Diario de Cuba, Jorge Olivera Castillo, Havana, 23 April 2015 — According to a close friend, no fewer than half of the graduates of Cuban universities during the last 50 years, have been graduated in vain.”
Such an assertion might be considered distorted and extremist, but the reality outweighs the data that continue to have no place in the official press nor in the other spaces controlled by the State-Party.
From the start, what counted was massiveness. The only insurmountable barrier to higher education is ideological divergences. The slogan about the university being “only for revolutionaries” is kept as current as on the first day it was proclaimed from the platforms and acclaimed by the multitudes.
Intelligence and suitability became secondary factors to be considered during the university admissions process.
If we add to such follies the regression in teaching methodologies and the limitations in using new technologies, conclusions are easily reached that have nothing in common with the statistics that overstate successes and promote perspectives that are realized, only and exclusively, in the reports by the officials.
In this scenario it is normal for the diploma which documents a university graduation to often be a false trail.
At times, all it takes is a simple conversation to confirm ignorance about key topics in national history and other subjects that taught in junior high and high school.
There are cases in which abilities are limited to a subject studied and do not signify an excellent education.
The future consolidation of capitalism in Cuba is a prospect that generates little enthusiasm for many who display with ill-concealed pride their university degree.
In such a context it will be impossible to cover up the many gaps in knowledge.
What will dictate standards is competitiveness – not participation in acts of revolutionary reaffirmation and other contrivances that exemplify the culture of social parasitism and the institutionalization of fraud as a norm of citizenship in the struggle for survival.
It is a shame to have invested so many material and human resources for such poor results.
The collapse of the paradigms of Caribbean-style socialism is a phenomenon undergoing its final phase.
Among the ruins that exceed their figurative framework to showcase their leading role across the country are those of the Ministry of Education.
In this act of the tragedy, what stands out is the army of functional illiterates coming out of the classrooms of the Revolution.
One of the legacies of a project that failed and whose founders refuse to accept the verdict of history.
Translated by: Alicia Barraqué Ellison
