ARTICULATION OF LEVELS IN ARTISTIC EDUCATION: AN EXPERIENCE OF EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH IN A LATIN AMERICAN CONTEXT

In this paper we present partial results of the project "Artistic tertiary education, High-School Artistic Diversification: analysis of the current articulation and future projections,"(1) which is centered on the High-School Artistic and Expression Diversification (BAE, due to its acronym in Spanish), an educational instance that corresponds to the last two levels of Secondary Education of Uruguay; it particularly addresses the problem of its articulation with the artistic tertiary education opportunities in the country. The BAE is one of the options offered by the High-School Diversification; it was created in 2006 as a first experience of specific art education at the secondary level. This research is the first systematic approach to the subject in a country with some of the oldest university degrees in South America on this field. The Project is developed in a moment of intense institutional change regarding artistic education, that includes the creation of new degrees and modifications to the structure of teacher training institutions on the different disciplines. The Project includes an ethnography of teaching practices related to artistic production, an analysis of the training of teachers involved at the different levels and of the expectations of the students starting and completing the BAE. The theoretical framework developed has as fundamental conceptual axes an anthropological perspective on learning situations, which addresses the relationship between the generation of knowledge and the society that produces it; the role of art in the construction of identity and citizenship; the possibilities of multi, inter and transdisciplinarity of the knowledge involved; the concepts of pedagogical and didactic models, explicit or implicit; stated theories and theories in use; hidden curriculum. We delve into the problem of the clash of institutional cultures, the result of a system whose levels - for the first time in the history of the Uruguayan education-must deepen both vertical and horizontal relationships. The methodology includes an analysis of the corpus of official regulations on BAE, and of current plans of study of tertiary institutions linked to BAE in the music, theater, and dance disciplines. In the field work we conducted records of learning situations, interviews with authorities, managers, teachers, and surveys to high school and tertiary students. Results can be summarized as: a) a clear mismatch on the education opportunities; b) a notorious lack of coordination between BAE and the tertiary education opportunities: this Diversification is not a propedeutic phase for any of the considered university degrees; c) a strong weight of the hidden curriculum; d) a marked difference of interest regarding BAE, considering university degrees dedicated to music creation, interpretation and research and the available courses for teacher training: while in the latter 50% of respondents have graduated from BAE, almost none of the students of the first was formed therein; e) a situation of inequality on the access to tertiary degrees in arts: the skills required for their access are not offered in the public system, in a country where the universality of free tertiary education is emphasized.