Introduction
The current world reality is subject to dynamic and varied forces that affect countries and individuals, transcending the old territorial borders. The socio-political and economic structures that governed the status quo of societies, individuals and institutions are being transformed and are currently in the process of being defined. This means that we are living in a period of uncertainty in which we must rethink what, how, when and for what. Historically, education, its educational, social and ethical purposes and objects, was supported by established models through which to sustain the certainty and justification of its existence and work.
Education and universities cannot be left out of the constant and dizzying transformation, since their relevance, efficiency and validity in the new reality will depend on their speed to respond to new needs. Finding the relevant path, whichever is chosen and conforming, represents transforming the nature of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) as they exist up to now.
Universities are institutions to which, from a leading State, the responsibility of giving a parallel response has been imposed, one with an economist and practical sense, and another, with a humanistic and ethical sense. The first requires responding to the needs of a labor sector through an instrumentalization of the professions. The second tries to elevate the human being to more sublime planes that allows him to achieve his self-actualization, the latter concept used in Maslow's Theory and also pointed out by Savater when referring to that second gestation that the human being has in the social matrix in which it is breeding and in which the educational system is increasingly assigned a more prominent role.
The social function assigned to educational institutions, whatever their level, has been transformed over time. Now, in addition to being a space in which knowledge is acquired and trained professionals are trained, it must be the preserver and educator of the ethical values that until recently were a priority function of the family institution.
The University and economic development
The university in Mexico, of a Napoleonic style from the 19th century due to French influence, in recent decades has made strong attempts to reflect the neoliberal North American model, it has tried in the second half of the 20th century, to give a more pertinent response to the needs of a labor sector that fights for advancement and modernization to increase its competitiveness.
Through national government policies, which are modified every six years and which, despite government alternation, have been strongly influenced by international organizations such as UNESCO, the World Bank and the OECD, in Mexico universities have been required to train students. individual to be able to enter the labor sector and promote the economic development of the country. It has been seen in education, the panacea to create the saving effect in the face of the situation of economic, social and cultural backwardness in which most of the population lives. The banners of liberalism and democracy have failed to lead the country and its institutions towards the desired social welfare. The gap between the economic, social and cultural poles has widened.
Now, it is the responsibility of education to achieve a fairer and more equitable economic development in which educational backwardness, extreme poverty, functional illiteracy, the lack of physical and technological infrastructure and the lack of scientific research to be mentioned are reduced. Some examples.
This responsibility, indicated by the State, responds to the interests of both the labor sector and the manifest guidelines of world institutions. This definition of educational aims and objectives arises from a context external to the Universities over and above their freedom and bypassing the possibility of participation in their self-definition, leaving the concept of autonomy only for speeches.
Savater (1997: 146) recovers Durkheim's thought manifested in Pedagogy and sociology, who insists more clearly on this point by mentioning that “the man that education must shape within us is not man as nature has him. created, but just as society wants it to be; and he wants it as his internal economy requires… ”And since the scale of values changes as society transforms, the education provided to man must change and by doing so, man himself will change.
This educational change, undeniably essential, must in the first instance enhance the humanization of the individual, freeing him from economic interests or the influences of a transitory power.
- Global partnership
Mexico cannot stand aside from the accelerated transformation that is taking place worldwide in developed countries. However, we are still trying to reduce the gap that our country has in relation to economic, political, educational and industrial progress, which places us in a position of structural weakness to undertake the transformation that in a global society is imperative. How can we follow the step of the developed countries towards the knowledge society when we still have problems to have an equal participation in the industrial society that is lagging behind?
If we want to enter the game, we must have cards from the same deck because otherwise we would isolate and reduce our role and our future as a society. The competitive disadvantages that we have as a society would deepen and it would be impossible to become an active agent in the exchange of the new society in the process of definition and which some call the information society while others, the knowledge society.
Although international organizations such as UNESCO, the World Bank or the OECD, call it interchangeably without making a distinction in terms of its differentiation, for the purposes of this essay, an information society will be understood as the production, treatment and exchange of factual information without the need for through management, reconstruction or creation, from information to knowledge.
