The Academic Profession in Brazil

Simon Schwartzman and Elizabeth Balbachevsky

Universidade de São Paulo

Published in Phillip G. Altabach, ed., The International Academic Profession: Portraits from 14 Countries. Princeton, NY: Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, 1997.


4. Work

a. Working conditions

The usual assumption behind full-time contracts for academics in the universities is that roughly about half the time is dedicated to teaching, and another half to research. In most public universities, and in some fields, departments and institutes more than others, there are active groups of professors working intensively in research and teaching. In aggregate terms, however, as indicated in table 9, only in the São Paulo university did the stated time budgets show a similar distribution of time between teaching and research. Teaching occupies most of the time in all other types of institution, except in the private sector where the time spent on non academic activities is slightly higher. When asked directly about the number of actual hours spent on teaching, about half of the respondents declared to teach eight or fewer hours a week, which is significantly lower than what appears in a standardized table(11). The distribution of teaching load is inversely proportional to the academic degree of the professor, and to the time he or she devotes to the institution (full-time professors in public universities teach significantly less than part time or temporary teachers hired by private institutions). There are no significant differences among regions or fields of knowledge.

Table 9 - Average number of working hours* a week when classes are in session, by type of institution
  State (SP) State (other) Federal Private Total
Teaching 12.6 17.7 16.2 13.4 14.9
Research 12.4 7.1 8.6 5.3 8.0
Services 3.9 3.9 4.0 5.3 4.0
Administration 4.7 4.2 4.8 2.1 3.9
other activities 6.2 6.9 6.3 13.8 8.7
* Answers adjusted to a standard 40 hours' week. When the total of hours reported was less than 40, the difference was attributed to "other activities"; when it was more, values were proporcionally reduced to fit the total of 40.

Table 10 gives the overall evaluation of working conditions in different types of institutions. Brazilian professors are reasonably satisfied with their working climate, but complain about professional benefits and working equipment and resources. The most significant differences are about retirement benefits, which are good in São Paulo and federal institutions, and, bad in other state and private places; and the significantly better intellectual climate and availability of material resources and services at the Universidade de São Paulo(12).

Generous legislation for Brazilian professors in federal universities and in the state of São Paulo allows for men to retire after thirty, and women after twenty-five of work with full salaries, without significant contributions to retirement funds during their professional life. In recent years, the cost of these retirement benefits was included in the higher education institution's budgets, absorbing about twenty to 40% of all resources available, and raising. This situation is clearly untenable, and cannot be maintained for long. At the other extreme, employees in private institutions are only entitled to a retirement ceiling of ten minimum wages a month (less than US 1.000,00) after thirty-five years of work, and there are usually no private pension arrangements. The situation in different states varies depending on whether their higher education institutions are defined as part of the civil service or not.

The better intellectual climate reported at the São Paulo university, combined with better evaluations on the availability of teaching resources and services, confirms the notion that this is one of the best academic institutions in the country, and one of the best equipped, although their professors are as critical of their academic environment as those in other institutions.

Table 10: Evaluation of Working Conditions (average scores)
  State (SP) State (other) Federal Private Total
a) Professional side benefits (1: excelent; 2: good; 3: regular; 4: bad, does not have it)
Retirement Benefits**** 2.26 3.68 2.58 3.72 3.01
Sabatical leaves**** 3.28 2.90 2.72 3.50 3.06
Support for academic travel**** 3.56 3.37 3.73 3.77 3.68
fellowships and incentives for further studies*** 3.06 3.04 3.17 3.36 3.19
other benefits (medical, housing, family education, etc.)**** 3.53 3.81 3.92 3.63 3.64
b) academic environment:
intellectual climate**** 2.18 2.69 2.41 2.32 2.39
relationships between academics and the administration* 2.59 2.67 2.45 2.56 2.53
morale among the academics*** 2.68 2.85 2.72 2.51 2.66
clarity of institutional goals 2.70 2.79 2.74 2.60 2.70
sense of community** 3.02 3.00 2.95 2.76 2.90
c) material resources and services:
lecture rooms 2.72 2.75 2.83 2.69 2.76
technical resources for teaching**** 2.90 3.24 3.29 2.94 3.12
laboratories**** 2.98 3.13 3.37 2.94 3.12
research equipment and instruments**** 2.92 3.45 3.49 3.30 3.34
computer facilities** 2.88 3.12 3.17 3.17 3.12
library**** 2.06 3.26 3.06 2.77 2.84
offices for faculty*** 2.80 3.26 3.10 3.05 3.06
secretarial support 2.84 2.91 3.11 2.61 2.89
significance: **** : < .0001 ***: < .001 ** < .01 * < .1

