Estudantes forjados nas arcadas do Colégio Militar de Porto Alegre (CMPA): "novos talentos" da Olimpíada Brasileira de Matemática das Escolas Públicas (OBMEP)

Abstract

This thesis aims at analyzing government strategies and tactics operated by Colégio Militar de Porto Alegre (CMPA), whose students have stood out in the Brazilian Mathematical Olympiad of Public Schools and been positioned as “new talents” in Mathematics. The theoretical foundations that have supported this investigation are theorizations by Michel Foucault, such as those found in Discipline and Punishment, The Birth of Biopolitics and Security, Territory, Population, and The Government of the Living. The research material has comprised CMPA documents and the official web page of the Brazilian Mathematical Olympiad of Public Schools. The analysis of the research material has shown that: 1) developing students’ competitiveness and making them become self-entrepreneurs are government strategies defined by both OBMEP and CMPA; 2) the tactics employed to reach such strategies have peculiarities: OBMEP modifies its regulations and ceremonies to deliver golden medals, and offers mathematical improvement programs to the students; CMPA performs the pinning ritual and encourages school hierarchy, the Participation Bonus and the use of the pin; 3) the coincidence of strategies and the convergence of tactics have positioned CMPA students as “new talents” in Mathematics.