Humanistic formation in Higher Education. A comparative study

Formación humanista en Educación Superior. Un estudio comparativo

Edgar Gómez Bonilla

Master in Education, Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla, Puebla. gbonillaedgar@yahoo.com.mx, Orcid: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1904-8584

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SUMMAR

This research assesses the students' perspective on how they assume the humanistic formation in their education. The quantitative research with cross-sectional design and descriptive scope, indicates in the findings that university students know how important it is to have mastery of technical skills to achieve a favorable job performance, which is strengthened by assuming the values of responsibility, solidarity, commitment and collaboration from their professional practice to project the development and progress of humanity. The comparative analysis of the Bachelor's degree programs in Public Administration and Management for Development, Civil Engineering, Nursing and History indicates that 65% of the students accept the influence that the international context has on Higher Education (HE), which is why they must opt for a technical-specialized education and also place the importance of assuming values that promote humanist principles as a counterweight to the homogenization that Globalization has tried to impose.

Key words: Higher education, humanistic education, globalization, promotion of values.

RESUMEN

La presente investigación valora la perspectiva de los estudiantes sobre como asumen la formación humanista en su educación. La investigación cuantitativa con diseño transversal y alcance descriptivo, indica en los hallazgos que los universitarios saben lo importante que es contar con el dominio de las habilidades técnicas para lograr un desempeño laboral favorable, que se fortalece al asumir los valores de la responsabilidad, la solidaridad, el compromiso y la colaboración desde su práctica profesional para proyectar el desarrollo y progreso de la humanidad. El análisis comparativo de los programas de Licenciatura en Administración Pública y Gestión para el Desarrollo, Ingeniería Civil, Enfermería e Historia, indican que el 65% de los estudiantes aceptan la influencia que tiene el contexto internacional en la Educación Superior (ES), por lo que deben optar por una educación técnica-especializada y también ubican la importancia de asumir los valores que promuevan los principios humanistas como contrapeso a la homogeneización que ha pretendido imponer la Globalización.

Palabras clave: Educación Superior, formación humanista, globalización, promoción de valores.

Introduction

One of the phenomena inscribed in contemporary societies is Globalization, which has transformed the world by introducing human beings into a homogeneous scenario that favors its apparent growth and disguised progress. The worldwide phenomenon has been referenced as the means to provide answers to the innumerable problems afflicting society, although such answers are approached from discourses that are generated from the economic perspective, leaving education, culture, ideology, beliefs, politics and society in second place.

HE in the last 30 years has been influenced by economic activity derived from aspects such as the opening of markets, regional integration, modernization of production processes, technology and media management; as well as, the highly consumerist societies, which are justified in the value of democracy promoting in individuals the acceptance of principles based on competitiveness, quality, efficiency, effectiveness, productivity and profitability, putting aside the sense of education which is to offer the learner something more than theoretical content, or the learning of techniques; this has to be complemented with the acquisition of the global vision proper of the training and with an attitude of commitment to the social and political world to which the learner belongs (Vargas, 2010, p. 154).

It is thought that economic prosperity is the result of participating in regional integration processes, forgetting the particularities of a nation that is represented in the diversity of languages, behaviors, cultural goods and habits that should ensure the continuation of coexistence and interactive relations in society (García, 2009, p. 26). Individualities, identities, nationalisms, reason and particularities cease to be relevant if it is understood that the globalizing discourse is interested in promoting homogeneous societies instead of heterogeneous ones that guarantee world development; therefore, economic integration should be projected as a coordinated decision to face adverse situations as a key challenge for the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), and the creation of common regional agendas represents an opportunity to promote cooperation (SELA, 2024, p. 5). The influence of Globalization in the international context in HE is growing due to the labor market, and from this perspective, it is necessary to count on cheap and qualified labor, which has generated that humanity is carried away by technical knowledge and automaton work, which ends up eliminating the norms of coexistence and interaction in its relationship with others, assuming a utilitarian perspective that should grant economic solvency, thus forgetting the humanistic essence of individuals (Berumen, 2001, p. 141).