b. Teaching

Teaching is the main activity of Brazilian academics, and their primary interest. The usual differences among types of institutions apply. Professors at the Universidade de São Paulo are more inclined to do research than the others, but only a few place research alone as their primary interest (table 11). Most of the teaching takes place at the undergraduate level, which, differently from the United States, is not general, but professional education(13). In the São Paulo and federal universities, there is a sizeable combination of undergraduate and graduate teaching, but not in the private and in other state institutions (table 12). The teaching load in institutions with little graduate education is slightly higher, in average, than in others (table 13).

Table 11: Your interests lie primarily in teaching or research? (percentages)
  State - SP State - other Federal Private Total
primarily in teaching 9.72 26.42 20.90 22.61 20.39
both, but leaning toward teaching 36.11 43.40 40.80 44.90 41.72
both, but leaning toward research 49.92 29.25 36.82 29.94 35.40
primarily in research 6.25 0.94 1.49 2.55 2.48

Table 12: Which of the following represents your teaching responsibilities at this institution?
  State - SP State - other Federal Private
entirely undergraduate 36.7 85.0 54.3 78.0
some undergraduate, some graduate 54.0  
38.9 17.3
entirely graduate 4.0 7.5 2.2 1.6
not teaching this year 5.3 7.5 4.6 3.1

Table 13: During this academic year, when classes are in session, approximately how many hours a week to you spend teaching at this institution
  Group Instruction Individualized Instruction
N average N Average
State, SP 142 8.7535 135 4.3926
State, other 101 12.3465 86 6.4070
Federal 383 10.7415 346 5.7572
Private 301 11.9236 199 5.1156

Teaching is carried on conventionally, more at the undergraduate than at the graduate level. Students are required to attend classes, write papers, make oral presentations and participate in class discussion. Evaluation of students' performance is based on repeated written tests at the undergraduate level, and single tests and papers in graduate courses. Graduate education follows the American, rather than the European tradition. Students have to attend classes, complete a fixed number of credits, and after some point write a dissertation (table 14). Most doctoral programs are concentrated in a few universities - the Universidade de São Paulo, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Universidade de Campinas, while masters' programs are more evenly distributed, but almost nonexistent in private institutions.

Additional similarities and differences between graduate and undergraduate education are given on table 15. Above all, students have to learn facts and amass information. Theories, concepts, paradigms and methods are more stressed at the graduate level, but still run in second and third places. Professional competence for problem solving is practically absent as an educational goal, either because universities are removed from professional life, or because professors do not know how to teach it - probably both reasons in combination.

Table 14: As a general rule, which of the following activities do you require of your students for successful completion of a course? (percentage requiring)
  Undergraduate (n=921) Graduate (n=324)
attend classes regularly 77.7 64.6
write several short papers 55.0 40.8
write a major paper 47.7 67.0
make a formal oral presentation 41.8 63.6
participate actively in class discussion 66.3 68.8
take a single examination 10.2 19.4
take two or more examinations 65.9 30.9
no specific requirements 1.8 1.9

Table 15: What do you think students should learn in your courses? (percentages stating it as first priority)
  undergraduate Graduate
Facts, information 49.6 37.7
Theories, concepts, paradigms 23.5 29.3
Research methods 4.0 16.0
professional competence for problem solving 1.1 5.2
others 10.7 11.7

