El Sistema Research Articles

El Sistema et l’attachement à la défamiliarisation: enseignement et apprentissage de la musique symphonique à Santa Rosa de Agua, Venezuela

Based on an ethnographic investigation carried out in 2015 within El Sistema, a Venezuelan program for teaching symphonic music, this article is a pragmatic analysis (Dewey, 2010) of what it is to teach and learn music in this context. The results reveal concrete social interactions between students and teachers, specific to the symphonic context. Data analysis is based on the concept of ‘attachment’ (Hennion, 2004) to what is familiar and comforting, and the concept of ‘defamiliarization’ (Shklovsky, 2008) in view of what is strange and unfamiliar. Paradoxically, these two conceptualizations are simultaneously interdependent and in constant tension. Contrasts are experienced every day, which can strengthen social cohesion and the continuation of music schools.

Intestinal parasites in schoolchildren, public health problem. Intervention from the National Integrated Health System of Uruguay

To generate a model of intervention, from the National Integrated Health System (NIHS, Uruguay), with school facilitators of health, web resources and approach from the schools to the community. Descriptive cross-sectional study of population base using a random sampling, non-clustered, during the months of April and December 2016. This was based in the model of schoolchildren health promoters, the use of web resources and community approach with the school as the centre of actions. The prevalence of parasites was 14% for Giardiasis (6,5 and 22%) (IC95%: 11-17) and 26% for Oxiurosis (IC95%: 22-30) (20 and 44%). Soil transmitted helminthiases were geo-referenced: we found 45 clusters, mainly in slums without basic services. These worrying results show that there are regions in Montevideo (Uruguay) with high levels of faecal home and environmental contamination. Community approaches with prevention activities from NIHS may have a positive impact on these vulnerable populations.

Un modelo para el Sistema Ganadero Nacional

El objetivo es representar el sistema de produccion nacional en equilibrio para la ganaderia bovina mediante un modelo que incluya indicadores caracteristicos a nivel macro, tales como porcentaje de destete, tasa de extraccion, porcentajes de hembras en faena, porcentaje de mortandad, vida util de las vacas, entre otros. Para tal fin se utilizaron las bases de existencias SENASA de la serie 2003-2018 (16 anos) surgidas a partir de la vacunacion Aftosa, y las bases de faena surge de la informacion historica publicada por la Secretaria de Agroindustria de la Nacion. La primera es una medida de stock, representada por las existencias en un momento determinado del ano (marzo); la segunda es una medida de flujo, representado por la cantidad de animales faenados durante todo el ano. Se concluye que el stock del modelo se compone de 53,7 millones de cabezas, de las cuales 22,6 millones son vacas. De la faena total, los machos representan el 56,2%. La faena de hembras de equilibrio es, por lo tanto, 43,8%. Si se consideran todos los indicadores en relacion al stock de vacas, estableciendo a estas como el 100%, la faena de hembras representa un 25,3% y la de machos un 32,5%, lo que representa una tasa de extraccion de animales para faena del 57,7%. El destete nacional se ubica en 67,8%. Los toros representan un 5% respecto al stock de vacas. Con un descarte de vacas - que van destino a faena - del 10,1% y una perdida de hembras por mortandad del 6,7%, queda definida una reposicion de vaquillonas del 16,8%. Con ello, la vida util de las vacas resulta de 7 pariciones. De las terneras destetadas, se destinan aproximadamente la mitad hacia reposicion (50,6%) y la otra mitad (49,4%) al engorde. Como comentario final debe indicarse que se trata de una representacion simplificada de la realidad, por lo cual las conclusiones surgidas en este marco de analisis, deben utilizase con las limitaciones del caso. Se ha intentado reflejar todo el sistema ganadero con un unico modelo, que puede utilizarse para estimar la posible evolucion del rodeo de acuerdo a la composicion actual, analizar escenarios posibles, analizar la relacion entre indicadores, inferir el impacto que pueden tener medidas para incentivar alguno de los indicadores respecto a los indicadores restantes, y establecer comparaciones con los sistemas ganaderos de otros paises.

Functional parameter measurements in children with ataxia telangiectasia.