This is how Savater (1997: 32) makes the distinction between information and knowledge by stating that "processing information is not the same as understanding meanings." Although the advancement of information and communication technologies (ICTs) make possible the mobility and transfer of a number of information, breaking the barrier of time and space, by allowing its sending, reception, location from anywhere on the planet and to any place in seconds, it is essential to have the intervention of a human being who possesses the necessary skills for its use. The same author mentions that "true education consists not only in teaching to think but also in learning to think about what is thought…", since it is at this moment of reflection and internalization of information that occurs in the human being,and that it is a function that has not yet been possible to transfer to technology, that knowledge is created and recreated.
This is in addition to the hypothesis used by Ramírez Romero et al., Whose study edited by Navarro (2005: 27) points out that “the incorporation of information and communication technologies in Latin America has been carried out responding more to marketing and marketing interests. political rather than academic interests ”, so that the scarce technology available is compounded by the deficient capacity for its management and use. The purchase and allocation of technological equipment often respond to political and electoral interests, instead of responding to the real needs of its recipients.
In the context of a global society, the educational imperatives for education, despite the differences that exist within the national educational systems structured up to now, should be presented in a similar way in the different regions and countries, regardless of their situation of education. developing.
In Latin America, and Mexico in particular for the purposes of this reflection, there are still not enough studies that allow us to know the state of the art of national universities in terms of the impact of ICTs. The lack of information is due to the fact that Comparative Education studies in Mexico, which could contribute much, is a space under construction. In Europe, an investigation was carried out to find out what would be the forces capable in the future to generate the change required in the universities, and the results taken up by Brunner (1999), after which they indicated as priorities the growing technological possibilities, the tighter budgets and new scientific discoveries.
If we are on the right track in considering that these will also be the forces required by our higher education institutions (HEIs) to be able to face the educational requirements that are emerging in the process of defining the new knowledge society, we are in problems. Our country currently has a basic level of education. Only a small sector has access to the higher education necessary to develop capacities for the management, use and development of technologies, a determining aspect in the knowledge society. On the other hand, thinking about having tighter budgets when in recent years there has been a decrease in the allocation of resources to HEIs is not feasible;While the situation of scientific research in HEIs is very little and is limited to a few HEIs, such as the UNAM, the National Polytechnic and a similar number of private HEIs, since the infrastructure and budget for its stimulation and development.
In addition to the above, we have the fact of the brain drain that, not finding a suitable context for their development, emigrate to institutions with better conditions and international recognition.
- Good free, good economic
To the extent that the accumulated information can be accessible through the development of ICTs, those who have the capacity to have them and use them as an instrument to possess information and also have the human capital trained to carry out the symbolic analysis of This will be in a position of advantage and superiority to all those countries, corporations and individuals that are not in this situation. This will result in value attributions transforming a free good, which could have been within the reach of a majority, into an economic good, whose mobility is conditioned by a market in which the laws of supply and demand must acquire a new perspective.
As information is considered an economic good, educational institutions, which until now had participated to a great extent in its production and management, will be one more agent in the market subject to world dynamics. Given this situation and the fact that, in Mexico and Latin America, among others, there are not the necessary resources to respond to the educational demand, the possibility of development, use and expansion of ICTs in the education sector, and to access them with learning and research purposes, it is reduced.
- Consumer good, investment good
In the knowledge society, information has become a consumer good whose possession translates into a competitive advantage, where the management, quality and speed with which it moves will be decisive.
This means that allocating resources to education is considered an investment that can produce a return, although until now it has not been possible to determine the impact it produces.
In order to advance in the understanding of the impact that knowledge will have on the economy, Paul Hirst (2000) provides us with a classification: the scientific-theoretical feasible to reproduce and use, the routine compiled by institutions, the one considered as intellectual property that would be the case of patents and copyright as examples and the tacit product of practices and skills developed on the job. As can be seen, these types affect different spaces with different economic impacts.
If we do not prepare, and anticipate, the knowledge economy we will suffer negative effects both socially and personally. The inequalities will increase. Within the companies, new forces will play to ensure the transmission and access to information, created or purchased.
The ownership and control of the knowledge will translate into economic benefits, so its possession will be restricted to a sector with the ability to own the asset. Here we are presented with a challenge, to determine who will decide and what will be the public and private information, with the ethical derivations that logically follow from this fact.
