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Researchers in learning analytics have created indicators with learners' trace data as a proxy for studying learner behaviour in a college course. Student Approaches to Learning (SAL) is one of the theories used to explain these behaviours, distinguishing between deep, surface, and organized study. In Latin America, researchers have demonstrated that organized approaches to learning could be more effective in higher education, leading to better performance and course approval. However, further analysis of student behavioural data is needed to understand this relationship and inform interventions targeting study habits and academic performance. In this study, we analyzed the relationship between student approaches to learning and their final grade in six college courses, using behavioural trace data as a mediator variable. Specifically, we conducted a quantitative study in two Latin American institutions where data of different granularity was collected from their Learning Management Systems. We observed that most learning analytics indicators do not mediate the effect between approaches to learning and course performance. However, there was evidence for fine-grained indicators acting as total mediators. Implications are discussed at methodological and pedagogical levels, aiming to inform the advancement of learning analytics in the region and its use for supporting student learning.

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are a worldwide commitment to a set of ambitious goals that advance sustainable social justice across the globe. Higher education (HE), while featuring in SDG 4: Quality Education, needs to occupy a bolder and more explicit position in the formulation of the SDGs and in their attainment, not only as an instrument toward the achievement of the SDGs but also in the sociocultural consciousness of countries towards a more sustainable and socially just world. Engaging with students in HE around these issues plays a vital role. Given Student Affairs and Services' (SAS) role and position in terms of support and development of students worldwide, it is a key player in supporting HE to become a more effective instrument in advancing the SDGs and in advancing students' attitudes and commitment to SDGs. To explore how SAS can play a more impactful role in advancing the SDGs and SAS' role in and contribution to SDGs around the world, we researched SAS practitioners' awareness of and engagement with SDGs. To collect data, we used a survey with open and closed questions via snowball sampling with self-selected participants from fifty-three countries (N=318). The results of our study suggest that SAS practitioners engage with and utilize the SDGs in a variety of ways across the globe, thus contributing to the role HE plays in advancing SDGs. In exploring the patterns, it emerges that SAS in the Global South (GS) and Global North (GN) engage differently with the SDGs. According to the results of our study, SAS in the GS appears to have more awareness of, engage more deliberately with, and use the SDGs more broadly in their work with students. While there are different trends on the role SDGs play across the global HE sector, the consensus seems to be around the need to discuss and engage with the SDGs more deeply, at curricular and co-curricular levels in higher education. Our research suggests that HE and SAS can do much more to generate awareness of SDGs, particularly in the GN.

This systematic literature review examines the panorama of interculturality in rural contexts of bilingual education in Latin America. It aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the current state of knowledge in Latin America and identify key themes, challenges, and gaps in the field. The review highlights the importance of recognizing and valuing linguistic and cultural diversity, particularly in marginalized rural communities. It also discusses the lack of adequate resources and educational policies as significant challenges to promoting intercultural bilingual education in these contexts. The findings underscore the need for further research and the development of effective strategies to enhance intercultural understanding and bilingual education in Latin American rural areas.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a profound impact on the education sector worldwide, and on undergraduate students in particular. This Scoping Review seeks to unearth research examining the psychosocial impact of the pandemic on undergraduate students in the regions of North America, Latin America, and the Caribbean. Additionally, this review explores students' coping mechanisms as a means to guide researchers in conducting informed investigations and to allow institutions in making meaningful decisions to combat the effects of the pandemic and future disruptions. Despite the wealth of research on COVID-19, findings from this review show a notable scarcity of literature specifically focused on undergraduate students. Findings reveal a consensus among studies regarding increased stress, anxiety, and depression among undergraduate students. Coping strategies employed by students highlight possible challenges such as overuse of social media and substance use, but they also shed light on potential interventions including physical activities, emotional strategies, and social supports. Future research should focus on filling the gaps in the existing literature and assessing the efficacy of targeted interventions. By gaining a deeper understanding of undergraduate student experiences and identifying effective support mechanisms, we can enhance the overall well-being and academic success of students.

In the last three decades, the promotion of stakeholder involvement in evaluation has been gaining relevance in the Latin American and internationally, across varied agencies, institutions, and civic organizations. The 2030 Agenda and the Global Evaluation Agenda have also recognized the centrality of participation in evaluation. This article explores stakeholder involvement in evaluation based on collaborative work with stakeholders from 15 evaluative experiences. It shows what characterizes participatory evaluation in the region today and the principles of this practice.

