The Tarcisio de Freitas (Republican) government is preparing to reorganize São Paulo State Schools, dividing units with more than 1,200 enrolled students. The split is expected to take place before the start of the 2026 school year.
The idea is that each school offers a single level of education and has its own management team. This will allow the two schools to operate within the same building.
The state Ministry of Education, led by Renato Feder, argues that reducing the size of schools will make it easier to manage education, as each unit will be responsible for a single level of education.
For example, 1,800 people will be enrolled in three levels of education (first year of primary school, final year of primary school, and high school) and will be responsible for just one cycle, rather than a single management team responsible for the school for up to three class shifts.
School list is not published.
The reorganization is expected to affect about 100 schools in the state, most of which are older and located in large cities such as São Paulo’s capital, Guarulhos and Campinas. According to the secretariat, of the 3,000 state schools, about 300 have more than 1,200 students.
Principals spoke sheet They were informed about the project last week and told that they needed to formally establish membership by Wednesday (12th). They complain that they are given little time to analyze proposals and consult with teachers, students, and families.
The government confirmed that schools were contacted last week, but said discussions on the topic had already begun much earlier in the URE, the regional education unit responsible for groups of schools in each region.
Michelle Minervo, Séduc’s education secretary, said the average number of students participating in the state network is 600 per school. Therefore, they considered large units to be those with enrollments that were twice the average, or 1,200 or more.
“We identified 330 large schools and proposed desegregation. These schools have very large school communities that are difficult to manage, and directors have to deal with very large teams of teachers, hindering improved educational outcomes,” he says.
He assures that no educational stage will be closed in these schools. The only thing that will be changed is the reorganization of the provision method.
“Schools will typically be reorganized on a rotating basis, so some schools will operate on one stage in the morning and another school on another stage in the afternoon. No students or teachers will be relocated to another school building.”
The idea of restructuring the São Paulo state network, the largest in the country with more than 3 million students, is not new. Ten years ago, then-Governor Gerard Alkmin proposed grouping schools to offer only one level of education.
The 2015 plan envisaged more than 90 schools being closed and a further 754 functioning in only one phase, affecting more than 300,000 students.
The project, without consultation or consultation with the school community, faced strong opposition from students who occupied dozens of units in protest of the closure.
The Ministry of Education says that “desegregation” and the resulting reduction in school size are consistent with findings in the academic literature. Schools with larger numbers of students, shifts, and stages of instruction are likely to have more complex educational management.
“The primary objective of desegregation is to increase intimacy and communication between the administrative team, instructional coordinators and teacher groups,” the document submitted to school principals says.
The document also claims that reducing school size will allow administrative teams to “improve their ability to identify learning gaps and develop recovery strategies.”
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