To collect preliminary functional data on ataxia telangiectasia and create a disease specific scale: the Ataxia Telangiectasia Functional Scale (ATFS). Retrospective information on patients with ataxia telangiectasia referred to the Assistive Technology Unit was included. Functional mobility scales (the Gross Motor Function Classification System [GMFCS] and the Functional Mobility Scale [FMS]-5, FMS-50, FMS-500) and activities of daily living [ADL] parameters were recorded. We created a 51-point ATFS, that consisted of three ambulation items adapted for ataxia telangiectasia in the frame of FMS (home, school, outdoors), five ADL items, and one schooling item. Twenty-seven participants (17 males, 10 females; mean age 10y 8mo [SD 5y 1mo], range 1y 9mo-25y 6mo), were enrolled; 168 measurements were recorded. Patients walked at a mean age of 1year 4months (SD 5y 4mo) and lost ambulatory capacity at 8years 8months (SD 2y 1mo). GMFCS level and FMS-5, FMS-50, FMS-500 assessments correlated with age (Spearman's correlations r=0.555, -0.617, -0.639, -0.662 respectively, p<0.01 for all), but plateaued after 12years of age. ATFS mean score was 37.46 (SD 7.88) and increased with age (Spearman's correlation r=0.585, p<0.01). The scale showed threestages of disease progression. In this pilot study we show longitudinal functional data of ambulation and ADL skills in ataxia telangiectasia, and created a framework for a functional scale. This functional scale closely approximated disease course, but further validation is required. The Gross Motor Function Classification System and the Functional Mobility Scale are ill-suited for ataxia telangiectasia assessments. Three functional mobility scales (home, school, outdoors) suited to ataxia telangiectasiawere created. The Ataxia Telangiectasia Functional Scale (ATFS) combines mobility and items of activities of daily living. The ATFS closely approximates the three-stage progression of the disorder.

Facts and counterfacts: A semantic and historical overview of El Sistema for the sake of clarification

Over the last years, El Sistema has been enthusiastically received around the world and has inspired several proposals aiming to transplant it to different contexts in different countries. It would seem, then, that El Sistema constitutes a renewed approach that allows a place for inclusive music education within the framework of the traditional orchestral format. The authors, both Spanish speakers, contribute a reflection on the meaning of the name El Sistema, being a short version of the historical and traditional denomination of this project in the context that gave rise to it in Venezuela. From this initial semantic distinction, they propose a clarification of the possible confusion between system, method, and sequence of procedures. For this, they use Frega’s Parametric Model, applied since 1994 for method comparison in various contexts and in equivalent tasks of sequencing analysis and/or difficulty grading. Additionally, they review historical events that gave context to Abreu’s proposal and its subsequent development. In this way, they attempt to elucidate a conceptualization that does not respond to the initial context and the characteristics of its practical implementation in diverse situations. This certainly does not imply a negative conclusion regarding a practice that might be valuable.

Severe neurological impairment: a review of the definition.

Severe neurological impairment (SNI) is a term commonly used in the medical literature, though there is no agreed definition. This limits opportunities for research into healthcare needs, treatment opportunities, resource planning, and outcome. We reviewed the literature to establish consistency of use of the term and to place it in the context of other commonly employed terms used to describe children with severe, complex medical needs. Forty-two articles were included for full-text analysis, with 23 including a definition of SNI. Motor impairment, intellectual disability, communication difficulties, and increased care needs were included in the definition in 80%, 70%, 30%, and 13% of papers respectively. Dependence on others for decision-making, chronicity, and distinction between disorders of the central nervous system and peripheral nervous system were less frequently included. There is wide variation in the use of the term SNI. A consensus-based definition of this term would be useful to facilitate future research. WHAT THIS PAPER ADDS: There is inconsistency in use of the term severe neurological impairment (SNI), limiting research efforts. In defining SNI, considerations are mobility, intellectual disability, communication difficulties, and increased care needs. Distinction between acute and chronic, central and peripheral nervous system disorders, and dependence on others for decision-making were less significant.

Medicina Interna: Un compromisocon el paciente y el sistema

Medicina Interna: Un compromisocon el paciente y el sistema

Music, a vehicle for fulfilment and social development

The national programme El Sistema was created in Venezuela. Since 10 years, an association based on this project emerge in France. ElSistema France use music for social development and fulfilment for deprived families. Three programmes exist which have set up a multicultural choir, a symphony orchestra in schools and staged an opera.

Part 1: Community Music Therapy and El Sistema: Addressing the Empowerment Needs of Individuals and Communities Facing Socioeconomic Marginalization

Music is an accessible tool for positive change within people and societies, even in places facing socioeconomic marginalization due to poverty, discrimination, and lack of access to resources. Social capital has to do with the resources and networks available within society, which may help confront issues faced by individuals and communities. Community Music Therapy (CoMT) and the music education movement known as El Sistema both utilize music—understood as social capital—to address social justice. The purpose of this study was to comparatively examine the ways in which CoMT and El Sistema programs may address the empowerment needs of individuals and communities facing socioeconomic marginalization and suggest how these two approaches may be able to work synergistically to achieve their shared goals. Its findings reveal many parallels and divergence between El Sistema and CoMT in terms of the role of the music, program structure, social justice goals, outcomes, music education practice, areas of intersection, existing scholarly research, and criticisms each has received.