It is important to reorient the training of future professionals from the university campuses so that their performance evidences a humanistic participation and retakes in their actions the essential values of the person, if in the short term we aspire to survive as a species, so it is here where HE must emerge to propose alternatives to ensure the integral development of society, understanding that humanistic education deals with the moral spaces of individuals, to provide ground for independence and the use of dialogue in all communication processes. At the same time, the educational act is constituted as the foundation of elements and policies that, by sustaining humanism as a base, may be more adequate and more responsible. Both the design, innovation, as well as the implementation of plans and programs in humanistic education, manage to establish with capacity for dialogue and self-knowledge, the projection of subjects with moral quality, to achieve the authentic integral formation (Sesento, 2021, p. 72).

Higher education and university education benchmarks in the international context

The search for the strengthening of Higher Education Institutions (HEI) has been a task of the federal government since the 1960's in the 20th century, so that it has had a relevant participation in their development in terms of financing . With this, Mexico's educational behavior in the 1990s can be understood, which, channeled by the state, influenced the trends and results presented by public universities financed with federal funds, by seeking a quality education based on the formation of students, with individualistic capacities to adapt to the challenges posed by the productive and working environments, as opposed to the formation that should be granted from the universities to reaffirm the commitment of future professionals to their society, avoiding in them the state of individualism and indifference (Torres and Zanatta, 2022, p. 2).

Currently, the challenge is to improve the quality of education and promote the strengthening of academic staff, students and graduates, because they determine the reality of how study plans and programs should be designed, by creating infrastructure and having the equipment that provides a timely organization of school administration, the relevant point with which the Public University is characterized is to respond to the needs that societies pose in international, national and state contexts. HE policies point out the need to train students who, upon graduation, understand current social problems and act as agents of transformation by having a series of skills and abilities to formulate solutions and solve key situations that contribute to progress.

Conceptual aspects in the promotion of values as a humanistic university education.

The promotion of values in humanity is an important aspect to be addressed due to the series of changes that are taking place, societies manifest scopes, but also demands that make their existence complex in the various areas that arise from everyday life, where pragmatic, utilitarian and materialistic behaviors seem to be the reason to act as individuals. At present, the promotion of values is a defensive response to the dehumanized culture, where it is necessary that societies retake the basic principles of humanistic attitudes, represented by the sense given to actions, whose orientation seeks the good of the person himself and the community, reflecting on the transcendence of the human being, because "the inclusion of values in educational practice becomes relevant when considering them as necessary principles in the social interactions of individuals and groups, and also because they contribute to create environments of respect in the different social contexts" (Washburn, Chaves, Valverde-Hernández and Páez, 2022, p. 14).

The approaches presented in the study of values are novel, their definitions propose a series of changes for world society and, in view of this, it has been decided to reorient their conceptualization towards principles that give meaning to the actions that we as individuals manifest on a daily basis. In Western culture, values have reached a stage where the contradictions on which they are based, added to the material world in which we live, have led them to be preached as universal theoretical premises that in reality are mentioned, but in practice are not understood, as is currently the case with the principles of justice, equity, solidarity, equality, tolerance, respect, among others, and that if not promoted will result in consequences that will often be subject to negative sanctions by the immediate social environment.

In the third decade of the 21st century, values contradict each other, because one thing is what is said and another is what is done, that is to say that in practice different connotations are manifested, causing in society, confusion, conflicts and fear about the future that awaits us in the face of the materialistic dynamics that is gaining ground every day. Values education is understood as "the set of principles related to attitudes and norms that establish an alignment between the values preached and those practiced, avoiding confusion between saying what is really done or really doing what is said" (Coll, 1998, p. 63).

The teaching of values has been presented in two scenarios: transmission and promotion. Transmission, with some time of application, has simply led to the conception and description of values; the second, of recent creation, emerges as an alternative that delimits the bases to act in a way that ensures the preservation of the world and social development based on the practice of man's essential values.

