Visit with the Secretary of Education in Cartagena

After spending a few days in Bogota, including visits and meetings at the national Ministry of Education (Ministerio de Educacion Nacional or MEN), we arrived in Cartagena on Thursday night. First thing Friday morning, we met with the Secretary of Education of Cartagena, Julio Alandete. We also were joined at this meeting and later in the day by the Advisor for Higher Education in Cartagena, Nereyda Correa Rosales. We did not have professional translators or university students with us, so Cassandra translated the entire meeting; normally she only had to do some of the translation, but today she was the only one! We were all impressed.

Julio spoke about the education model in Cartagena, which is part of a new plan for education development (The School is the Center) as a way to build social change. Although it is not visible, Julio told us, actually 60% - 70% of the population is extremely poor. They are working towards “Just One Cartagena."

We learned about the District Education Plan and the different areas they are working on. These include many areas, such as a project to prevent dropout by providing children with food and other supports, a program for adult literacy (which includes literacy, basic education and adult secondary education), and programs focused on technology, etc. Cartagena has also made sure that there are no school fees in any school. The city puts in a lot of funding and support, both from the MEN and additional funding from the mayor and the city.

During the talk we heard about “megaschools” that the city is building – schools that are large, serve many children, and offer support services such as food and activities. Later in the morning we visited the Flor del Campo Megaschool. Cartagena is currently building 20 new schools, and some will be open seven days a week as community centers. Weekend activities will include training on capacity building of families and communities, sports, arts, culture, community development projects, etc.

Cartagena has done a lot of work around adult literacy. The Secretary told us that in the past few years they have had many ceremonies celebrating thousands of adults who have gained literacy skills. They believe that basic literacy is a step towards secondary education. The adult education teachers are paid and contracted by the Secretariat and classes are free to students.

It was great for me to learn more about adult education programs and I was happy to see that Cartagena seems to value the importance of adult education from basic literacy through adult secondary and even post-secondary (which we would learn about later in the day)!

Karen McCabe