Part 2: Community Music Therapy and El Sistema: A Multiple Case Design Study Reflecting Music's Empowerment in Marginalized Communities

Music is an accessible tool that has been used to foster change within people and societies, even in those places facing socioeconomic marginalization due to poverty, discrimination, and lack of access to resources. Social capital has to do with the resources and networks available within a society, which may help confront issues faced by individuals and communities. Community Music Therapy (CoMT) and the music education movement known as El Sistema* both utilize music—understood as social capital—to address social justice. Part I of this article defines CoMT and examines the purpose and goals of CoMT and El Sistema comparatively, and the ways in which their programs may address the empowerment needs of individuals and communities facing socioeconomic marginalization. Part II reviews the findings of a study that leads toward a suggestion of how these two approaches may be able to work synergistically to achieve their shared goals. Findings reveal many parallels and divergences between El Sistema and CoMT which may be useful in advancing change. This article defines the role of the music, program structure, social justice goals, outcomes, music education practice, areas of intersection, existing scholarly research, and criticisms each has received, in an effort to further advance the understanding and possibilities music’s influence may have on society.

In Their Words: Children's Perspectives on an El Sistema Music Program's Effects on their Well-Being.

The El Sistema movement uses music as a promising tool to promote healthy childhood development and well-being, particularly in children facing socioeconomic challenges. Recognizing the need to better support underprivileged children in their neighborhood, the community-based organization Share the Warmth (STW) created an El Sistema-inspired music program named STW El Sistema. Owing to their program's recent rise in popularity and corresponding costs, STW El Sistema coordinators partnered with McGill University researchers to formally evaluate and better understand the program's effects on participating children. We sought to understand participating children's lived experiences in STW El Sistema, and their perspectives on the program's impact in their lives and on their well-being. Community-based participatory research (CBPR), where STW partners were actively involved in the identification of the research question and in the interpretation and dissemination of research findings. This qualitative descriptive study included eight children aged 7-12 years stratified by age into two semistructured focus groups for thematic analysis. Children described STW El Sistema as associated with their well-being: 1) emotionally, by learning to cope with stress, and learning patience and confidence; 2) socially, by fostering a sense of community and relationships with peers and family; and 3) personally and educationally, by promoting scholarly motivation and career ambition. Children expressed that STW El Sistema music program improved aspects of their well-being. Study results warrant longitudinal studies to further assess El Sistema's impact on quality-of-life indicators.

Dancing Energies: Music, the Ineffable, and State Power in Venezuela

This article explores how Venezuelan musicians experience and speak about music's "ineffability," frequently contrasting it with the linguistically fixed state discourses about music. I approach this topic through my ethnographic work on El Sistema, a state-funded program that provides free classical music education and instruments to 900,000 young people across Venezuela. Studying the ways in which El Sistema participants experience and discuss ineffability in music captures the unpredictable, unruly, multiple, and contradictory dimensions of how they inhabit state power. Using a combined phenomenological and discursive approach, I think of music practice as simultaneously the locus of state and symbolic power, and a social experience that transcends and escapes it. I trace how young musicians appeal to the ineffability of music to make sense of their own experiences as barrio (popular sector) residents who are suspended in the cracks of polarized discourses and in the double bind of state power and its opposition. I read young musicians' determination to experience music as ineffable, or detached from the political context, as a medium for confronting the dilemma of being simultaneously dependent on and critical of a state that aims to defend their interests. In summoning musicians' verbal testimonies of music and the concepts that emerge from them as a key to understanding experiences that are thought to be ineffable, I respond to recent calls to articulate a more nuanced place for language in studies of affect and embodiment.

In Their Words: Children’s Perspectives on an El Sistema Music Program’s Effects on their Well-Being

In Their Words: Children’s Perspectives on an El Sistema Music Program’s Effects on their Well-Being

“El Sistema” e il “Coro de manos blancas”. Modelli educativo-musicali tra realtà consolidate e scenari futuri

This article provides an introduction to, and a critical discussion of, the educational model referred to as El Sistema, founded by Jose Antonio Abreu. In the course of over 40 years, starting from Venezuela, Abreu’s system has inspired educational programs for social change all over the world. The program, which thanks to the work of its founder has become an element of national interest, is currently managed by the Ministry for Family, Sport and Health, and has spread globally. After a short historical overview, the article discusses the primary aspects of the educational approach that forms the basis of the Venezuelan model, which today is also part of the Italian educational experience. The discussion is complemented by a preliminary examination, the first in our country, of the peculiar features of inclusive didactics in the main special education program connected to El Sistema, called Coro de Manos Blancas.