- Status and financing
The Mexican educational system is a pyramid with a broad base, initial and basic education, towards which there have been educational policies that have favored it with the allocation of most of the economic resources that the State allocates to education at the national level. Tuition coverage at these levels is almost total. However, as academic levels rise, the allocation of resources is reduced.
This has meant that the middle and upper levels do not have the capacity to meet the demand. The HEIs are insufficient, they are concentrated in urban areas with a large population, there is no update in educational models, there is a lack of diversification of the offer, which is also rigid and there is a gap of ignorance and isolation between the HEIs and the Laboral sector.
The ordinary subsidies received by HEIs suffer a fall as of 1995 as a result of the economic crisis that the country experienced. These resources are intended to cover current expenses required to sustain operations and payroll. However, for 1997 a recovery period begins that continues until 2002, when it is practically equal to that of the previous period. The periods of 2003 and 2004 show a constant decrease in ordinary subsidies in relation to enrollment.
| ENROLLMENT | ORDINARY SUBSIDY | ||
| 2001-2002 | 2003-2004 | 2001 | 2004 |
| 1,070,443 | 1,123,164 | 26,241,142.4 | 27,365,691.7 |
| % INCREMENT | 4.69 | % INCREMENT | 4.10 |
* SEP (2005)
Faced with this national reality, especially in the last five years, the allocation of resources to HEIs has adopted new forms as a result of evaluation and accreditation procedures whose parameters are established by the State. Resources are assigned, in addition to the ordinary subsidy, by means of an extraordinary subsidy. The extraordinary subsidy is currently the possibility for HEIs to introduce quality and improvement processes to their activity. Although the extraordinary subsidy is distributed through a greater number of programs, instead of increasing as the demand for enrollment grows, over time it has been reduced as shown in the following table:
* SEP (2005), Undersecretary of Higher Education.
The instruments used by the State for the allocation of extraordinary subsidies are diversified. There are more programs through which your assignment is managed. However, while new programs such as FIUPEA, PRONABES, PIFI, PIFOP, FAEUP, and PIFIEMS are being created, all of them created by the current government, resources do not increase.
The amount of resources channeled through these programs shows a considerable increase during 2002, the year from which a trend towards decrease begins, which remains until 2004 (2005 has not yet been totalized).
We see that the 2001 subsidy, in relation to the 2000 subsidy, although the number of programs through which it flows increases, in reality the contribution of resources decreases, as can be seen in the following table.
| 2000 | 2001 | |
| THOUSANDS OF PESOS OF 2003 | 4,234,370.5 | 3,006,987.9 |
| THOUSANDS OF CURRENT PESOS | 3,511,960.3 | 2,641,415.9 |
* SEP (2005)
These data indicate that the growth, although limited, has only been in enrollment, since the increases in ordinary and extraordinary subsidies are practically non-existent, but rather decrease if the accumulated inflation rate of the last five years is simply considered together with the increases in salaries, public services and general costs of materials, among others.
The University and pedagogical practice
- University autonomy, definition of goals
University autonomy represents for HEIs the possibility of self-definition. Among the most distinctive features of this status we have the option to choose its authorities, to manage its resources as well as the freedom to design its curricular, methodological and evaluative proposals.
Scarce resources have allowed the emergence of institutions and processes oriented to the evaluation and accreditation of education at the global and national level, among whose main purposes we have the efficient use of resources as well as the observance of parameters of educational quality.
Under this context, there has been an increase in the intervention of organizations external to the HEIs which are defining the relevant quality parameters for them. It is from the outside that the problems are defined and the solutions for university work are clarified, avoiding the value that the participation of its teachers, researchers, authorities and students can contribute.
What kind of autonomy exists when living in the shadow of the budget allocation determined by organizations external to HEIs?
- Educational imperatives of the future
Educational institutions cannot abstract themselves from the tidal wave of change and they need to fight for technological development, for which both teachers and students will be required to develop skills in the management of technologies as well as to stimulate in them critical thinking that allows them to differentiate and manage the vast amount of information available.
New educational approaches are required that emphasize lifelong learning aimed at the student learning to reason, to see and understand, not only the current world but also to be able to move in a future world still unknown. Learning meaningfully and reflectively requires stimulating critical thinking that allows man to consciously make decisions that avoid falling into technological determinism.
