Training
Since the period of military dictatorship until 1985,
education has been invested as part of the country's
economic recovery. Uruguay has the highest literacy level in
Latin America. The school system, which is essentially
state, consists of six-year primary school (starting at age
6) followed by a secondary school in two stages of each
three years, the "basic cycle" and "baccalaureate". The
latter stage is divided into a university preparation and a
vocational preparation program. In 1996, 91% of children
went to primary school and 36% to secondary school.
Investment in adult education has been made to correct
illiteracy, which in 1995 was 2.7%. The country has two
universities, one state that accepts the majority of
students and one Catholic. Check topschoolsintheusa for test centers of ACT, SAT, and GRE as well high schools in the country of Uruguay.
The population is almost exclusively of European descent -
the last Native Americans were exterminated in 1832. Uruguay
is therefore the only country in Latin America
without an indigenous population. Population growth is the
lowest in Latin America. This is partly due to massive
emigration as a result of the economic crisis and political
repression in the 1970-80's. About half of the country's
population lives in the capital Montevideo.
The fertile lands east of the Uruguay River have been
inhabited for at least 10,000 years. In the early 16th
century, the area was inhabited by three peoples: the
Charrúa who were hunters and led a nomadic life, the
Chanas who developed a burgeoning farming community
along the banks of the Uruguay River, as well as the
Guaranians, in addition to mastering various
agricultural techniques mastered the manufacture of
ceramics and the sailing of the river in canoes.
In 1517, Juan Díaz de Solís, as the first Spanish
conqueror, sailed up the Río de la Plata River, where he was
killed by the natives. In 1527 Sebastián Gaboto was the
first European to navigate the Paraná and Uruguay rivers and
founded the first Spanish settlement in the region. But the
Spanish conquerors ignored the eastern part of Uruguay for
the next hundred years. That first changed when the governor
of Asuncion - Hernando Arias de Saavedra (Hernandarias) -
introduced cattle in 1611 and began to transform the area
into a "sea of cattle." The excellent pastures and
temperate climate enabled large-scale cattle farming, which
attracted "faeneros" - people who worked to pull the skins
of the dead animals - all the way from Brazil and Buenos
Aires. The indigenous population and these faeneros
was mixed and this was the origin of the "gaucho". The
indigenous people had already completely changed their
culture with the introduction of beef in the cooking and of
the horse in the work in the plains.
The proliferation of cattle farming in the 18th century
led to the extinction of some mammal species, reduction of
vegetation and depletion of the soil. The indigenous
population was displaced to the Jesuit missions in the
northern part of the country, and was subject to a definite
extinction policy that peaked in the 19th century.
In search of cattle and access to the rivers, the
Portuguese gradually entered the Banda Oriental. It
was the name of the area of present-day Uruguay and a
significant part of the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do
Sul. It had been collected in 1680 and was for decades the
subject of strife between Spaniards and Portuguese. By 1724,
Spain had ordered its governor of Buenos Aires, Bruno
Mauricio de Zabala, to cross the La Plata River and to set
up a fort in the Gulf of Montevideo. Like Buenos Aires,
until 1776, Uruguay was subject to the Viceroy of Peru. This
year, the Spanish royal house divided the old viceroyalty
and formed the Viceroy of Río de la Plata, headquartered in
Buenos Aires. Montevideo served as a naval station from then
on.
|