Calzada (1998) defines values as the moral formation of young people based on the transmission of values for the implementation of practices for the benefit of society; this task is a responsibility that has been assigned to school institutions since the birth of modern educational systems (p. 65). For Garza (2000), the transmission of values are a set of "intangible, and timeless entities that are expressed through human actions, where the important thing is to contextualize situations and try to explain them or describe events, as necessary tasks to evaluate the meaning of actions" (p. 17). The position of "transmission of values" remains at the level of the imaginary and sentimental, therefore, the education of feelings is important, however, it is necessary that reason prevails in the interaction of the individual to convince the other, in order to seek a human and social complementarity.

For his part, Berumen (2001) refers to the promotion of values as: "that phase that is related to the knowledge and will capacities of individuals, where the axis of action is man, the person, because every existing human being is a person" (p. 129). It is about people in the international context not staying in the formation or presentation of something, but in ensuring a professional practice based on valid reasoning, because the training that the student should receive through his insertion in the higher educational context should favor personal development, through the expansion of intellectual, social, cultural, practical horizons, among others inherent to the human being who feels, thinks, acts and does; but above all, who acts as a being with ethics (Dimas, 2017, p. 244).

Following the postulates of Camps (1993), Coll (1998) and Berumen (2001) for the case of undergraduate students, an alternative for improvement is to go beyond the transmission of values by opting for their promotion. It is necessary to rethink the teaching of values so that from their impulse, individuals and especially university students relate the principles preached with those practiced, avoiding the separation in both planes. The promotion of values should allow individuals to anticipate the facts through the sense they give to their actions, because if they continue in the transmission phase, they will continue in the line of communication of values from their conception and preaching without relating them and even less applying them. The aim is to progress from values with ethical sense where skepticism is abandoned, looking for ways to facilitate social coexistence, thinking in more hopeful positions for our immediate future. The intention is to activate humanistic attitudes where the development of the spirit, the search for health and economic welfare, all of which are based on social responsibility.

Materials and methods

The research assesses the effects of the globalizing context in HE, as well as the limitations it generates in the humanistic formation of university students, the purpose is to analyze a series of strategies that allow the promotion of a humanistic attitude with an interdisciplinary perspective in undergraduate students.

Design

The methodology carried out in this research is based on the quantitative approach (McMillan and Schumacher, 2005), because it measures the appreciation of the influence of the globalizing context that affects the professional training of university students, which has an impact on the attitudes and values they assume to participate in the social context. The research has a non-experimental cross-sectional design, because data are collected at a specific time that allows a comparative study among four undergraduate programs. The research is descriptive because it identifies the characteristics and profiles of university students with respect to the humanistic training obtained for their future performance as professionals in the labor market. The purpose is to identify the influence of the globalizing context on university students in order to understand why there is an orientation towards individuality and materiality instead of assuming a humanistic attitude as a reasonable alternative.

Spatiality

International educational trends and their influence on undergraduate students are studied in the scenario of the Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla (BUAP), based on four academic programs located in the Faculties of Administration, Nursing, Philosophy and Letters and Civil Engineering. BUAP is one of the public universities that at regional and national level has achieved growth parameters based on the policies it has promoted in education, for example the quality of the programs is evidenced by the terminal efficiency rates, as well as external evaluations conducted by the Interinstitutional Committees for the Evaluation of Higher Education (CIEES), the Council for the Accreditation of Higher Education (COPAES), and the National Council for Humanities, Science and Technology (CONAHCyT).

In BUAP, 88 years after its creation (1937), the educational offer of bachelor's degrees in face-to-face mode is 93 programs, which are divided into four areas of knowledge: Economic-administrative, Engineering and Exact Sciences, Natural and Health Sciences, Social Sciences and Humanities (BUAP, 2024). In the economic-administrative area, there are five academic units: Administration, Public Accounting, Economics, Communication Sciences and Law, which offer 18 degree programs; for the purposes of the study, the Bachelor's Degree in Public Administration and Management for Development was chosen.

