President Bachelet: “Approximately 93% of students will receive free textbooks”

“These are specific benefits that will represent significant savings for families. We calculate that the cost of textbooks is approximately 150,000 Chilean pesos per student. Furthermore, we are providing very high quality books,” she said.

President of Chile Michelle Bachelet visited the distribution center for free textbooks in the Santiago district of Pudahuel in the company of Education Minister Adriana Delpiano. The purpose of the visit was to observe the distribution of books to students from local public and subsidized private schools.
“We are talking about over 3.1 million students enrolled in 11,000 schools throughout Chile. In other words, approximately 93% of our students will receive free textbooks. The government guarantees that all of them will have high-quality basic educational materials so that they receive exactly what we want to give them: a quality education,” President Bachelet explained.

The textbooks will be provided from the Pre-kinder through Grade 12, and a total of 150 different titles will be distributed. Schools that have decided to offer English classes in Grades 1 through 4 also will receive textbooks for those levels.
All of these materials, including the textbooks, are the property of the student and will remain with them when they finish the school year. This will allow teachers to use them to encourage children to continue to learn and for students’ families to enjoy and benefit from them.
“The reform is no longer an idea. These are specific benefits that will represent significant savings for families. We calculate that the cost of textbooks is approximately 150,000 Chilean pesos per student, which means that this is a major savings for families. Furthermore, we are providing very high quality books,” the President explained.

During her speech, President Bachelet also referred to the implementation of the Inclusion Law, which ends the practice of charging copayments for over 240,000 students whose families will no longer need to pay for their education.

“One need look no further than here, in the district of Pudahuel. There are six schools here that decided to join the free education program through the Inclusion Law. These now form part of the group of 328 schools in the Metropolitan Region that will be free for everyone starting this year,” she added.
As she brought her remarks to a close, the President reiterated the government’s commitment to make progress in regard to education.

“I believe that we can be optimistic. We can make changes. Some claimed that we would not be able to do it, or that it would be a huge step backwards. And the truth is that they were wrong. Whether you look at families that will be able to have quality free education in schools and universities or at the fantastic, high-quality textbooks, I believe that this shows that this is not a step backwards at all. On the contrary, it is a huge step forward,” she noted.