This paper traces a conversation between the authors about their long-standing (Urban) and more recent (Gómez Muñoz, Zárate Pinto) engagement in and with RECE. The conversation revolves around the role and potential of reconceptualist thought in contexts of early childhood realities in the Global South, most prominently in Latin America, where two of the authors are based, while one has extensive work connections to the region. Given RECE's roots in US-American and English language worlds, what other approaches exist in Latin America contexts and beyond that enable us to challenge the dominant narratives of early childhood education, its narrow disciplinary base, its policies and practices? Drawing on work with marginalised communities, the conversation turns to necessities of advocacy and transdisciplinarity, and to possibilities of epistemic and new activist alliances.

Background: Mentorship is critical to success in postgraduate science, technology, engineering, math, and medicine (STEMM) settings. As such, the purpose of this study is to comprehensively explore the state of mentorship interventions in postgraduate STEMM settings to identify novel practices and future research directions. The selection criteria for reviewed articles included: (1) published between 2002 and 2022, (2) peer-reviewed, (3) in English, (4) postgraduate mentees, (5) a program where mentorship is a significant, explicit focus, and (6) a description of mentee outcomes related to the mentorship intervention. Overall, 2583 articles were screened, and 109 articles were reviewed. Results: Most postgraduate STEMM mentorship intervention studies lack strong evidence to evaluate the effectiveness of the intervention, with only 5.5% of articles designed as randomized controlled trials. Most mentorship interventions (45.6%) were created for faculty, and few (4%) were for postdoctoral researchers. Also, only 18.8% of interventions focused on underrepresented groups in STEMM. Most interventions (53.7%) prescribed a dyadic structure, and there was more mentorship training for mentors than mentees. Conclusion: Overall, these findings identify gaps in mentorship interventions and provide step-by-step guidance for future interventions, including a consideration for underrepresented groups and postdoctoral scholars, robust mentorship training, and more randomized controlled trials.

This study assesses the acceptability, appropriateness, feasibility, and efficacy of a novel asynchronous video-based intervention for teaching respiratory physiology and anatomy to medical students in resource-limited settings. A series of short video lectures on pleural anatomy, pulmonary physiology, and pathophysiology was created using Lightboard and screen capture technology. These were uploaded to YouTube and Google Drive and made available to 1st-3rd year medical students at two Latin American universities for 1 week. Employing a parallel-convergent mixed methods design, we conducted surveys, focus groups, interviews, and pre/post testing for qualitative and quantitative data. Thematic Analysis was used to analyze qualitative data and McNemar's test for quantitative analysis. Seventy-six students participated. The videos' short format, interactivity, and Lightboard style were highly valued for their flexibility, time efficiency, and educational impact. Students recognized their clinical relevance and trusted their content, suggesting potential applicability in similar settings. Despite infrastructure and connectivity challenges, the use of flexible streaming and downloadable options facilitated learning. Survey results indicated high levels of feasibility (99%), appropriateness (95%), and acceptability (95%), with significant knowledge gains observed (37% correct pre-test answers vs. 56% post-test, p < 0.0001). Our findings demonstrate high acceptability, appropriateness, feasibility, and efficacy of a targeted asynchronous education centered on short-format videos in resource-limited settings, enabling robust learning despite local barriers. Flexible access is key for overcoming localized barriers. Taking an adaptive, learner-centered approach to content creation and delivery to address constraints was pivotal to success. Our modular videos could serve as versatile models for flexible education in resource-constrained settings.

Although executive functions (EFs) have been identified as a cornerstone of cognitive development, knowledge of this fundamental ability in children is based primarily on research with North American and Western European samples of middle to high socioeconomic status (SES). In this article, we highlight advances in research on developmental EFs from Latin American regions, an understudied area that provides a unique context important to understanding EFs. Our narrative review suggests the potential for both universality (e.g., increasing cohesion and longitudinal stability among EFs' task performance, general positive associations with age, and other social and cognitive abilities) and cultural specificity in EF development (i.e., contributions of SES, educational environments, parenting styles, and cultural values). It is important to consider the development of EFs outside of typically examined samples--and specifically within Latin American countries--to understand more thoroughly these abilities and to generate interventions that consider cultural context.