In Natural and Health Sciences, there are seven academic units: Agricultural and Livestock Sciences, Biological Sciences, Nursing, Stomatology, Medicine, Veterinary Medicine and Zootechnics, offering 18 programs, choosing the Bachelor's Degree in Nursing. In the case of Engineering and Exact Sciences, seven units are presented: Architecture, Computer Sciences, Electronics Sciences, Chemical Sciences, Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Physical Mathematics, which offer 33 programs, the Bachelor's Degree in Civil Engineering was selected.

Finally, in the area of Social Sciences and Humanities, there are seven academic units: Plastic and Audiovisual Arts, Arts, Political and Social Sciences, Physical Culture, Philosophy and Letters, Languages, Psychology, offering 24 programs, the area was represented by the Bachelor's Degree in History (BUAP, 2024).

Timeliness

The timeframe of the research study was Fall 2024, with the 2022 (fourth semester) and 2023 (sixth semester) generations of students in the Minerva Model curriculum who studied the General University Training Area with the subjects Human and Social Formation and Development of Complex Thinking Skills.

Subjects and study sample

The study universe was made up of the group of undergraduate students and the sample is organized according to the four areas of knowledge that represent the BUAP's Higher Education Division (DES) (see Table 1)

Table 1.

Universe and sample of students.

Higher Education Division	Program	Student population	Sample of students
Economic-administrative	Public Administration and Development Management	581	59
Engineering and Exact Sciences	Civil Engineering	1487	148
Natural and Health Sciences	Nursing	1039	103
Social Sciences and Humanities	History	351	36
T O T A L		3458	346

Source: BUAP (2024). Anuario del Tercer Informe de Labores. Rectory.

The following academic programs were chosen: Public Administration and Management for Development, Civil Engineering, Nursing and History, and their students were the subjects who answered the research instrument in the form of a questionnaire. As for the student sample, we worked with 346 subjects who represent 10% of the 3,458 students enrolled in the aforementioned degree programs (see Table 1). According to their data, the student sample ranged in age from 18 to 26 years old (see Table 2). The ages most frequently displayed in the questionnaires were, in first place, 20 years of age with 75 mentions for the four academic programs, followed by 22 years of age with 70 mentions. The least representative ages were 25 and 26 years, which were presented in the Nursing and History degree programs, and although the frequency was not numerous, the data indicate that for this type of program the study ages are broader, that is, older populations in comparison with the other programs (see Table 2).

Table 2.

Average age of the sample of students.

Program	Administration Public	Civil Engineering	Nursing	History
Age	f	f	f	f
18	9	15	8	0
19	7	12	20	11
20	15	34	22	4
21	9	23	16	0
22	13	31	20	6
23	4	18	10	5
24	2	15	0	0
25	0	0	0	6
26	0	0	7	4
Total	59	148	103	36
Average	20.5	21.12	20.81	21.78

The demographic data of the sample allow visualizing a student group with an average age of 21.05 years, so it can be stated that the population currently being formed in the university classrooms is young, that is the trend that is presented in the first four semesters. As for the gender of the group of students, the situation does not differ from that prevailing in the other academic units of the university, where the school population presents higher figures for the male than the female gender. In the case of the sample of the 346 students surveyed, 145 are female and 201 are male, presenting a percentage of 42% and 58% respectively (see Table 3).

Table 3.

Gender of the sample student population by academic program.

Program	Public Administration		Civil Engineering		Nursing		History		Total
Genre	f	%	f	%	f	%	f	%	f	%
Female	31	51	36	25	68	66	10	23	145	42
Male	28	49	112	75	35	34	26	77	201	58
Total	59	100	148	100	103	100	36	100	346	100

The table shows a gender balance in the Public Administration degree, but not in Civil Engineering (75%) and History (77%), where the tendency is towards men, while Nursing (665) is for women.

