Sistema Regional de Información
en línea para Revistas Científicas de América Latina,
el Caribe, España y Portugal

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a developing educational approach that aims to improve learning for all students without having to make significant modifications to the curriculum. This concept has been progressively incorporated into pedagogical debates and education regulations. Along this line, some publications have illustrated the efficacy of UDL in terms of access, participation, and commitment to learning processes, especially in the case of students with disabilities. This paper provides a systematic review of relevant academic literature that enhances our understanding of how UDL was integrated into teacher education processes by identifying three different forms of conceptualizing UDL. For this purpose, 88 articles were included that addressed the incorporation of Universal Design for Learning into initial and in-service teacher education processes. The results point to a dominant approach grounded on a problematic association of UDL with students with disabilities or learning difficulties. This narrow view restricts how teachers apply inclusive practices in classrooms, calling for a broader and more comprehensive interpretation of UDL. The study contributes to fostering discussions about Universal Design for Learning (UDL) as a whole, including the dominant perspective projected in how it is understood and applied in teacher education and classrooms. It envisions new, more inclusive scenarios for the development of educational approaches that support all learners, fostering a truly inclusive learning environment.

The initial teacher training for basic education gained prominence on the Brazilian public agenda in the 2000s, leading to a series of public policies. One of these policies involved reserving 20 % of the seats in the newly created Federal Institutes for initial teacher training, in what were called undergraduate teaching courses. At the time, there was a growing shortage of teachers, both in quantitative terms (reflected in the lack of teachers) and qualitative terms (with many professionals in the classroom who did not have specific graduation in the subject they were teaching). This study specifically focuses on the Federal Institutes, with the aim of analyzing their impact on improving the educational indicator "teacher training adequacy," an instrument used by the Ministry of Education to monitor the progress of public policies designed to address issues related to teaching in basic education. Using a quantitative and descriptive correlational approach, the study uses three statistical databases from the Ministry of Education to explore the relationship between the availability of seats in teaching courses and the teacher training adequacy indicator. In the end, it confirms the hypothesis that the Federal Institutes contributed to raising the mentioned indicator: on average, the 336 Brazilian cities that have Federal Institutes showed a 5.2 % higher performance in teacher training adequacy when compared to cities without the presence of the institution.

Based on the scenario of a low degree of national coordination in the educational policy of the Brazilian federation, the article aims to identify and discuss the challenges, mechanisms and contexts that motivated, in 2016, the decision by the government of Espírito Santo to adopt and institutionalize the Pact for Learning (PAES) inspired by the collaborative regime program of the state of Ceará. To achieve the proposed objective, this case study was based on exploratory research with qualitative bibliographic and documentary studies, linked to the concept of public policy diffusion. The results showed that the adoption of the program was consolidated through cooperation and learning mechanisms and that the policy adopted had, in its conception, a certain structural rigidity that disregarded local contexts and factors. The discussions emphasized the central role played by the National Council of Education Secretaries and third sector institutions in fostering a network of horizontal interaction that encouraged the spread of ideas and successful public policy models. It was concluded that the adoption of the program was an isolated government decision and that social protagonism was not taken into account in the policy formulation and construction stages. Finally, it was inferred that the lack of a National Education System compromises articulation and cooperation between education systems.

As a result of the social approach adopted in recent years by the Mexican Federal Government, a new strategy has emerged to promote higher education, focusing on the most marginalized individuals and communities, with the goal of fostering their inclusion in professional training at this level. This research presents the philosophical foundations of this initiative, based on the concept of “episteme”; it includes a review of the evolution of higher education in Mexico from the perspective of civil engineering, utilizing a stratigraphic model of knowledge. In particular, the creation of the Benito Juárez García System of Universities for Welfare and the Civil Engineering School in Texcoco, State of Mexico, is described. The latter serves as an alternative to address the consequences of educational policies implemented under the so-called neoliberal framework, representing a potential option for improved social participation in the development of specialized technical capacities. The results and conclusions demonstrate that the educational reforms implemented do not follow a continuous discursive line but rather emerge in response to the episteme or discursive stratum of the moment. As a case study, the current higher education model in civil engineering is presented. In the same way, the results of the new model of the University of Civil Engineering are presented.

