Education truly matters: Key lessons from Mexico's educational reform for educating the whole child

Abstract

Mexico's 2012-2018 federal administration launched an extensive educational reform whose main goal was to transform its large and complex education system, so as to prepare students to successfully face twenty first century challenges. The assumption being that, by providing them with the tools they need to succeed in this rapidly changing world, Mexico will in turn become prosperous, fair and free. It entailed rethinking the conceptualization and structure of the system, and involved profound transformations in its organizational, budgetary, technical, pedagogical and administrative spheres, with quality and equity as guiding principles. Two disruptive innovations -which steered the process- stand out: teachers' appraisals and the new national curriculum. About this curriculum, three, of several salient features, discussed in this chapter, are: its learning outcomes' structure, which effectively articulate twelve of the fifteen grades of compulsory education; the introduction, from PreK to12th grade, of socioemotional learning; and curricular autonomy as a means to achieving pedagogical innovations in schools. Unfortunately, this reform defied deeply rooted uses and habits of various stakeholders and treaded on many political interests, which resulted in a convoluted process that has threatened its consolidation. The new president campaigned against the reform. It is still uncertain what policies would continue.