Students aged 40 or over are a minority in Brazilian universities. In face-to-face courses, they represent just over 5% of the total enrollment.
The most recent data from the “Mapa do Ensino Superior”, prepared by Instituto Semesp, an entity that represents providers of higher education in Brazil, indicate that, in 2021, only 7.1% of students in on-site courses at private universities were 40 years old or older. more. In the public network, the percentage is even lower, 4.7%.
The pandemic does not seem to have affected the admission of the 40+ population to universities. In 2019, 6.7% of students attending private universities were in this age group. In the public network, the proportion was 5%.
In distance higher education, the 40+ population appears a little more represented in the proportion of students. In 2021, they were 20.7% of the total in the private network and 27% in public education.
According to the president of Semesp, Lúcia Teixeira, the profile of university students is changing and this is very positive for people’s education. “We have seen changes in classrooms. There is a diverse profile in terms of ages, races, genders, social classes. This diversity is very rich for the university, because the student will not only learn the subject, but learn to see the social reality and be prepared to practice the profession in a way that transforms it”, she says.
Offended student in SP
Recently, a publication by three students of the Biomedicine course at a private university in Bauru, in the interior of São Paulo, mocking a 40-year-old colleague, generated outrage on social networks.
In the images, one of the students jokes: “Guys, quiz of the day: how do you ‘unenroll’ a classmate?”. In the sequence, another young woman replies: “Man, she is 40 years old already. She was supposed to be retired”. “Really”, agrees another colleague.
The National Household Sample Survey (PNAD), carried out by the IBGE, shows that, in fact, 40-year-old Brazilians are far from retiring. In the last quarter of 2022, 70% of the population between 40 and 59 years old was employed, second only to the age group between 25 and 39 years old, in which 76% of people had an occupation in the analyzed period.
After the repercussion of the students’ video, a 40-year-old niece of the student manifested herself on social media and said that her aunt always had the dream of studying and never had the opportunity, as she had to work non-stop to help the family. She also reports that her aunt was very happy and excited about the start of classes.
“Face-to-face higher education has, little by little, received more and more older women, outside the 17 to 24 age group, more common in universities. The woman, in addition to working, is commonly a provider, often having to take care of the family and household chores. This causes many to postpone their dreams”, explains Lúcia Teixeira.
Unisagrado, the university where those involved in the video study, publicly expressed its support for the offended student and said that it does not condone any type of discrimination.
A CNN tries to contact the young women and has not yet received a response.
(with information from Thais Magalhães, from CNN)
Source: CNN Brasil
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