In keeping with the belief that education is part of the backbone of a well-functioning society and the success of individuals, the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights recognizes education as a human right. One way to ensure that everyone can exercise this right is to take down barriers that prohibit some people from exercising those rights. Making education free is one way of taking down barriers. This is especially necessary in a country like Chile with such high economic inequality.
Unfortunately, simply making some schools free of charge has not been a successful solution to the problems of inequality faced by Chileans today. While each child has access to a school of some type, most of the free schools perform much worse than schools that charge tuition fees. There are also fewer school options in more rural parts of Chile, meaning that even if the school located near where a student lives is of very low quality, that child may have no other choice than to attend that school.
For a number of years now, Chile’s education system has been under scrutiny for the way it perpetuates economic and geographic inequalities that have existed in Chile for decades. These grievances sparked major student-organized protests in 2006, 2008, and 2011, when over a million students took to the streets!