Instrument

The instrument in the form of a questionnaire was addressed to the group of students and its elaboration was the result of a literature search and review, which led to the establishment of measurement and validation criteria required by quantitative studies. Four study variables are approached for the analysis of the influence of the globalizing context in the humanistic formation of future university professionals represented in: 1. Attitudes that teachers should demonstrate in the classroom; 2. Skills that HE students should develop in their professional practice; 3. Answering this questionnaire took the informants between 10 and 15 minutes approximately, the application was carried out at the BUAP facilities with students who took the subject Human and Social Formation and Development of Complex Thinking Skills, between January and February 2024. The results were codified by designing a database where the answers given by the participating subjects were located in order to proceed to their respective measurement, using the Likert Scale, as well as the analysis of questions that required open answers.

Results

From the measurement of the variables focused on assessing the profile with which university students should be trained, it was identified how they perceive the promotion of values and if they manage to understand it as a reasonable alternative that leads to the transformation of society by counteracting materialistic and individualistic principles. One of the questions asked to the participating subjects corresponded to the attitudes that teachers should demonstrate so that students promote a humanistic culture, modifying the pragmatic postures with which they graduate and enter the labor market as university-educated professionals.

If Table 4 is observed, according to the results presented by the sample of students, the attitudes that they consider that teachers should manifest in hierarchical order, in order to give meaning to their teaching actions, through their example that will allow them to adopt new ideological positions in the present are: 1. Maturity and respect in the treatment of students - Administration (92%); Civil Engineering (83%); Nursing (53%); History (93%)- 2. Ability to relate to other people -Administration (92%); Civil Engineering (83%); Nursing (53%); History (93%)- 3. Interest in students' academic performance -Administration (92%); Civil Engineering (80%); Nursing (53%); History (80%)- 4. Trusting environment they foster towards students -Administration (70%); civil engineering (81%); Nursing (53%); History (85%).

Table 4.

Attitudes that teachers must show in order to promote humanistic culture in students.

PROGRAM	Public Administration	Civil Engineering	Nursing	History
A C T I T U R E S	%	%	%	%
Maturity and respect in the treatment of students.	92	83	53	93
Ability to relate to other people	91	83	50	83
Interest in student academic performance	92	80	53	80
An environment of trust that fosters trust towards students.	70	81	53	85
Accessibility and availability	49	77	53	80
Appreciation of their profession	70	62	37	68
Ability and confidence to teach	49	61	50	90
Human competence	60	77	0	0
Humility	68	62	0	60
Concern for student learning	49	64	53	78
Problem solving strategies	55	62	37	78
Promotion of cultural values	70	62	0	53
Sense of responsibility	49	78	0	83
Teamwork	53	78	45	65

Likewise, as an alternative to the humanistic attitudes that students establish as essential, there are those where teachers are requested to bet on accessibility, availability, responsibility, humility with respect to their academic practice, demonstrating appreciation for their profession, as well as teamwork and the promotion of strategies that ensure the solution of problems by providing alternative answers for a world that has been tinged by the Technological Revolution.

Another of the questions in the questionnaire was that of the skills that university students should present and that will allow them to participate in the global scenario. If Table 5 is observed, the skills that university students should develop in the face of Globalization are in the following order: 1. Efficiency - Administration (98%); Civil Engineering (80%); Nursing (87%); History (60%)- 2. Quality -Administration (96%); Civil Engineering (61%); Nursing (79%); History (25%)- 3. Productivity -Administration (55%); Civil Engineering (77%); Nursing (82%); History (63%)- 4. Efficiency - Administration (98%); Civil Engineering (83%); Nursing (74%); History (23%). Based on the results, it is striking how students give priority to the skills related to the discourses of the globalizing context, thinking that these are the capacities, skills, aptitudes and qualities that a professional with a university profile in the contemporary world must have.

Table 5.

Skills to be developed by the university student.

