Experience at Universidad de Santiago becomes a public policy

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President Bachelet made public a new government’s initiative in favor of education: it is the Programa de Acompañamiento y Acceso Efectivo para la Educación Superior (PACE), which goal is to help the most vulnerable students in Chile improve higher education access, just as Universidad de Santiago has been doing since 1992.
At its first stage, the measure will benefit more than 7 thousand high school students. The Mineduc will take charge of the program and Universidad de Santiago, together with Universidad Técnica Santa María, Universidad Católica del Norte, Universidad de Antofagasta and Universidad Católica de Temuco will collaborate to implement it this year. During the ceremony, Juan Manuel Zolezzi, President of Universidad de Santiago, emphasized that “we will use everything that the State gives us to improve our Propedéutico Program.”

During a ceremony held at Palacio de La Moneda, President Michelle Bachelet, together with the Minister of Education, Nicolás Eyzaguirre, officially launched the Program for Accompaniment and Effective Access to Higher Education, (PACE, its acronym in Spanish), a measure that seeks to guarantee youngsters from vulnerable high schools and with the ability to study the access to higher education.

The initiative replicates the existing University Preparatory (Propedéutico) Programs in the country, an initiative that was pioneered by our University in 2006 and that was preceded by the bonus score to the admission test results added by Universidad de Santiago since 1992.

President Bachelet emphatically assured that “inequality in our country cannot continue. We have to give support to young people who exert themselves and who deserve it. Therefore, together with making deeper structural changes, we want to start now,” taking actions before the first 100 days of her administration.

“This program will provide academic, psychological and vocational support to the best students coming from schools and high schools in vulnerable areas so that they enter a university, professional institute or technical training center, if they want, and keep studying until they graduate,” the President said when she explained the PACE.

At a pilot stage, this initiative seeks to help 7,583 students who are today in third year of high school, in 67 educational establishments of 34 communes of the country.

These vulnerable youngsters and schools will be supported by 5 universities that have a Preparatory Program recognized by UNESCO, are members of the Cruch and have been awarded an Academic Leveling Scholarship for 2014. These institutions are Universidad de Antofagasta, Universidad Católica del Norte, Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María, Universidad Católica de Temuco and Universidad de Santiago, that drove this initiative.

Universidad de Santiago’s Preparatory Program to be strengthened

“Precisely today we start an important process: the expansion of the Propedéutico, that was created by Universidad de Santiago in 2006,” Universidad de Santiago’s President, Juan Manuel Zolezzi, proudly said.

He stressed that, although now it became a public policy, “we are not going to take away the funds that we have been assigning for this purpose since 2006. We are going to use everything that the State gives us to improve and enhance the program”, he said.

For his part, the Director of the Unesco Chair Program, Francisco Javier Gil, said that he was very happy because after several years “we have been heard”, referring to the Preparatory Program experience of more than 20 years in our corporation.

“What this program does is going to places where it is not possible to identify through other mechanisms those youngsters who have made the most of their learning opportunities. We identify them and invite them, since the first year, to dream of studying at a higher education institution, if they want to. Through this, the motivation to study develops and when adding motivation to the classroom, the entire educational environment gets better,” Professor Gil said.

A day to celebrate

Fernanda Kri, Academic Vice President of Universidad de Santiago, who also attended the ceremony, said that she was satisfied “because it is a policy that was mostly started at Universidad de Santiago, but mainly because it is an action going in the right way that will allow us to progress in equity and quality at the same time. Therefore, I believe this is a day to celebrate, but also a day to start working, because we know how to do it. If we want to increase the program’s coverage, we have many things to think together with the other universities and with the Ministry,” she said.

For his part, the Director of the Program at Universidad de Santiago, Máximo González, said that he was proud of “the number of capable youngsters, although they have not had the possibility of developing their talents until now.” He hopes that, in the future, Preparatory Programs will not exist. “When higher education will be free in Chile, these Preparatory Programs will not make sense anymore, because students’ merits and the work that they do during high school will be recognized by the School Grades Ranking, and the economic problems that they have will be replaced with free education. We are patient, optimistic and we believe that this step is a good signal in that way.”

Camilo Ballesteros, former Feusach’s President and current Director of the Government’s Division of Social Organizations, attentively followed the activity.

He stressed that this initiative expresses Universidad de Santiago’s spirit. “This evens the field up, giving all youngsters the same opportunities at entering higher education. It is also a recognition of the historical role that the University has played. First, in the 90s, with the bonus score for lower-income students and, today, with the Propedéutico. It is a recognition of the work done by the University.”

According to the President’s proposal, the PACE plans to include 339 vulnerable schools and high schools by 2015, with students from first to fourth year and by 2017, it should include all the most vulnerable educational establishments in the country.

Translated by Marcela Contreras