Discussions on the inequality of the school day in preschool, elementary and middle school education in Colombia

Abstract

Discussions on the length of the school day in Latin American countries have been constant and conflictive, particularly in recent decades, following the progress in coverage that most of these countries have made. As we shall see, there is no agreement on the correlation: longer school day - better academic results, or at least this is not considered to be the only determining factor. However, other dimensions of the social system are analyzed in which there is a positive impact of extending the school day, especially those related to a better use of children's free time, avoiding their involvement in gangs and facilitating the working lives of their mothers, fathers and caregivers. We insist on the lack of commitment, especially in the allocation of resources by the Colombian State to advance in the definitive establishment of the single school day in the country's public schools and how this results in unequal conditions between official and private educational institutions, which, in spite of this, are evaluated and classified on the basis of a supposed meritocratic model: through standardized tests, which in turn are decisive when it comes to accessing higher education, either because they are the first filter in public universities or because they are a prerequisite for accessing scholarships or financing credits; thus a perverse system is configured that is doubly exclusive and inequitable, which, as observed towards the end of the essay, was further deepened as a result of the social isolation resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic.