Implementing institution: Fundación Paraguaya
Country: Paraguay
Source: WISE
Execution period: 2002 - in progress
Plataforma de Prácticas Efectivas: Collaborative learning
To transform students from poor rural areas into social entrepreneurs, while ensuring the sustainability of the school and the local community.
A comprehensive approach focused on technical learning through the management of an agricultural business.
The learning model significantly develops students' skills in business management and entrepreneurship.
The San Francisco Agricultural Secondary School program was developed and launched by Fundación Paraguay in 2002 and is aimed at all young people in the country who live in rural areas and are economically vulnerable. They pay an annual tuition fee equivalent to US$ 21 to cover the costs of their food and school materials.
The learning model is strongly linked to practice, which is linked to and complemented by conventional courses. The content of the classes includes the national curriculum (science, mathematics, history, etc.), technical courses in agricultural management and courses in entrepreneurship and business management. Students use this knowledge to collectively develop, with the support of their teachers, micronegotiations in the school.
During the 3 years of their studies, the student entrepreneurs manage the agronomic and economic aspects of their business, learning in this way to live together, to know, to undertake and to be financially sustainable. The sale of their products in local markets generates resources that maintain the self-sustainability of the school. Teachers have a very important responsibility for the sustainability of the program because it is through their teaching that entrepreneurship projects are generated that are appropriate to the reality of the local market.
The Foundation trains in two additional areas of the program, courses in agronomic management and business management. The decision to introduce technical courses in agriculture and entrepreneurship at the secondary level is based on the analysis that the main cause of poverty in Paraguay is the low human capital of the farmers and their scarce knowledge about the market and the management of their business.
In 2005, 40% of the Paraguayan population lived in rural areas, working mostly in agriculture. Some 61% of the people in these areas were below the national poverty line (50% in urban areas) and 12% were considered illiterate. In turn, only 28% have completed secondary school, as compared to 54% in urban areas. The rural world in Paraguay is marked by high degrees of isolation and low human capital. To reverse this situation, in 2010 the Ministry of Education launched a multi-grade program for initial schools in rural areas. The program includes advice and training for teachers, as well as a modified curriculum aligned with the needs of the rural world.
In 2007, the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) financed a study to assess the impact of the San Francisco Agricultural School’s pedagogy on its students. For 3 weeks, a consultant interviewed the headmaster of the school, the teachers and the managers of Fundación Paraguay. The qualitative analysis highlighted a significant increase in children’s skills in business management and entrepreneurship. For the model to be replicable, the study highlighted a number of preconditions that have to do with teachers’ motivations, which must be deeply focused on learning through business; the location of the school which should have good access to a local urban market; and its resources, since it must have a property and infrastructure capable of developing several businesses. The main strengths of the self-sustainable agricultural school program lie in the entrepreneurial approach that promotes a strong dynamic toward innovation and cost control.
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