Professors are not happy with their teaching work, and complain about the number of courses they have to teach, the size of their classes, their teaching facilities and resources, administrative workload, availability of research funding and non academic professional activities. Some important differences among institutions appear. Professors at the Universidade de São Paulo are less unhappy about their teaching facilities and resources, but complain more about administrative workload; professors in private institutions and São Paulo are more prone to see their non-academic activities as an asset. They are all favorable to incorporate the student's opinions in the evaluation of teaching activities, something which is in fact seldom done in Brazil, and believe that there should be better ways to evaluate teaching performance. They dislike the pressure to publish, although this pressure is usually not very strong, because of the lack of graduate education and research in the private sector, and the job stability in the Federal system. Interestingly, the Universidade de São Paulo, which is the more research intensive institution in the sample, is also where the pressure to publish is seen as less problematical. Finally, except again at the Universidade de São Paulo, professors believe that teaching effectiveness, rather than research, should be the main criterion for promotion (table 17).

Table 16: Please indicate the way your teaching is influenced by the following circumstances (1, strong positive; 5; strong negative influence)
  State, SP State, other Federal Private Total significance(1)
The number of course I am assigned to teach 2.66 3.16 2.64 2.77 2.69 **
the number of students enrolled in my classes 3.05 3.32 2.96 3.29 3.12 *
eaching facilities and resources here 2.89 2.97 3.44 2.90 3.13 ****
my administrative work 3.84 3.53 3.38 3.22 3.43 ****
the availability of research funding 3.20 3.65 3.60 3.25 3.43 **
my non-academic professional activities 2.38 2.80 2.59 2.27 2.48 **

Table 17: Statements about teaching conditions at the institution (1: agree; 5: disagree).
*student opinions should be used in the evaluation of teaching effectiveness 1.80 1.68 1.65 1.50 1.65 *
the pressure to publish reduces the quality of teaching 3.52 4.22 4.07 4.06 3.98 ****
we need better ways to evaluate teaching performance 1.89 1.68 1.70 2.05 1.84 **
teaching effectiveness should be the primary criterion for promotion of faculty 3.46 2.59 2.65 2.33 2.67 ****
(1) Significance: ****: <.0001 ***: <.001 **: <.01 *: < .1

Finally, professors are not happy with their students. They see them as not well prepared in language, communication or quantitative reasoning skills; they often do just enough to get by academically, are willing to cheat to get good grades, and are less studious than in the past. This situation of anomie among the student population, as perceived by their professors, is more acute in the private and in the state universities outside São Paulo, which are the institutions where more students come from lower social strata, and have less resources to attend them. In all places, professors feel remote from their students and think that they ought to meet them more often outside the classroom, but it is difficult to imagine what it is actually done about it.

Table 18: Please give your opinion about the ability and performance of the undergraduate students of your institution (1: agree; 5: disagree)
  State, SP State, others Federal Private Total significance (1)
they are adequatedly prepared in written and oral communication skills 4.17 4.43 4.33 4.41 4.34  
they are adequatedly prepared in mathematics and quantitative reasoning skills 3.57 4.0 3.92 4.08 3.05 **
they do just enough to get by academically 2.88 2.05 2.58 2.28 2.47 ****
they are willing to cheat to get good grades 3.21 2.84 3.14 2.56 2.94 ****
they are more studious than the students I had five years ago 3.76 4.22 3.75 4.16 3.0- ***
faculty should spend more time with students outside the classroom 2.06 2.05 1.94 2.05 2.01  
(1) Significance: ****: <.0001 ***: <.001 **: <.01 *: < .1

c. Research

More than half of the professors say that their working contracts require research activities, a figure that reaches 91% for the São Paulo university and 65% for federal institutions. Percentages are also high for those with a doctoral degree (80.2%) and those in the basic sciences (67.8%). The percentage of professors saying that they are involved in some research work is higher than those subject to a formal contract to do it, since they can do research outside the institution where the interview was conducted.

Unfortunately, there is a significant difference between general statements about research work and the reality, as can be seen in tables 19 and 20. Only a third of those who declared to be engaged in research received any kind of financial support in the last three years, and slightly more than 50% had what could be called a "qualified" academic product, as defined on table 19. Of those, 21% had just one product in the last three years, and 36% one or two. Although the quantity of "products" is a very rough measure of academic achievement, such small numbers do mean that scientific production by Brazilian academics is small. Not surprisingly, there are large differences in scientific production among types of institutions. In the São Paulo university, 54.3% of the professors had more than one product a year in the last three years, against 27% for federal universities, 8.3% for other state institutions, and 32.2% for the private ones (probably persons doing research in other institutions).