P R O G R A M M E	Public Administration	Civil Engineering	Nursing	History
H A B I L I T I T I E S	%	%	%	%
Efficiency	98	80	87	60
Quality	96	61	79	25
Productivity	55	77	82	63
Efficiency	98	83	74	23
Reasoning	91	48	71	90
Creativity	55	33	0	88
Application of knowledge	70	45	74	85
Learning to solve	70	61	84	85
Cognitive	47	75	49	63
Ease of speech	49	61	76	65
Management of work techniques	51	62	76	60
Motor	70	75	79	65
Observation	53	59	74	63
Critical thinking	70	32	0	83
Logical thinking	91	59	71	83
Promotion of self-knowledge	57	48	71	68
Reflection	53	31	0	63

In the case of Administration, the skills considered basic by the students were, in hierarchical order: efficiency, effectiveness, quality, logical thinking and reasoning; for Civil Engineering, the following were presented: efficiency, effectiveness, productivity, cognitive and motor skills. In the case of Nursing, efficiency, learning to solve, productivity and quality prevailed. Finally, with History, the discipline breaks with the structure of the previous programs because rather than emphasizing pragmatic and utilitarian skills, it is inclined towards skills that lead to the conformation of a humanistic labor participation such as: reasoning, creativity, application of knowledge, learning to solve, logical and critical thinking (see Table 6).

Table 6.

Skills considered basic by students in hierarchical order.

H A B I L I T I T I E S	Public Administration	Civil Engineering	Nursing	History
Application of knowledge				3°
Learning to solve			2°
Quality	3°
Creativity				2
Efficiency	2°	2°
Efficiency	1°	1°	1°
Productivity		3°	3°
Reasoning				1°

With respect to the indicator: Attitudes that the university student should develop in the international context, the following were presented in hierarchical order: 1. Commitment - Administration (92%); Civil Engineering (88%); Nursing (71%); History (85%); 2. Responsibility - Administration (89%); Civil Engineering (81%); Nursing (71%); History (65%); 3. Being Positive -Administration (89%); Civil Engineering (75%); Nursing (71%); History (83%)- 4. Sociability -Administration (91%); Civil Engineering (71%); Nursing (82%); History (63%). The data indicate that despite the fact that in contemporary skills, students choose to promote those of a pragmatic and utilitarian nature, when analyzing the attitudes with which they should perform, they do identify the importance of having the essential values to implement in their professional work, expressing the need to maintain and disseminate them as measures to ensure progress and social development (see Table 7).

Table 7.

Attitudes to be promoted by the university student.

P R O G R A M M E	Public Administration	Civil Engineering	Nursing	History
ATTITUDES	%	%	%	%
Commitment	92	88	71	85
Responsibility	89	81	71	65
Being positive	89	75	71	83
Sociability	91	71	82	63
Ongoing training	70	74	74	88
Cooperation	58	45	0	85
Kindness	28	52	84	68
Attention	49	74	97	65
Kindness	30	52	79	60
Good performance	28	75	76	60
Professional interest	70	55	74	65
Leadership	32	52	71	55
Perfectionist	28	52	74	28
Propositive	49	52	71	83
Security	49	52	87	60
Simplicity	30	77	74	63
Seriousness	32	46	71	60
Decision making	60	45	79	65
Initiative	49	45	0	85
Optimism	70	45	0	63
Dedication	64	45	0	0

From the characterization of attitudes presented by the sample of subjects, and in order to understand their positions, it was considered pertinent to visualize their concerns, thus in the case of Administration the attitudes that are translated as the way of being of the individuals and that the students consider as basic, were in hierarchical order: commitment (92%), sociability (91%), responsibility (89%), and being positive (89%); for Civil Engineering there were: commitment (88%), responsibility (81%), simplicity (77%), and being positive (75%). In the case of Nursing the following prevailed: attention (97%), safety (87%), kindness (84%), and being positive (82%). Finally, the following were ranked with History: continuous training (88%), commitment (85%), cooperation (85%) and initiative (85%), see Table 8.

Table 8.

