory of Public Policies (LPP) of the University of the State of Rio de Janeiro (UERJ) based upon the 2000 Census shows that, while one out of every ten white Brazilians over 25 years old has a college diploma, among black Brazilians the proportion is much less.

Only one out of every 50 persons who call themselves mixed race, black, or indigenous has completed his or her college education.

The “Map of Color in Brazilian College Education” was presented at the conference “Two Years of Quota Policies: Balance and Perspectives,” which was held from October 25 to 27, 2004, at the University of the State of Rio de Janeiro.

College Education

According to the Census data, only 5.8 million Brazilians have completed college—the equivalent of 6.77% of those over 25 years old. And, of these few, 82.8% identify themselves as white; 2.1%, as black; 12.2%, as mixed race; 0.1%, as indigenous; and 2.3% say they have Asian ancestry.

A comparison of these percentages with those of the Brazilian population by color or race (53.7% white, 6.2% black, 38.5% mixed race, 0.4% Asian, and 0.4% indigenous in 2000) clearly demonstrates that the university has a larger percentage of white and Asian Brazilians and a reduced percentage of black, mixed race and indigenous Brazilians.

Among white Brazilians over 25 years old, 9.93% have a university education.

Among Afro-Brazilians, the figure is only 2.13%. Of mixed-race and indigenous Brazilians, the percentages are only 2.36% and 2.22%, respectively.

Among those older than 18 who are attending college, 78.8% are white. Of the Brazilians who have completed a master’s or doctoral program, 86.4% are white, 9.2% are mixed-race, 1.9% are of Asian extraction, and 0.2% are indigenous.

Only 1.8% of those with a master’s or doctoral degree self-identify as Afro-Brazilian. Among these is Antônio Carlos de Alleluia.

“I taught my children that they should not be ashamed of their color and that they needed to prepare themselves to be among the best. They’ve had experiences similar to what happened to me. Who knows? In 100 years things may be different,” he says.

The entire Alleluia family is among the small percentage of Afro-Brazilians who are currently studying in universities or who have completed their college education.

Besides the father, who is an engineer, the mother, Elma, who is 51, is an economist; the oldest child, Antônio Breno, 25, is studying electrical engineering and pursuing his master’s degree in telecommunications.

The two youngest daughters are university students. In the Morro do Vidigal favela, the family has created the Alzira de Alleluia Center of Professional Education, an NGO preparing young people who are Afro-Brazilian and/or poor for the professions.

Exclusion Begins in High School

The author of the LPP research, the sociologist José Luiz Petrucelli, says that racial discrimination begins in high school.

Of the Brazilians who complete this level of instruction, 67.6% are white, 4.3% are black, 26.5% are mixed race, and 0.9% are of Asian ethnicity. Only 0.2% are indigenous.

“In high school there is already a racial filter. Since universities have fewer openings available than the potential demand, it is the white population that is admitted.

´If high-school education were more balanced, there would be less inequality in the university. As things are now, it can be seen that Afro-Brazilians are underrepresented in the university and discrimination also extends to the workplace,” affirms Petrucelli, the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) investigator responsible for analysis of the Census data about education and color.

He says that it is a mistake to imagine that the racial difference stems solely from socioeconomic conditions, since it also can be found in the population with a per-capita household income higher than five minimum wages.

(One Brazilian minimum wage is 260 reais a month or US $90.90; five minimum wages equals US $455.)

In the white group with this income, 37% have concluded their university education; among those who call themselves black or mixed race, only 20% have completed college.

Petrucelli defends the idea of implementing racial quotas in the universities as a means of reducing the inequality.

“Those against quotas maintain that merely improving K-12 education solves the problem. It doesn’t. And they still say that those in favor of quotas are against improving education for everyone, which is not true. The quotas are a way of trying to remedy the inequality in a shorter period of time.”

University Quotas

In Brazil, thirteen public institutions of instruction have now agreed to quotas, reserving spaces for students who are black, disabled, indigenous, low income or those coming from public schools.

To make this system a general formula, the Executive Branch sent a bill to the Congress setting aside 50% of places in institutions of higher learning for students coming from the public schools.

Of this 50%, racial quotas will be established in proportion to the percentage of black or indigenous people in the state in question, according to the IBGE data.

At least 27 other similar projects are under consideration in the Congress. In the University for Everyone (ProUni) Project, which anticipates offering free education in private institutions to low-income students, there is also talk of quotas for minorities.

This article was originally published by O Globo.

Translated by Linda Jerome - LinJerome@cs.com.

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