Image / Cubadebate

By Roberto Morejón

The Cuban teaching system should receive recognition if we appreciate the corollary of a comparative study applied in 16 countries, on behalf of a structure related to UNESCO's Regional Bureau of Education for Latin America and the Caribbean.

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization fulfills one of its missions by watching over the progress of instruction, and in that purpose it detected that there is NO progress in the region south of the Rio Bravo since 2013.

The research conducted by the Latin American Laboratory for the Evaluation of the Quality of Education states that even a year before the Covid-19 pandemic, more than 40 percent of third grade students and more than 60 percent of sixth grade students in the subcontinent did not reach the minimum level of primary competencies in Reading and Mathematics.

Children in Cuba stand out in this universe by being above the regional average in most of the areas evaluated, with no gender gaps in Mathematics and Science.

Associated factors contribute to such success in Cuba, UNESCO acknowledged, such as the support of families in the learning process, the wide access to preschool education and the time devoted by schoolchildren to study during the week.

The analyses carried out under the auspices of UNESCO are a source of satisfaction for Cuban pedagogues, who, nevertheless, are promoting the third phase of improvement of the national education system.

The Caribbean nation still needs to emphasize a greater understanding among students of irreplaceable values such as honesty, selflessness, love for the homeland and respect for adults.

Even in the midst of material hardships, since not all schools can have the expected level of constructive maintenance, no child is left out.

This is what happened when, in search of the new normality and thanks to a better control of the course of the pandemic caused by the new coronavirus, Cuba resumed the 2020-2021 school year in a classroom mode, with the appropriate distance between chairs and desks, which forced to find variants so that no one would be left out.

Under these unusual circumstances, the men and women of tomorrow receive in Cuba an education with unquestionable guarantees.