A plataformização nas políticas da Secretaria Municipal de Educação do Rio de Janeiro

Abstract

The present study aims at the policies of recommending digital technologies adopted by the Municipal Department of Education of Rio de Janeiro (SME). It has a temporal scope from the pandemic period (2020) until the completion of this research in 2024. It is concerned with how these formulations promote the incorporation of platforms and virtual learning environments in the Municipal Education Network, which is entirely managed by the SME and includes early childhood education and elementary education. The study works from a Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) perspective by Norman Fairclough (2001,2012) in constructing the hypothesis that the approaches to technology observed in SME policies are part of ideological formations analogous to those of reform and of multilateral agencies, with the statements of these organizations providing a kind of reference matrix. To do so, it relies on excerpts from SME texts and its representatives, educational formulations from selected documents and reports of international economic organizations, and agreements between the Department and technology companies for providing digital communication systems controlled by technological oligopolies. Uses the “policy cycle approach” formulated by Stephen Ball and colleagues to analyze the relationship between SME technology policies and those formulated at a macro level. The results of this research indicate that the policies investigated in this specific study refer to ideological factors associated with the neoliberal discourse aimed at economically dependent countries. They also point out that instrumental adherence to digital platforms tends to provide opportunities for the maintenance of hegemonic meanings and practices, and that when institutionalized, they act to dissolve the boundaries between public and private. Consequently, they contribute little to the project of critical and transformative Digital Culture, as they provide opportunities for the scrapping of teaching work in both material and symbolic dimensions.