Quality in early childhood education: dimensions of teacher training, physical infrastructure and democratic management in daycare centers of the bahian semi-arid region

Abstract

Quality in early childhood education constitutes a critical dimension for educational equity, particularly in municipalities of the Bahian semi-arid region where factors of institutional, fiscal and infrastructural vulnerability converge to create challenging contexts. This study critically analyzes the three fundamental dimensions that determine quality in daycare centers: initial and continuing teacher training, conditions of physical infrastructure, and participatory democratic management. Through synthesis analysis of specialized literature (Shonkoff, Kramer, Oliveira, Paro) and normative documents (DCNEI, BNCC, National Quality Parameters), it examines how each dimension operates as a pre-condition for the others and how their deficits combine to reproduce educational inequalities. The study argues that quality does not constitute an abstract or aspirational construct, but rather a concrete and measurable set of material and professional conditions. In semi-arid municipalities, the simultaneous absence of teachers with higher education training (frequency below 40%), inadequate infrastructure (80% of daycare centers in adapted spaces), and mechanisms for democratic management configures a scenario that reproduces cycles of educational disadvantage. It is concluded that public policy on quality in early childhood education in inland northeastern Brazil requires: (i) initial training programs with permanence scholarships; (ii) investment in infrastructure specific to early childhood; (iii) structuring of participation councils with deliberative power. These measures do not constitute a luxury, but an imperative of right and human development.