Qualidade do serviço prestado: um estudo sobre a percepção das famílias beneficiadas no Programa Criança Feliz (PCF) e Primeira Infância Melhor (PIM)

Abstract

The Happy Child Program (PCF) was designed by the Federal Government to support the implementation of the First Childhood Legal Framework and the Better First Childhood Program (PIM) was created by the State Government of Rio Grande do Sul, known for being a pioneer in public policies in the Brazil. Both are carried out by municipalities, with the aim of promoting the integral development of children in early childhood. The general objective of this work is to evaluate the Criança Feliz and Primeira Infância Melhor Program according to the perception of its users. This is an exploratory and descriptive study, with a quantitative and qualitative methodological approach, where families' opinions about the quality of the service provided by the programs in three municipalities in Rio Grande do Sul were investigated. In the quantitative approach, data from the project in the year 2023: “Satisfaction with the Primeira Infância Melhor (PIM) and Criança Feliz (PCF) programs: an analysis from the perspective of Rio Grande do Sul families”, from the Federal University of Santa Maria (UFSM). And in the qualitative approach, a semi-structured interview was carried out to measure the impact of the PCF and PIM. The two methodologies were structured in indicators that measure the assessment of service quality based on the Servqual Scale of Parasuraman, Zeithaml and Berry. From this, 284 questionnaires were analyzed using secondary data, which we analyzed using descriptive statistics and factor analysis. The results show, in general, that families are satisfied with the activities of the Happy Child and Better First Childhood Program. In the descriptive analysis, the most positive perceptions are included in the Security dimension with an average of 4.93 and Empathy with 4.91, while the Tangibility dimension has the lowest average with 4.32 (maximum average of 5). Regarding family satisfaction with the programs, respondents showed that they were completely satisfied with the PCF and PIM activities. The results obtained by factor analysis showed positive reliability in the seven factors, analyzed using Cronbach's Alpha coefficient as a reference measure, showing relatively similarity between the three municipalities. Therefore, as a source of primary data, a semi-structured interview was carried out with six beneficiaries of both programs online and by telephone. Data analysis was carried out manually with the help of bibliographical research, interview transcriptions and content analysis, which exposes the opinions expressed by the interviewees. The main results show families' satisfaction with the programs. The study is relevant as it analyzes the satisfaction of families benefiting from the programs. Therefore, it is expected that the results of this research will provide an understanding of the perception of families using the programs. It is estimated that the study can serve as a management tool, capable of demonstrating to society the results achieved in the municipalities, in order to outline new actions.