Unfortunately, as Savater (1997: 210) mentions, “… the new idea of the importance of education for human well-being and progress was captured by national interests, and equipped to carry out a work whose social desire was definitely reduced and exclusive”, it is imperative that an educational path be sought whose aims and objectives are more free, flexible and diverse.
In addition, the organization of the institutions must change along with their objectives and methodologies, since otherwise, the organizational structure will become the cage that does not allow transformation.
- Objectives and methodology
The advantage of experience is not always sustainable. Above all, if it is not linked to what Garner (2004: 12) calls “learning to think in a scientific way”. The wealth of information, its exponential accumulation, makes it impossible for man to possess existing knowledge. Since you will not be able to be the owner of all the informational baggage, nor will you be able, from the simple possession of the information, to use it to face situations not yet defined and to which you will need to offer alternatives.
The national educational system, in its different educational levels, is organized to be representative of the past to which it clings and in which, it seems, it finds its reason for subsisting. From the initial and basic level to the higher level, it is pertinent to question the educational objectives raised to this day. There is evidence, the product of international evaluations, that indicates that our educational processes are not giving the expected results. At least not those that would equal us to those produced in developed countries.
If we have the courage as a society to see our shortcomings, we will be able to redesign our programs and manage to train the free, open and flexible student, who is not shackled by data and information shackles that, in the best of cases, will become superfluous and out of date.. This information that has been transmitted and reproduced in the student's brain by the traditionalist teacher, becomes a barrier that prevents him from conceiving learning from new, more creative and innovative perspectives. We must put a stop to the cognitive recipes and open a new space to questioning, analysis, scientific and creative thinking, capacity for synthesis and especially, to develop the ability to establish links and connections between data, situations, problems, areas of knowledge and solutions.
All of this requires the bonding agent and facilitator, language. This factor, which distances us from the animal and has allowed us to humanize ourselves and develop our intellectual capacity, has also been transformed. At present, the mother tongue is only a first step. We must build the entire ladder with a foreign language, a technological language, and a symbolic language.
Situation of ICTs in the Mexican educational reality
- Infrastructure
The development of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in Mexico is limited to a few institutions and people. The technology and its use have not yet spread to a massive level. Its cost is not within the reach of the majority and only a privileged few know how to use it. Thinking of multiplying the use of ICTs in Mexico in the short term is utopian. Neither the state nor society in general have the resources and capacities to make it happen.
The level of education and scientific technological training is still basic. Due to this, the efforts made by the State to introduce technology into schools, such as the encyclomedia program for basic level, is, most of the time, an investment of resources not used rationally. This is due to factors such as the lack of capacity of teachers to handle it, the lack of knowledge of methodologies through which to make efficient use of it for the sake of learning or, simply, the lack of an infrastructure that allows its adequate preservation and maintenance.
At the world level, there is the formation of an information economy where the possibility of economic development of a country or region lies in its capacity for the production, absorption, adaptation, diffusion and use of knowledge. In the last decade, more scientific knowledge has been produced and made available with easy access than has been had throughout the previous history of mankind.
Faced with this reality, we only have to revalue the role of the human being: man is the only one who creates wealth since his intervention is essential to transform such amount of information into knowledge. In order to fulfill his function, man needs to develop new capacities that transform him into a symbolic analyst. Given the immensity of information and knowledge generated, the methodological and learning capacities managed in the Mexican educational system are currently insufficient.
The success of education could be measured by the average density of information that individuals in a country are capable of handling and using.
- Human capital
Under this new reality, the role of human resources as an active and creative workforce is invaluable. The development of countries will depend on the ability of their society to use knowledge and adapt to new demands. Consequently, the role of universities, as a management space for human capital, must be rethought. Educational institutions, at all levels, must be capable of transforming both their form of organization and their educational objectives.
If HEIs do not have the vision, and find the way, to modify their role historically assumed as preservers and transmitters of knowledge and culture and assume a new more dynamic, flexible, diverse and open profile, they will lose their now already conditioned credibility.
If educational policies insist on being pigeonholed into actions such as strongly benefiting with resources, programs and infrastructure at the basic educational levels without attending to the middle and higher levels, supporting a certain model of professional training, increasing the rigidity in stratification of degrees or institutions each time more specialized, it will not be possible to make the necessary change to respond to the new needs that are emerging as conditions for the inclusion of Mexico in the Knowledge Society in a pertinent and feasible way for the good of the country's development and society.