Attitudes considered basic by students in hierarchical order.

ATTITUDES	Public Administration	Civil Engineering	Nursing	History
Kindness			3°
Attention			1°
Commitment	1°	1°		2°
Cooperation				3°
Ongoing training				1°
Responsibility	3°
Security			2°
Simplicity		3°
Sociability	2°	2°

Regarding the indicator: Values that the university student should show, the following aspects were presented: 1. Professional responsibility -Administration (92%); Civil Engineering (75%); Nursing (74%); History (83%)- 2. Humility -Administration (91%); Civil Engineering (45%); Nursing (79%); History (85%)- 3. Understanding -Administration (28%); Civil Engineering (57%); Nursing (79%); History (80%)- 4. Honesty -Administration (89%); Civil Engineering (69%); Nursing (74%); History (80%)- 5. Respect -Administration (34%); Civil Engineering (71%); Nursing (84%); History (65%)-, see Table 9.

Table 9.

Proposal of values to be promoted by the university student

P R O G R A M M E	Public Administration	Civil Engineering	Nursing	History
V A L O R E S	%	%	%	%
Professional Responsibility	92	75	74	83
Humility	91	45	79	85
Comprehension	28	57	79	80
Honesty	89	69	74	80
Respect	34	71	84	65
Kindness	28	48	76	60
Love for the profession	26	62	71	65
Appreciation	49	57	74	33
Interest	51	77	68	38
Loyalty	30	45	74	37
Moral	53	46	76	60
Simplicity	55	49	74	60
Sincerity	57	45	74	80
Equality	92	48	0	65
Tolerance	94	46	0	65

The results indicate that students understand that they must have technical skills for the workplace, and they know that in order to achieve a favorable professional performance they must assume a series of attitudes and values. The type of university professional profile that should be formed at the university, according to the position of the students, is the one that develops the skills presented by the educational discourse of the globalizing context such as effectiveness, efficiency, productivity, and quality, which should be harmonized with attitudes and values that lead to growth, development and progress from attitudes that are represented by: commitment, responsibility, being positive and sociable as a professional, and values such as: honesty, humility, respect and tolerance, thus the University must guarantee the formation of future professionals, through indispensable knowledge that will allow them to exercise citizenship in an effective and responsible manner which implies fostering those interpersonal, intercultural, social and civic skills that allow students to understand our social reality, coexist and exercise democratic citizenship in a pluralistic society (....) beyond efficiency, effectiveness or competitiveness, it is important to adopt a reflective stance on imported, ideologized and apolitical proposals (López, 2014, p. 195).

Conclusions

The assessment of the effects that the globalizing context has generated in HE allows visualizing its influence on the professional training of undergraduate students, understanding that there is a situation that leans more towards the action of individuality instead of the collaboration that indicates the humanist attitude, as a result of the trends and fashions that have been imposed by the deciding nations that are still supported by the continuation of the capitalist system and the neoliberal model, betting that societies respond to the demands of the productive processes and the accumulation of surplus value as the economic axis, thus causing the need to have cadres of workers from the category of qualified workers to participate in the global phenomenon but that in investment are conceived as cheap labor.

Faced with the utilitarian outlook, the University must transform itself and assume a new culture of professions and professional practice, establishing criteria with which graduates will have to perform in the labor market. One of the important aspects to highlight is the characterization of the profile of the person to be formed in the classrooms, according to the development of skills that are defined as the abilities, abilities, aptitudes and qualities that allow doing something, as well as the attitudes that are conceived as the way or manner of being together with the values, which are understood as everything that is aspired to because it is considered desirable and, therefore, it is associated to aspects such as appreciation, esteem, interest and preference.