Knowing the social discourse around (dis)ability allows us to understand what social imaginaries persist and exist around it and to be able to gauge changes in cultural images of disability. To this end, we analyze the discourse produced by five discussion groups that cross heterogeneous variables (inclusive, within each group) and homogeneous variables (exclusive, which have given rise to the existence of each group). This allows us to saturate the discourse, which is strengthened in the group interaction. This analysis warns us of individual imaginaries in the discourse of people classified as ablebodied and of rather social imaginaries of those who are classified as disabled. Nevertheless, cultural images of dehumanization are practically constant in the discourses, whereby people classified as disabled are represented as burdens, an object of charity and victimization, or figures of overcoming, objects of admiration and fetishes of inspiration. It remains, however, to pay more attention to representations of disabling barriers and crippling times that propose other imaginaries about the experience of (dis)ability.

This essay aims to rescue the theoretical, epistemic and empirical substance of the phenomenological theory of social imaginaries (Baeza, 2011) in order to understand, interpret and challenge the notion of disability. Through a critical review of the models that have defined and intervened in people with disabilities, a definition of disability will be proposed as a social imaginary construction, emphasizing how the imaginaries of disability play a prepon- derant role not only in the perception of people with disabilities, but in how they structure their life projects. Finally, as a manifest, some suggestions are broken down to subvert the pejorative notions of disability and promote/enhance the agency of these people.

This article employs a discourse analysis based on the theoretical-methodological proposal of Gilberto Gimenez (1989), with a particular focus on the interventions of Chilean parliamentarians during the discussions that led to the enactment of Laws N° 20.422 (2010) and N° 21.015 (2017). The former establishes rules on equal opportunities and social inclusion of persons with disabilities in Chile, while the latter encourages the labor inclusion of persons with disabilities. The findings illustrate how these discourses perpetuate stereotypical social imaginaries about people with disabilities, thereby reducing their capacity for agency and full enjoyment of their rights. Despite legislative advances, the analysis reveals the persistence of power structures that legitimize marginalization, underscoring the need for critical reflection and genuine commitment to true social and labor inclusion.

Special Education plays a fundamental role in the training and development of people with Intellectual Disabilities (id). In this context, the present study immerses itself in the exploration of the Social Imaginaries of Intellectual Disability, focusing specifically on the significance that Special Education professionals give to their practices belonging to a Special Labor Training Center in Chile. The methodology is situated in the sociophenomenological interpretive paradigm with a qualitative design. The results obtained respond to the process of raising emerging categories where an ambivalent understanding of the approach and evaluation of learning development, the definition of the teaching methodology, experiences, challenges and projections of students with intellectual disabilities is revealed. The convergences point to the imaginary meanings of educational practices, which are permeated by a struggle in the training process, where the social imaginaries of [Progressive Approach] were identified, as well as the [Comprehensive Approach] linked to [Individual Needs] present in students with id. The conclusions of the research include the presence of social imaginaries in educational practices reflected in the aspects of a comprehensive approach to the student with id projected towards the autonomous life of students in society.

This article explores how media in Mexico perpetuate hegemonic and stigmatizing social representations of disability, with a particular focus on the Teleton. Through a qualitative content analysis covering the period from 2008 (the year Mexico ratified the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities) to 2024, it is demonstrated that the Teleton has consistently framed rehabilitation as the key to a dignified life, employing mechanisms of charity and pity. The analysis identifies the discursive and narrative devices that reproduce a reductionist perspective on disability. Given that Teleton is broadcast on the most-watched television network in the country, the article discusses the implications for public perceptions of disability. The reach of this organization effectively reduces the State’s obligations as a guarantor of rights and solutions to social issues related to disability. The conclusions highlight the significant role of media in the production and perpetuation of stigmatizing and dominant representations of disability, suggesting that this same role could be leveraged to transform these representations and promote more dignified and accurate portrayals. Such transformations could facilitate a better understanding of disability and support the full participation of individuals with disabilities in all spheres of social life.

This article is based on research on the social imaginaries of disability manifested by the increasing cases of people who become blind or visually impaired as a result of repression by security forces in different countries. Blindness acquires the value of ghost and fantasy, manifesting, unveiling archaic symbols of disability as punishment, victim, sacrificial ritual, immolation in the emerging context of repression of popular demonstrations. The systematic attack on the eyes, the action of blinding as a recurrent practice can be analyzed in terms of the improper use of non-lethal or “reduced lethality” weapons as a strategy of crowd control and disincentive to popular demonstrations. However, at the archetypical level, the symbol of the surrender of the body to sacrifice, of predators in search of defenseless and incapacitated prey, the threat of mutilation as a violent practice of social control allows us to analyze at the symbolic level, through social imaginaries, the new emerging scenarios, which are configured from convergent-divergent, coincident and contradictory interpretations.