The Professional teaching service and the degrees in educational sciences. Elements for an analysis

Abstract

Amongst the legislative changes that have accompanied the new Mexican educational reform, the article 24 of the General Law for Professional Teaching Service (Ley General del Servicio Profesional Docente) has given rise to the possibility that new professions with pedagogical profile get involved in teaching tasks in preschool and elementary education. The new legislative decree takes for granted that the pro-fessional profiles of teachers that were trained in teacher-training colleges and students who graduated from degrees in education or pedagogy can be seen as equivalent. This article seeks, on one hand, to give an account of the logical and empirical reasons that make impossible that kind of standardization; on the other hand, it foresees some of the expected consequences that would cause the implementation of this legal provision. The analysis is illustrated by a review of the results at the call for applying at the Profes-sional Teaching Service (Servicio Profesional Docente) of the students who graduated from Educational Sciences degree in a university situated in a federate state of the Mexican Republic.