The New Version of the SAT: Chile's Teenagers Against Inequality - Timeline

For ages, people believed that education is one of the most important things in a person’s development. Indeed, obtaining a degree does play a significant role in our lives.

All around the globe, college and university graduates have a sufficient job-seeking advantage over those who haven’t completed their degrees.

Realizing the crucial role of education, wouldn’t it be fair to provide everyone with equal opportunities to obtain it? Probably it would.

Some students are lucky to have financial support to study at good facilities. At times they don't even have to bother that much. Today, there are many solutions to make learner's life easier. Some use essay writing help from http://essayhub.com/; others hire tutors or otherwise invest in their education.

Still, there are those who just can’t afford to pay extra for education. It would be fair to give them a chance too.

Unfortunately, not all countries are ready to support young people of all backgrounds in their commitment to study. In this article, we are going to look at the Chilean students’ strike. It took place recently and aimed to stop inequality. What were the reasons?

Let’s find this out and discuss the timeline of events.

Mass Student Strikes in Chile: Reasons and Objectives

Throughout 2019, Chile has been in the grip of economic and political cataclysm. The mass indignation flared up on October 18, when government authorities have officially increased public transportation fares. The people’s indignation has been snowballing, causing lots of rebellions against inequality and elitism.

What inspired people to rebel, and what were they demanding? The core reason behind mass strikes takes its roots in the early 1980’s. The right-wing dictatorship constitution of Pinochet, the reforms towards free-market and limitation of states involvement in such areas as health or schooling effect Chilean society even in 2020. After a huge economy growth, the split between the richest and the poorest remain to increase.

Although the uprising took place because of transportation fares, the biggest trigger for student strikes became a law that required students to take the University Selection Test (PSU).

The PSU is a Chilean version of the SAT. In other words, it is the exam learners have to pass in order to apply to college.

Most Chileans agree that the introduction of the PSU is biased. According to reports, most local students attend public schools that are free of charge. Apparently, free facilities provide a lower quality of education compared to private schools that are funded by student fees. Only 4 out of 10 applicants can afford relevant secondary education which embodies them to pass a test successfully and get into university.

Students are convinced that their peers from private schools have larger chances to pass the PSU and get into college. This statement is also backed by official stats. According to the research, only 30% of public school pupils score well enough on their tests to enroll in college, on the contrast to 43.5% of teens from partially-private schools and 79% from fully private ones.

Looking at such numbers, it becomes clear that the PSU is indeed biased in favor of the minority of students whose families can afford paying more for education. According to the ACES (a far-left students’ union for high-schoolers), such educational burdens are what causes income inequality and low rates of social mobility in Chile.

The union highlights that it is unfair to grant a more successful future to some teens, just because their families can afford better schooling. The requirement for the PSU basically means that only pupils from private educational facilities can be prepared well enough to pass the exam. Respectively, they are the ones that get a chance to enroll in college and land a decent job in the future.

What are the objectives of strikes? The ACES and its members see themselves as a social justice movement. The mission is to put an end to a biased attitude and ensure equal opportunities for everyone regardless of background.

Chilean Strikes: Timeline

The student strike has emerged earlier this year. The PSU testing was scheduled for January 6 and 7, 2020, and about 300,000 pupils were expected to take the exam these days. However, the ACES and its members got in their way.

The union has disrupted the activities of test centers. Teenagers striking against the PSU were clashing with the authorities. They were blocking entrances and burning test papers. The protest didn't let at least 82,000 pupils take their tests.

After strikes, the rebels occupied the offices of test authorities and demanded them to end the PSU.

On January 27 and 28, teens called for additional strikes.

Possible Solutions for Chilean Issues

The strikes that take place in Chile are the people’s way to drive the government’s attention to the pertaining issues. In the long run, these riots have the potential to reshape the Chilean political landscape.

Revels claim that they are fighting against inequality in the country. However, if one decides to dig deeper into the causes of people’s frustration and indignation, it will be evident that not the inequality issue itself keeps inflaming riots. The cause, to a larger extent, is the government’s inaction and unwillingness to make a change.

No doubts, the government, and Piñera himself, has yet to come up with a solution to the growing list of economic and political demands, which also include president’s resignation.

“In Chile’s case, the state is doing nothing in terms of redistribution or diminishing differences in people’s incomes,” says Rodrigo Pérez, a professor of development economics at Santiago’s Universidad Mayor.

So, what can Chilean authorities do to change the situation? Obviously, to satisfy the nation’s demands, the government needs to make real changes in the country’s political landscape. There are a few steps to solve pending economic issues and diminish financial inequality among people:

- Increase income. One of the main things the Chilean government should do is reduce the current income gap among representatives of different classes. This implies an increase in minimum wages and pensions;

- Provide better funding. Another key solution is ensuring a stable flow of state funding to help poorer communities develop and prosper;

- Balance out the cost of services with people’s incomes. One of the biggest concerns of rebels is unjustifiably high costs of basic services that don’t get in line with the wages. To solve this issue, the country’s authorities need to offer a reform that would reduce the cost of essential services. Among them are healthcare and education.

These are the key solutions that can satisfy the demands of Chileans. At this point, the country’s president Sebastián Piñera has already made some of the relevant proposals, including marginally higher taxes on the rich, acceleration of the minimum wage, a 20% increase in the pensions, and adequate costs for healthcare.

However, to make an actual change and not just grow people’s dissatisfaction, the government needs to implement these solutions as soon as possible. There is no space for empty promises in today's Chile.

The Bottom Line

To many of us, Chile has been known as one of the stable, peaceful, and good-performing countries in Latin America. However, the events of the past year have changed everything. Riots, acts of vandalism, cruelty, and violence have been emerging here and there all across the country.

The thread of civil strikes, which includes other protests apart from those against the PSU, still continues.