Changes in São Paulo's high school system and their media repercussions

Abstract

The Brazilian high school reform, established through Law No. 13,415 of February 16, 2017, promoted many changes in this stage such as curriculum flexibilization and an increase in the number of class hours in this stage of basic education. Each educational system could organize such changes according to its specificities, and the state of São Paulo was the first to implement the reform, in 2021. This study aims to contrast the arguments of the São Paulo government to justify the modifications made with content about the measure published by mainstream media, through an analysis of the g1 portal. The objective is to investigate whether the persuasive strategies of the government’s official texts were reflected in the journalistic coverage, in accordance with the Gramscian concept of hegemony. To this end, eight releases from the São Paulo government presenting the changes related to the reform in the state and 14 texts from the g1 portal that echoed this official information were analyzed. The analyses show that, in part of g1’s coverage, there were discussions about the government’s lack of dialogue with students and teachers and about the setbacks of the measure. However, official statements remain the most prominent and, generally, without due scrutiny. Furthermore, it is noticeable that little criticism is directed at the influence of business sector representatives in education.

Keywords: High school reform; press; g1; educational policies; hegemony.