Table 19. Research activity, by institutional context and academic degree.
  The contract with the institution requires research Is engaged in some kind of research In the last three years :
received some kind of financial support for research had one or more qualified scientific product(*) had one or more product of any kind (**)
Total 52.9% 63,8 31,5 54.7 75,9
Institutional context
State (SP) 91.0 93,2 49,7 82,8 94,7
State (other) 44.0 53,8 20,6 38,5 64,2
Federal 65.0 72,8 33,8 57,2 80,3
Private 22.9 41,4 23,4 43,7 65,4
Academic degree
undergraduate 30.2 42.9 14.7 37.6 59.0
specialization 31.0 40.7 11.6 33.0 63.3
master's degree 64.3 70.0 61.3 83.7 96.2
Doctor's degree 80,2 91,6 61,3 83,7 96,2
Associate and full professor 61,8 77,3 42,7 76,2 86,4
* scholarly books authored, articles in academic books or journals, patents secured, artistic work performed or exhibited, video or film produced.

** all of the above, scholarly books edited, research reports, papers presented to conferences, professional articles for newspapers and magazines, computer programs for public use, and others.

clique para ampliar

Part of the difficulty in getting research done is related to the limited academic qualifications of a large section of the professors, and part to the scarcity of research funding. The proportionally large investments in science and technology made by the Brazilian government from the late sixties to the late seventies were drastically reduced in the eighties, while demand increased. For those who reported some kind of financing in the last three years, about half received less than five thousand dollars. The main source of financing is the Brazilian government, and in the second place the researcher's own institution. No researcher receiving grants only from their institution got more than US 5.000 in the last three years, and about half of those receiving from the Brazilian government also remained below that limit (tables 21, 22 and 23). This picture suggests that the possibility of actually doing research in Brazilian universities has been more limited in the last three years than the figures on academic publications suggest. From the humanities and social sciences to technology and health, those who manage to work in teams are more likely to receive support for their work than those who work alone, but their chances are still of less than fifty percent. Not surprisingly, professors who only do research see negative influences in their surroundings, the highest - and justified - complaint being the scarcity of research funding (table 24 and 25).

Table 21: Total amount of research funding received in the last three years.
  Frequency percent cumul %
less than US$ 5.000 137   46.3   46.3
5 to 24.9 92   31.1   77.4
25 to 49.9 28   9.5   86.8
50 to 99.9 15   5.1   91.9
100 to 249.9 15   5.1   97.0
250 to 499.9 thousand 3   1.0   98.0
more than US$ 500 thousand 6   2.0   100.0
Total 302   100.0 100.0

Table 22: Source of financing: Multiple answers):
  Total Percentages
From the institution where I work: 133 34.4
From Brazilian goverv. agencies 237 61.2
from Brazilian companies 35 9.8
from Brazilian private foundtions 23 5.9
from international agencies 35 9.0
from foreign governm agencies 39 10.1
from multinational companies 20 5.2
from foreign private foundations 13 3.4
from other sources 15 3.5
N: 387

Table 23: Grant values for those receiving from one source only (main sources):
  Own Institution (%) Brazilian Government (%)
less than US 5.000 100% 48.7
between 5 and 24.999   33.0
between 25 and 49.999   6.1
more than 50 thousand   7.8
N 17 110

Table 24: scientific production and finantial support, by organization of research work
  Works in research in teams Does individual research does not research now Total
Scientific production with finantial suport 41.9% 18.0% 3.4% 24.9%
scientific production without finantial support 29.5 46.9 26.9 31.0
no scientific production in the last three years 28.6 35.2 67.7 44.1
Total (100%) 465 128 327 920

