Public school and its teachers: from school trajectories to social representations of students

This article analyzes social representations of "public school" and "public school teacher" taking as a reference the trajectories of university graduates from public schools, enrolled in the Humanities, Philosophy, Arts, Communication, Legal Sciences and Education Centers at UFPE. As a reference, we adopted the Theory of Social Representations, particularly the structural approach proposed by J. C. Abric. We developed a qualitative research with a group of 15 university students, enrolled in different courses from the different academic centers mentioned. As a data collection instrument, we use the narrative interview. The material was analyzed with the support of the content analysis technique. We organized the corpus into thematic categories. The results reveal the school's social representations centered on learning space and coexistence; a space permeated by affective relationships and situations of violence. Despite the adversities, students do not deny the formative role played by the public school and the incentive of teachers to achieve academic success. Especially in reference high schools, the role of these professionals was considered more active and relevant. Thus, the investigation reiterates the importance of the public school and its teachers for low-income students. In view of the results, we defend educational policies aimed at valuing the public school, to guarantee better teaching and learning conditions for the young people and adolescents enrolled in it.