Higher Education in Brazil: the implantation of UNITINS and the use of EAD as an expansionist strategy for a public university

• Main Authors: Nelson Pretto, Isabel C. Auler Pereira
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina 2009-12-01
• Series: Perspectiva
• Subjects: ensino superior; universidades e faculdades-tocantins; políticas públicas; ensino a distância-tocantins; higher education; universities and faculties-tocantins public policies; distance education-tocantins; enseñanza superior; universidades e facultad
• Online Access: https://periodicos.ufsc.br/index.php/perspectiva/article/view/12169

This article highlights elements in the implantation of the University Foundation of Tocantins (UNITINS) associated to the use of information and communication technologies through the initial offer of “tele-presential” teaching, which is characterized by the association of televisable and technological resources. It is based on the contextualization of the events that took place at UNITINS in the periods of its implantation with the use of a tele-presential educational modality (and later Distance Education) as resources that make viable the accelerated process of conception, formulation and execution of the pedagogic project of the tele-presential Normal Superior course, initially offered in Tocantins State and later in the entire country. The reconstitution of this historic route at UNITINS, identifying the constant changes in its legal nature, emphasizes the coincidences between the adjustments made during the period of its implantation and the context of restructuring and adjustments of the Brazilian State to the demands of international policies. These transformations leave clear marks of the ties of higher education in Tocantins to a policy of minimization of resour-ces for public universities. The continuous restructuring of the University, either as a public foundation, or as an authority or foundation open to private capital and the beginning of offering of distance courses are in keeping with the neoliberal agenda adopted by the state government and with the establishment of new regulatory standards and substantial changes in the field of Brazilian higher education.