School Census: more than 650,000 children dropped out of school in three years

The number of enrollments in early childhood education fell by 7.3% between 2019 and 2021. According to information from the first stage of the 2021 School Census released by the National Institute of Educational Studies and Research Anísio Teixeira (Inep) this Monday ( 31), during this period, 653,499 children up to 5 years of age dropped out of school.

The rate of children enrolled in daycare centers fell by 9% between 2019 and 2021. The most significant drop was recorded in the private network, which showed a reduction of 21.6% from 2019 to 2021. In the public network, the drop was 2.3 % in this period. In all, the 2021 School Census recorded 69,900 day care centers in operation in Brazil.

In all stages of education, in 2021, 46.7 million enrollments were registered – about 627 thousand less compared to 2020, which corresponds to a reduction of 1.3%. The municipal network serves the majority (49.6%) of students. The state network is the second largest (32.2%), followed by the private network (17.4%). The União (federal network) is responsible for 0.8% of the students enrolled. The country has a total of 178,400 basic education schools.

The 2021 School Census showed stability with a relative increase in the number of enrollments in the final years of elementary school. The educational stage is the largest among all in basic education, with 26.5 million students. In 2020, the country had 11,928,415 students from 6th to 9th grade. In 2021, there were 11,981,950 enrollments in those same years – an increase of more than 53,000 students.

The survey also showed that the proportion of elementary school students enrolled full-time increased again. Between 2019 and 2020, the rate dropped from 9.6% to 7.6% in the early years and from 9.3% to 6.9% in the final years. In 2021, 8.5% and 9.2% were recorded, respectively. In the case of the first years of the educational stage, the level of full-time students is practically the same as in the year that preceded the covid-19 pandemic.

According to the survey, there was also an increase in the number of enrollments in high school. 7.8 million students were registered in 2021 – an increase of 2.9% compared to 2020. According to Inep, there is a trend of evolution in enrollments in the last two years of the educational segment, with growth of 4.1% between 2019 and 2021. At this stage, the number of full-time students increased significantly in the public network – from 13.8% to 16.4% in one year. In the private network, the evolution was lower, going from 5.4% to 5.8% between 2020 and 2021.

teaching networks

The municipal network is primarily responsible for offering the first years of elementary education. There are 10.1 million students (69.6%), which corresponds to 84.8% of students in the public network. In the initial years, 18% of students attend private schools. The segment share decreased by 7.1 percentage points between 2020 and 2021.

The state network, on the other hand, accounts for 40% of enrollments in the final years of elementary school, with 4.8 million students. At this stage, there is a majority division of responsibility between states and municipalities – the municipal network serves 5.3 million students (44.7%). Private schools account for 15% of enrollments. In all, 12 million students attend the final years of elementary school in Brazil.

The state network has the largest share of secondary education, serving 6.6 million students (84.5%). It also includes the majority of public school students (96%). Next are the private networks, with around 935 thousand students (12%), and federal networks, with 229 thousand enrollments (3%), respectively.

professional education

The number of students enrolled in vocational education showed a small drop amid the pandemic scenario. In 2020, 1,936,094 students were registered in the segment. In 2021, there were 1,892,458 enrollments. Vocational education enrollments are mainly concentrated in the state network, representing 42.6% of the total, followed by the private and federal networks, with 37.7% and 17.6%, respectively.

School Census

The first stage of the 2021 School Census brings information about all schools, teachers, managers and classes (in their different stages), in addition to revealing data on students and their characteristics.

In 2021, 2.2 million teachers and 162,796 principals were registered in Brazilian basic education. The 2021 School Census showed that most professionals who hold the position of director have higher education (89.5%) and are women (80.7%).

The second stage of the 2021 School Census will be held from February. Inep will apply the questionnaire “Educational response to the covid-19 pandemic in Brazil” for the second consecutive year.

The survey was carried out for the first time in the 2020 edition, with the aim of verifying the consequences of the health crisis on the educational system, in addition to mapping the strategies adopted to minimize damage to teaching and learning.