How to teach professional ethics in graduate programs? Opinions of the professors-researchers from the Juarez Autonomous University of Tabasco

Graduate education has become an important issue in Mexican educational policies. Students’ enrollment in this level has been showing a constant growth since 1980 and, as a consequence, educational institutions and governmental departments are being more interested in keeping trace of graduate programs, either specialties, masters or doctorates.

Nowadays, the National Council of Science and Technology urges institutions to maintain quality through the evaluation of several indicators such as student’s registration, academic groups, updating and amendment of curricula, graduation rate and productivity of professors and candidates.

Particularly, since four years ago, the Juarez Autonomous University of Tabasco (UJAT) has implemented different strategies to improve the quality of its graduate programs and to get CONACYT certification. Nevertheless, the subject of professional ethics does not represent a matter of discussion in the institutional policies yet. Despite of this, professor-researchers who work at the UJAT are aware that this is a central topic in the education of new researchers.

In this paper, we present some of the results obtained in this university, as part of our participation in the Interuniversity Project on Professional Ethics. Some of the most important outcomes show that 78.4% of the professors consider that curricula must include a specific subject on professional ethics.

Talking about its content, they suggest the following aspects: Problems in professional work (17.5%), Professional principles (15%), Analytical and reflective education (15%), and Principles to achieve a good labor performance (12.5%). The main values that according to these professors must be socialized among graduate students are: ethics, cognitive values, professionalism, scientific values and responsibility. As far as the values that must be promoted among academics, they highlighted: ethics, professionalism, scientific values, democratic values and honesty.