HISTÓRIA RECENTE DA EXPANSÃO DO ENSINO SUPERIOR NO BRASIL: 1990 A 2020

Abstract

Brazilian higher education has its origins in an ingrained elitist tendency, serving a public from the highest social strata and with a tradition in higher education. However, there was a significant demand for progression in studies, putting pressure on the government to correct the gap between the supply of vacancies and the demand for higher education. Thus, several policies were aimed at democratizing this level of expansion. The present study seeks to carry out a survey and discussion about public policies aimed at the expansion of higher education implemented in the recent history of the country, since 1990. In order to obtain an understanding of how the current university structure in the country was conceived, and how its audience was characterized. This analysis was carried out through official documents available in the Official Gazette of the Union, as well as published by the responsible public entities. Also included are budgetary data from public transparency and statistical synopses from higher education educational censuses. It appears that the country's social inequalities are reflected in educational inequalities. In this way, public policies implemented aimed at mitigating such inequalities stand out. Faced with the difficulties of structuring the public system to absorb all high school graduates, private HEIs took better advantage of the public policies of that period and continued to expand.