Table 25: Indicate the way your academic research is influenced by the following circumstances (mean scores: 1 - strong positive influence: 5 - strong negative influence)
the availability of research funding 3.54
facilities and resources for research here 3.34
the number of courses I am assigned to teach 3.16
the kinds of courses I am supposed to teach 2.59
the number of students enrolled in my classes 3.11
the quality of students available as research assistants 2.76
the amount of student advising I do 2.84
my non-academic professional activities 2.90
my administrative work 3.60
valid cases: 545

d. Service

"Service" translates in Brazil as extension work, and for many years it was usually understood as some kind of assistance work carried on to the benefit of the poor, in terms of health services, legal support, continuous education, teacher training. Students and professors can participate in extension work, and in some cases (more specially in the health sector) it is an integral part of the student's training. More recently, the word begun to encompass also services provided to private clients, business organizations and governments, with some kind of payment. Initially, paid outside consulting and services were seen as infringement of full-time contracts, but today they are widely recognized as important mechanisms to link the universities with their environment, and improve the income of the most entrepreneurial staff. Abuses, of course, can happen, and several universities have tried to regulate how much time their full-time professors can dedicate to extension and other kinds of consulting work, how much of their income can be derived from these activities, and the overhead the university should receive. These limitations, however, are usually not very strict, and are seldom enforced.

The number of professors who report to have been engaged in some kind of service activity is very large, 77.2% of the total. Most believe that services to society are a professional obligation, few consider that services distract them from their main activities, and, for a sizeable group in some fields, they provide a substantial parcel of their income. The main difficulties they find for their service work are the lack of adequate research facilities, and their administrative workload. Their attitude toward service is positive, less in the sciences, and more in the technical professions.

The biggest client for services is the Brazilian government, followed by educational institutions, and finally by private companies and industries (table 26). Here again, the usual differences apply, although they are not very large. The highest percentage of professors involved in services was at the São Paulo university (88.7%), and the lowest at federal universities (73.2%). Professors engaged in basic sciences had the lowest level of involvement (70.2%), and those in health sciences, the highest (87.2). Not surprisingly, technologists had more contacts with the private industry, those in humanities and education with educational institutions, and those in health with governmental institutions (table 26).

Table 26: With which kinds of organizations have you worked in the past year (includes paid and unpaid consulting work, public and volutary service) - multiple responses
  N %
Business, Industry 223 30.49%
Educational Institutions 341 47.30%
Local Government 318 44.11%
National Government 206 28.57%
Private, social service 62 8.60%
International govern bodies 39 5.41%
other int. institutions 38 5.27%
other 98 13.59%
TOTAL 721 100.00%

Most service work is without economic compensation. Persons in technical professions, engineering and those working in the private sector get an average of 40% of their time spent on services paid; on the other extreme, those in basic sciences are paid less than 20% of the time. More than a half of the professors who report to have been engaged in services see this kind of activity as a matter of economic necessity (53% on the total). This necessity seems more urgent among professionals working in the private sector, and less frequent among professors from the University of São Paulo. There is also a linear, inverse association between academic rank and this necessity. Finally, academics working in the technical and social professions are more willing to agree that they do it as a mater of economic necessity than the others.

Table 27: Services and extension work
  does not provide services to institutions believes that:
faculty has an obligation to apply knowlege to problems of society services are a distraction which competes with essencial work paid consulting work is economically necessary service is important for faculty evaluation
Type of Institution
State, SP 11.3% 64.2 11.9 25.2 39.1
State, other 22.2% 77.1 19.3 34.9 35.8
Federal 26.8 68.1 13.4 31.9 38.9
Private 23.9 67.0 10.4 41.2 29.6
Fields of knowledge
basic sciences 29.8 58.3 14.5 21.1 28.9
social sciences 25.1 74.7 12.0 59.9 38.0
humanities 20.1 62.1 9.1 25.1 32.9
technology 20.5 77.1 10.8 53.0 34.9
health 12.8 73.4 17.6 31.4 45.2


Notes

11. On table 9, whenever the sum of declared working hours by a respondent in a week was more than 40 hours, the values were reduced proportionally to that value; if the sum was less, the difference was attributed to "other activities". Thus, all answers were standardized, for comparison's sake, to the same 40 hours' work week.

12. The results about "sabbatical leaves" are misleading, since they are not institutionalized in Brazilian universities, except in very few places.

13. Several questions in the Carnegie questionnaire distinguished "undergraduate introductory courses", from " other undergraduate" and "graduate and professional", a classification that does not apply to Brazil.