The latest federal education data gives sisu a significance that goes beyond admission lists. In a system often judged by who gets in, the new census points to a more surprising outcome: who finishes. The 2024 Higher Education Census, organized by the National Institute for Educational Studies and Research, shows that students who entered federal institutions through reserved slots graduated at a higher rate than other entrants, challenging the assumption that access policies stop at the classroom door.
Why the graduation gap matters now
The central fact is clear. Of students who entered federal universities and the federal network of professional, scientific and technological education through reserved slots, 49% completed their degree. Among other entrants, the completion rate was 42%. That difference matters because it shifts the debate from access alone to persistence, academic support, and institutional belonging. It also suggests that affirmative access policies are not merely opening gates; they are being converted into credentials at a scale that policymakers can no longer treat as marginal.
The same census shows that more than 1. 4 million people entered federal education through reserve-slot policies between 2013 and 2024. In 2024 alone, that figure reached 133, 078 students. Most of those enrollments were in universities, which registered 110, 196 cotistas, while 22, 587 were counted in the federal network. Taken together, those numbers frame sisu as part of a broader admissions architecture that has steadily widened the presence of historically excluded groups in public higher education.
What lies beneath the headline
The deeper story is not only the volume of admissions, but the durability of the pathway. The census indicates that most students who enter higher education through affirmative action finish their courses and earn diplomas. That finding matters because higher education debates often focus on entry thresholds, while completion tends to receive less attention. Here, the completion data suggest that reserved slots are not producing a weaker academic outcome; in this dataset, they are associated with a stronger one.
Another layer is the policy design behind the numbers. The Ministry of Education has framed these results as evidence of the success of policies expanding access to higher education. The census also shows that, in selection processes linked to the Unified Selection System, the University for All Program, and the Student Financing Fund, about 2 million cotistas have entered undergraduate courses since these mechanisms were adopted. With sisu, more than 790, 100 students entered public universities through the quota law, and from 2023 to 2026 that number reached 307, 545 students. Those figures point to scale, but also to continuity: the policy is not an isolated measure, but a sustained pipeline.
Policy design, quotas, and completion outcomes
The census highlights three policy pivots that help explain the current picture. First, the quota law is mandatory for federal institutions and was updated in 2023. That update created a specific quota for quilombolas and expanded access for lower-income students by reducing the income threshold from 1. 5 minimum wages to one minimum wage per capita for those using economic criteria. Second, it preserved the school-origin requirement, keeping the rule that all three years of secondary school must have been completed in a public school. Third, the updates aim to reflect the diversity of Brazilian society more faithfully inside federal institutions.
Those changes matter because completion rates do not emerge in a vacuum. If a student body enters through multiple legal routes but is selected under a coherent public policy framework, the resulting graduation figures can become a measure of how well the system integrates access and continuity. In that sense, sisu is not just an admissions gateway; it is part of an institutional design whose results are now visible in graduation data.
Expert perspectives and broader impact
The available data support a cautious but important interpretation: expanding access has not diluted completion in the federal system. Instead, the census suggests that quota students are completing at a rate that exceeds that of non-cotistas. That has implications for how universities, policymakers, and the public assess merit, support structures, and the long-term value of inclusion policies.
Federal bodies have not framed the numbers as a temporary anomaly. The Institute’s census, together with the Ministry of Education’s policy framework, presents completion as part of the intended outcome of admissions reform. The broader impact reaches beyond federal campuses. Because the same logic also informs admissions pathways linked to the University for All Program and the Student Financing Fund, the evidence has relevance for the national discussion on who enters higher education, who stays, and who graduates.
For now, the message from the 2024 census is straightforward: the debate around sisu is no longer only about opening doors. It is also about what happens after students walk through them, and whether the country is prepared to measure success by graduation as much as by entry. If completion continues to outperform expectations, how much further will federal policy move from access to full educational attainment?
