Information Technology in Argentina
Literacy
Argentina has a literacy rate of 96%. Schooling is mandatory for 9 years. Overall attendance falls to half after seventh grade. [6]
Students and Schools
According to the 1991 national census, 10 million people out of a total population of 32.6 million, are currently attending one of 42,000 educational institutions in the country, from kindergarten through university.
About 915,000 children attend 9,700 kindergartens, 5.9 million children attend 24,500 elementary schools, and 2.16 million attend 6,500 high schools across Argentina. Although most children under age 14 attend elementary schools, only half of them finish.[4]
Argentina's National Universities
Argentina's system of education in general, and its public universities in particular, are experiencing a deep crisis. Lack of resources and purpose, coupled with political tensions and economic instability, have resulted in a decline in academic standards and a waste of the available resources in the country's institutions of higher education. Overcrowding and frequent strikes by faculty and staff have taken their toll on the quality of education. U.S.-style solutions, like student-loan programs and community colleges, are also growing increasingly popular. The Menem administration has pledged to increase its education budget by 20 percent per year until the 1993 budget is doubled. More and more private universities, meanwhile, are emerging to take up the slack.
Argentina has 24 national universities, all of which are financed by the federal government. There are also two provincial universities, funded by the provinces of La Rioja and Santa Cruz, and four institutitions with university status belonging to the Armed Forces and the Police. There are, in addition, 26 private universities.
Both private and public universities have failed to respond to the country's
labor needs. Seventy percent of all university students are currently enrolled
in one of six traditional fields of study (medicine, law, architecture,
etc), despite the virtually saturated labor demand in these fields.
University majors available in Argentina
Majors Federal Private
Universities Universities
Public Accounting 22 17
Business Administration 16 9
Educational Studies 15 10
History 18 7
Law School 9 15
Social Services 16 8
Agricultural Engineering 20 3
Communication Sciences 13 7
Source: The Economist Intelligence Unit Limited, 1996
English
Since the late 70's, learning English as a second language has been on the rise among Argentine students. American English has gained acceptance as the language of the international businessworld. This leads many Argentine students to seek English profficiency.
Science and Technology
In argentina there are approximately 350 per million people that are scientists and engineers in research and development. This represents less than one-tenth the concentration of the United States of 3,873 per million. [6]
There are very few large university programs specializing in Computer Science or Management Information Systems in Argentina. Nearly all Argentins'a management and communication software is imported.
Magazines
COMPUMAGAZINE is the most widely-read industry-specific publication in Argentina, and the one with the largest circulation in South America. It is published monthly, besides its four annual special editions. The regular monthly edition is sold to 45,000 readers, and the special editions are sold to 80,000. It is aimed primarily at key purchasing decision makers with articles on lab testing of new hardware and software releases, product reviews, market surveys, as well as sections on Windows, multimedia, communications, games, etc.
The COMPUMAGAZINE reader profile in the private sector follows:
Owner/President: 61.8 percent Manager: 64.7 percent Supervisor: 72.2 percent Employee: 66.6 percent
BYTE Argentina is two years old and is available to Argentine readers seven days after it is published in the US. It contains approximately 70 percent of the articles appearing in the American edition, and the remaining 30 percent consists primarily of interviews of executives in leading Argentine computing firms. It is oriented specifically to a technical audience, and 30,000 copies are published monthly.
PC Magazine is the second largest industry-specific publication in Argentina, publishing 33,000 to 37,000 magazines on a monthly basis.[15]
Last Updated: 4/27/97
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