The present study indicates that 65% of the students accept the postulates of the globalizing context in HE in their professional training, such as having specialized and continuous education, with participation in stays abroad and language learning, placing knowledge as an individual value and opportunity, but which also generates the pressure to be hired as qualified labor, in the ideal of professional -according to employers- which is based on the demonstration of effectiveness, efficiency, quality and productivity. On the other hand, they also point out the need to challenge the globalizing process by adding to their future practice in the labor market social and cultural criteria that should be activated from the promotion of values, as a conditioning factor of the professional typology that conciliates and provides them with more opportunities to be incorporated into social, productive and/or labor life. In the opinion of BUAP students, the values with which they should perform in their professional practice are: that of people who know how to respect, be responsible, commit themselves and work as a team, being able to practice tolerance as an alternative for social coexistence.

Globalization has activated a series of effects, both positive and negative, which has influenced the ideology of university students by orienting them towards the acceptance of individuality, a consequence of the discourses of competitiveness, leaving aside the humanistic vision, which must be recovered to achieve the means of coexistence and respect for societies in the contemporary world, leading to the integration of the multiple dimensions of human existence: social, ethical, economic, cultural, civic and spiritual; the inclusion of people who are often discriminated against (...) and taking into account their educational needs; assuming learning in an open and flexible way to propitiate opportunities that allow expressing the potential with a view to a sustainable future and a dignified existence. In addition, it implies overcoming the vision of conventional academic learning and accepting other forms of learning related to the emotional, social and ethical (Ojalvo and Curiel, 2018, p. 119).

The analysis of the influence of the international context of HE on students shows that one of the problems is the lack of correspondence between what students think and what the globalizing project manifests. There is a lack of awareness of how to participate in the globalizing discourse because the prevailing economic dynamics, technology and information saturation hinder understanding and reflective analysis in the New World Order. It is difficult for students to identify the skills and abilities they should develop and the attitudes and values they should assume as professionals in their discipline, perhaps because they do not observe in their own trainers the example of how to assume these principles that give meaning to the existence of the profession, as well as the search for the welfare of the individual and the collective.

Improvement alternatives

The alternatives that favor the formation of professionals who abandon the world of materiality and utility, so that humanization becomes the essential rule of action must opt for: a) Making the teaching and promotion of values, as well as the strengthening of ethics in professional practice for all areas of knowledge, be established as a foundation for all areas of knowledge within the University. b) Design academic programs based on the objectives, contents and learning activities of a given discipline to generate a human, reflective and proactive vision, instead of a dehumanized, material and conformist posture. c) Encourage university professors to assume attitudes that open the humanistic culture, so that through their actions they show students how to break the pragmatic postures with which they are formed and graduate to enter the labor market.

Final considerations

Globalization has transformed higher education, because by imposing the preferential economic view on the humanistic vision, derived from the requirements of the labor market and the need to have professionals who demonstrate high standards of labor skills have pushed aside the performance values relevant to life in society. University education, under the influence of accreditation and certification processes, has focused on quality and productivity rather than on critical reflection or the integral development of the person. In view of this reality, it is imperative to reorient HE towards a humanistic approach that strengthens the teaching of values.

The assimilation of a humanistic attitude in university students allows to delimit the promotion of values, as a response that leads to the advancement and strengthening of society. The subjects that are educated in universities, and in the case of BUAP students, must start by placing as a central point the development of social and cultural life, the desire to improve, respect for others, which must be on a par with the technical and human training. Emphasizing the humanistic aspect as a daily practice and being responsible with the way of thinking, is what will allow students and future graduates to interact permanently with others; solving, developing the ability to "know how to do"; and most importantly, retake and reaffirm traditional values.

It is important that undergraduate students reflect on the importance of the humanistic vision "as a selective process for the establishment of more supportive relationships, with dialogic transformations and collaborative methods, through the collective exercise among peers in their formative plane" (Sesento, 2021, p. 70). 70), being a fundamental need for all disciplines, that is, both those that bet on exact and technological knowledge, as well as the humanities themselves, otherwise the progress of our world will be doomed to failure, because even if we have advanced technology and scientific progress, the absence of fundamental values in humanity will prevent individuals from realizing themselves fully, ending up affecting the world in general and society itself in particular.

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