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Changes in the Educational System
Bowles (1971) believes that the problems which the Cuban Revolution
has experienced have been due in large part to the legacy which the
Revolution has had to overcome. He lists four main goals for changing
the system: to expand the nation's productive capacities which had
stagnated for 50 years under capitalism; to eliminate dependence on
U.S. and establish interdependence with socialist countries; to
eliminate classism, sexism, and racism; to place labor in a higher
consciousness of creativity and social consciousness, removed from
the objectives of competition and personal reward. All four goals
have at the very center a need to completely revolutionize the
educational system.
Integration of education into total system
Bowles (1971) guotes Guevara as saying, "To build communism, a new
man must be created simultaneously with the material base ....
Society as a whole must become a huge school" (p. 472), and Castro as
saying, "Revolution and education are the same thing" (p. 472).
According to Bowles, the learning process must be organized and con
trolled as a group effort, a collective action to achieve a common
goal.
All phases of education have the "fundamental function of implanting
in students the knowledge, skills, allegiances, and value orientations"
(Valdes, 1972, p. 447) that result in building the "new person,"