Music Education as a Path to Positive Youth Development: An El Sistema-Inspired Program

The El Sistema music education philosophy links positive individual and social development through musical education. This study is a longitudinal examination of the impact of participation in an El Sistema-inspired program, the Miami Music Project, on positive youth development. We hypothesized that over the course of a school year, participation in ensemble-based after-school music programming would significantly enhance factors associated with positive youth development. Specifically, we evaluated social emotional constructs aligned with the Five Cs of Positive Youth Development: Competence, Confidence, Caring, Character, and Connection. Results revealed that participants showed significant increases across all five Cs over the course of the year. Additionally, findings showed that Miami Music Project students showed greater enhancements over time in Character, Competence and Caring when compared to a group of youth who did not participate in music education. This study presents empirical documentation of the numerous meaningful social and emotional enhancements that participation in an El Sistema-inspired program is engendering among youth. In this type of rigorous orchestral model of musical instruction, youth seem to acquire not only cognitive benefits but also a host of social and emotional enhancements, ostensibly from learning in an environment that requires disciplined social cohesion. These findings provide insight into the holistic approach foundational to the El Sistema philosophy and adds to our overall understanding of musical instruction in important ways.

El Sistema, “The Venezuelan Musical Miracle”: The Construction of a Global Myth

The Venezuelan orchestral training program El Sistema represents a paradox. It may be the most famous and lauded music education system in the world, yet scholarly examination in recent years has revealed numerous flaws in the dominant narrative, which appears increasingly like a myth. This article examines the processes by which this narrative was established both nationally and internationally, focusing on the creation, dissemination, and consolidation of the myth by the media, program evaluations, and an emerging global El Sistema industry.

El Sistema as an Opportunity for Collaboration between School and Home – Parents’ Perspectives on an El Sistema-Inspired Activity

The aim of the study is to gain an insight into how the parents perceived their own and their children’s participation in an El Sistema-inspired programme, and how the parents’ participation and commitment should be understood in relation to their importance for their children’s schooling. The study is a case study and is based on semi-structured, qualitative research interviews with three parents. The results show the parents do not promote the idea that El Sistema is a programme that creates opportunities for their children to develop their musicality or paves the way for a career as a musician. Instead, the parents are happy that their children have discovered an interest that engages the children and support their personal development. The programme also provide an opportunity for both children and parents to build a social network. In the light of our theoretical point of departure in communities of practice, the result shows that it is possible to understand the El Sistema-inspired programme as helping to reinforce the parents’ involvement in school practice. The findings of the study suggest that El Sistema-inspired programmes do not simply promote the interest and commitment of parents in relation to their children’s schooling but go further, in that they also promote the children’s development and the well-being of the parents themselves. The results show that the El Sistema-inspired programme helps to bring children, parents and school together. https://doi.org/10.26803/ijlter.17.8.3

Autogestão popular e autoeducação: a experiência de Oaxaca – México (2006)

Trata-se de resenha do livro El Pueblo ensaya la revolución. La APPO y el sistema de dominación oaxaqueño. Esse livro, de autoria de Marco Estrada Saavedra, foi publicado em em 2016 por El Colégio de México, Centro de Estudios Sociológicos.

Between adoption and adaptation: Unveiling the complexity of the Orquestra Geração

In this article, we present part of the results from a wide-ranging research study addressing Orquestra Geração (OG), a Sistema-like project set up in Portugal in 2007. Orquestra Geração strives to bring about, through collective musical practices, the social inclusion and social mobility of children and teenagers experiencing educational and social vulnerability. The data collected include semi-structured interviews with three OG mentors, one of whom currently serves as the OG director, the OG sub-director, former national coordinators, the current national coordinator, and school coordinators, as well as observations of music classes, orchestra rehearsals and intensive summer internships. We briefly describe the project before detailing the organization’s identity and the profile of its music teachers in a narrative highlighted by the actors’ own words. Finally, we analyse the OG through the lenses of two different and yet complementary conceptual frameworks: Mintzberg’s organizational typology, and Cultural-Historical Activity Theory, as expanded and applied by Engeström. Findings suggest an underlying tension between adopting El Sistema’s methodology, as implemented in Venezuela, and adapting this to the Portuguese context. Moreover, a concentration of power in a few key figures may possibly prevent Orquestra Geração from prospering within a framework where its identity stands out as an autonomous project from El Sistema.

Who watches the watchmen? Evaluating evaluations of El Sistema

Within the growing field of publications on El Sistema and Sistema-inspired programmes around the world, a marked divide can be observed between the findings of critical academic studies and commissioned evaluations. Using evaluations of El Sistema in Venezuela and Aotearoa New Zealand as our principal case studies, we argue that this gulf can be explained at least partly by methodological problems in the way that some evaluations are carried out. We conclude that many Sistema evaluations display an alignment with advocacy rather than explorative research, and that the foundation for El Sistema's claims of social transformation is thus weak.