Therefore, one of the main challenges for the university revolves around two critical aspects: its ability to become a generator of knowledge and its curricular flexibility to create possibilities for continuing education and professional updating. Going from the simple transmission and preservation of the information collection to the management of knowledge means a root change, a rethinking of its structure and organization, an open-heart operation. Will our universities be able to find the strength to do so? This impulse must come from her gut, a utopian goal if we see the force with which the mechanisms of resource allocation keep her fists trapped.
It is indisputable that the economic development of a nation or region of the world is influenced more by human capital than by economic capital. We have a clear example in countries like Germany which, after World War II, were in a situation of total crisis and yet took off while countries like Mexico still have structural problems that have prevented economic development.
- Values and Ethics
In the new world context, the knowledge society, interrelationships and exchanges will be weakened, direct contact between individuals will decrease. Transactions will be through ICTs, at high speed and at a distance. This carries a risk. The setback in humanization that beings have managed to achieve through history thanks to human interaction.
For this reason, it is essential that the transformation towards the knowledge society be carried out accompanied by what Gardner (2005) calls the respectful mind and the ethical mind.
Since ancient times, human beings have used brands to differentiate ourselves, to identify ourselves with our group. The colored beads or paint on the skin have been transformed into a jacket and tie, cell phone and laptop. We continue to look for brands that differentiate us, even when social differences in today's world are so polarized that they would hardly be confused. This tendency to form groups, typical of human nature, will appear under new patterns not yet clearly defined.
Every day it is more imperative to learn to live with those who are different, something that will also be increasingly difficult to do when that whom it is necessary to respect we only contact through a keyboard and a screen. Perceiving differences is a first stage for human cognition and we must, as part of the educational process, learn to label and interpret these differences in order to respect and appreciate them.
Another great challenge for the knowledge society is the preservation and use of an ethical mind. Although ethical orientation begins during the first years of life at home, HEIs and society have an inescapable responsibility. This is due to the fact that the formative influence of human beings is increasingly diverse, open and lasts throughout life.
The context of the knowledge society has no precise limits. It is by nature open and flexible, so ethics can become the bluff that tells us if we are crossing the line. An ethical work in education and in the use of ICTs will be the shield that protects from a degeneration of the process of shaping the knowledge society.
Conclusions
For HEIs to be able to respond to the new educational imperatives that they must assume within the knowledge society, they must find mechanisms through which to participate, collegially and efficiently, in the definition of their educational aims and objectives and their clarification of their social responsibility..
This freedom needs to be independent of the evaluation and accreditation processes whose main objective is the allocation of subsidies. Bodies such as the National Commission for the Evaluation of Higher Education (CONAEVA) should initiate a review of their functions to allow themselves to observe that they establish their role of… "proposing" criteria and quality standards for functions and tasks… (Navarro, 2005: 58), not to mark them as mandatory.
If we do not have the resources required to have ICTs that allow us to intervene in the new knowledge society, we must turn our eyes to what we do have: individuals. It is essential that we initiate actions aimed at developing beings with the capacities that will be required in the future.
In this sense, Gardner (2005: 14) points out “it is not possible to even begin to develop an educational system if the skills and knowledge that are valued and the kind of people that are intended to be trained when the formal educational process arrives are not taken into account. to its end". The people who make up the educational demand of the HEIs have also been transformed, they are no longer exclusively young people who complete their secondary education. Education throughout life already puts pressure on the formal educational system, which requires modifying its organization in order to provide a relevant response.
Today's society doesn't always value respectful and ethical minds. Many examples of intolerance have been presented throughout history. An example that should make us reflect is what happened at the "Wannsee Conference" in 1942, where the decision was made to carry out the "final solution" for Nazism. At this fourteen-person conference, eight had received their doctorates from the most prestigious European universities of the time. This shows us that education does not always guarantee the development of values. Our HEIs must, within their educational priorities, reserve a space for them.At this moment in the definition of the knowledge society, it is pertinent that we return to these aspects as priorities and try to preserve them in order to achieve the levels of justice and equity that humanity requires to survive.
Bibliography
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