Teacher training in Gender, Human Rights and Interculturality: Higher Education Experiences in Mexico

Abstract

The Mexican National Education System, at its various levels and modalities, is the setting for teachers with diverse academic backgrounds and work experiences. Together, they shape the school landscapes and cultures that define educational spaces. Within this framework of diversity, the problems faced by higher education teachers are identified, specifically those of teacher trainers from public and private teacher training colleges and the Teacher Training Centers (CAM) in Veracruz, Mexico. Their undergraduate programs offer little or no training in teaching and addressing human rights from an intercultural and gender perspective in the classroom, given that their curricula were oriented toward the study of specific disciplinary fields, neglecting socio-educational topics. The main objective of the research was to analyze the experiences of teacher training through the Diploma in Human Rights from an Intercultural and Gender Perspective.

The methodology used was qualitative, with a phenomenological-hermeneutic design, which allowed for a deeper understanding of reality based on the experiences of the participants. The results reveal that their teaching practices are based on weak theoretical and methodological training in pedagogy and interculturality, coupled with the fact that they serve large groups of students and work at more than one institution to supplement their income. This allows us to understand why their teaching interventions focus solely on curriculum content without addressing the diversity of the student body.