Brazil Human Capital Review

                   There is a world consensus that the governments, politicians, education systems` employees, parents and students must make an effort to upgrade the quality of education. The fourth industrial revolution is about to begin and we all should be prepared for the technological challenge. The law for the implementation of high school reform in Brazil in 2017 was a good step toward the right direction. Now depend on education system of every state for its effective implementation. We all know that integral high school is difficult to implement in the short-term, but the law is very clear, until 2026 all highschool in Brazil will be full-time. With more investment in new schools will be perfectly possible to implement this new highschool in all schools in every state. So, in October there will be elections, we must not forget to demand the correct  implementation of the high school reform from our candidates for governors` office. We should not wait more, we are wasting precious time.    This post is a summary of the book with the incomplete title above published in June of 2022 at  https://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/099359007012217076/pdf/IDU0c9bcb58a08ac704dbe081eb077b28ef22453.pdf

                       Human capital formation is an urgent agenda. The reasons abound. Brazil was among the most severely affected by the pandemic. In face of these consequences, the question is how to rebuild a stronger country, accelerate inclusive growth, and ensure that lessons were learned from the crisis. This book argues that more and better investments in people is the best way to respond to this global emergency. A significant challenge for Brazil and for most Latin America countries is to improve conditions that will allow children and teenagers to flourish and develop their potential. The story of lost talent starts by using a new indicator to track progress towards human capital accumulation in Brazil at the municipal level: the Human Capital Index (HCI). Higher HCIs today means higher labor productivity in the future. There is no time to waste. Data shows that human capital progress has been slow, unbalanced, and unequal. This leaves the question: does the map of "many Brazils" represent an improvement or deterioration of human capital in recent years? The story of human capital accumulation in Brazil stops abruptly in 2020. The pandemic has had devastating impacts at every stage of skills formation. Schools remained closed for 78 weeks, which was one of the longest closures in the world. Consequently, the proportion of children who do not read and write jumped 15% between 2019 and 2021. There is a long road to recovery. Action, more than ever, can not be postponed. Learning recovery  should be a priority in the coming years. First, and foremost, all students must return to school. Evidence has shown that personalized tutoring and adaptive learning platforms are strong short-term strategies for a solid recovery. However, the legacy of the pandemic has an extra element: unmotivated students rarely learn well or stay in school for long. Human capital is the engine for change. It is the key that unlocks equitable and inclusive prosperity. The Brazil human capital is a story in which the enormous amount talent has been historically underdeveloped and unutilized. This story Brazil can not afford to ignore. The overall HCI in Brazil fell from 0.601 in 2019 to 0.540 in 2021. If adequate measure are not taken, it will take an estimated ten years to recover to 2019 HCI levels. Some policies seem to enhance school quality. One example is full-time school education. Existing literature describes the many factors associated with education quality and school attendance. Parental education seems to play an essential role in explaining children's educational attainment. In addition to student and family characteristics, the school system has also been shown to affect student outcome. A school environment with better infrastructure such as libraries and laboratories appear to improve enrollment rates. Other policies can also enhance school quality, such as full-time school. A key element to guaranteeing public education services is the constitutional obligation of municipal and state governments to spend 25% of net tax revenues on education, and the suplementation of these funds by federal transfers. These transfers are managed by the National Education Fund (FUNDEB). The current challenges faced at each stage of the life cycle are not easy to address and require coordination ability between jurisdictions, policy adjustments to program capacity and service provision. Despite adverse socioeconomic conditions, Sobral, a city in the state of Ceará, has consistently had outstanding performance in the IDEB. Public education in Sobral has one goal: every student must complete lower secondary education at the right age and with appropriate learning. The municipality found success by prioritizing learning, establishing clear goals within the school community, and monitoring progress. Furthermore, the municipality established a focused curruculum with a clear learning sequence. For instance, Sobral established a set of learning strategies to ensure all students were able to read by the end of grade 2, and provide the existing illiterate students in grade 3 with access to additional support to become literate. The municipality also prepared and motivated teachers. The municipality offers structured lesson plans to help teachers acquire a classroom routine. The concept of many Brazils pointed to where policy intervention is needed. Brazil's great challenge in the coming years is to improve and recover its human capital without increasingregional inequalities. Brazil has a wealth of administrative data with disaggregated information that enables the construction of a detailed portrait of human capital in the country. There are, however, some data limitations worth summarizing so that further progress can be made. The report highlightedlifecycle challenges that potentially affect current HCI performance across age groups. The road ahead will involve policy innovation based on successful models that can help Brazil recover and asccelerate huamn capital accumulation. The report has indicated pathways that could lead to better HCI. Right now. the most urgent items on the policy agenda are: recovering from current losses with inclusive education policies and providing a resilient healthcare system with services designed to reach the most in need. Successful federal and subnational experiences during the pandemic have provided valuable lessons moving forward. Government should take advantage of  these lessons and work towards equitable progress by making sure that policies reach those who are systematically in disadvantaged positions.