As much as I enjoy Feynman's writings, I'm rather surprised at the significance people attach to that old anecdote. It was just his short experience with one class, and we don't even know which university it was. I wouldn't assume the situation depicted there is representative of Brazilian advanced education in the 60s. In any case, it certainly doesn't match my experience in the 90s (I majored in CS at a Brazilian university). For instance, my exams would typically involve writing and analysing algorithms, solving mathematical problems and proving theorems. If you memorized the textbook without understanding it you wouldn't pass a single class.