Arguments for training teachers in religious education in the religious studies course at UFPB: what kind of teachers we want to graduate?

Abstract

Based on rhetorical analysis, this paper discusses the educational planning of the religious studies course—teaching degree—offered by Universidade Federal da Paraíba (UFPB). It presents a brief overview of religious education under the current legislation, an approach to the institution’s teacher training, and an assessment of what is expected of teacher training in this university. In a preliminary review, it is inferred that the autonomy of the educational field considered from the premise of secularism, could be under threat. This paper concludes that public universities, here understood as hubs of knowledge and basic education teacher formation, have the responsibility to ensure that their courses’ educational planning should not adopt a speech whose fundamentals would compromise the basic principles of secularism.