Computer programming is a skill of increasing importance in scientific and technological fields. However, in introductory computer science (CS1) courses in higher education, approximately one in every three students fails. A common reason is that students are overwhelmed by an accelerated and inflexible pace of learning that jeopardizes success. Accordingly, in the computer science education literature it has been suggested that the pedagogical philosophy of 'mastery learning,' which supports students progressing at their own pace, can improve academic outcomes of CS1 courses. Nevertheless, few extended mastery learning implementations in CS1 have been documented in the literature, and there is a lack of guidance and best practices to foster its adoption. In this paper, we present a four-year action research study in which a modular mastery-based CS1 course was designed, evaluated and improved in successive iterations with cohorts of engineering freshmen in a Latin American research university (N = 959). In the first year of the intervention, only 19.3% of students passed the course in their first semester attempting it. In successive iterations, the instructional design, teaching and learning activities, course content, and course management were iteratively improved such that by the fourth year of offering 77.1% of students passed the course in their first semester. Over this period, course attrition was reduced from 25.0% to 3.8% of the cohort, and students' mean time spent in the course decreased from 23.2 weeks (SD = 7.38) to 14.9 (SD = 3.64). Results indicate that modularization for mastery learning is a viable approach for improving academic results in a CS1 course. Practical considerations towards successful implementation of this approach are presented and discussed.

A recent global reconnaissance of Christian higher education found a number of key themes that shaped current developments, such as the pressing challenges of secularization and nationalization but also the advantages of privatization and massification. This article provides an update to this older analysis by taking a birds-eye view of trends within the past 70 years of global Christian higher education. It reveals that privatization and massification trends do not predict new developments in countries and outliers always exist. Furthermore, it highlights some findings missed in previous analyses related to the importance of indigenous Christian groups and Christian general education.

This article presents an analytical framework for examining the different roles the state can play in improving higher education governance in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). It argues that adequate governance of national higher education systems is fundamental to moving toward a new social contract in the sector. It describes different roles the state can play in a new social contract for the future governance of higher education and proposes recommendations for strengthening the governance of national higher education systems in LAC. It also reviews the literature on higher education governance and discusses changes in analytical approaches. It emphasizes that local factors are key determinants in understanding changes in the governance of national higher education systems and identifies trends toward the configuration of hybrid governance systems. It is suggested that a new social contract in higher education depends on the capacity of national governments to articulate the necessary political consensus; to pursue an agenda of higher education modernization as a human right and a public good; and to achieve greater effectiveness in addressing key challenges related to equity, quality, sustainability, and the long-term development strategy of higher education.

Open-source hardware and software platforms have played an important role in democratizing access to technology and education in computer science and engineering. Recent advancements in tools, such as KiCad, MicroPython, and Thonny, integrated development environment potentially accelerate low-budget educational applications, providing a smooth and consistent learning curve for users. The BitDogLab, utilizing these platforms, is designed and developed for Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics activities based on the Raspberry Pi Pico Board, featuring artificial intelligence (AI)-supported programming via the GPT model. BitDogLab is an open-source hardware solution with a flexible design for continuous expansion in both software and hardware areas. Its functionality, based on open-source code, can be enhanced by integrating various software resources. Additionally, BitDogLab's adaptability to sophisticated hardware like robotic systems or advanced sensors expands its educational applications. An evaluation of BitDogLab, conducted through a hands-on workshop at the Latin America Open Technology Conference--Latinoware 2023, revealed unanimous interest among 36 respondents, mainly for teaching programming (58%), and valuing its low cost, diverse components, and ease of AI-assisted programming. 75% of respondents expressed a strong desire to use BitDogLab, despite 19% preferring familiar boards like Arduino or Micro:bit. The project's open distribution encourages community contributions, promoting collaborative learning and innovation from children to preuniversity students.

Gender differences in early childhood development are under-researched in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) where almost 90% of the world's young children live. This study examines the direction, magnitude, and variation of gender similarities and differences in 3- and 4-year-olds' early childhood development in 71 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Moreover, we explore whether country-level gender inequality correlates with gender differences in early development. We analyzed Early Childhood Development Index (ECDI) data from UNICEF's Multiple Indicators Cluster Surveys and the Demographic and Health Surveys between 2010 and 2019 (n = 226,980). Using logistic regression, we estimated children's odds of being developmentally on track in literacy-numeracy, approaches to learning, social-emotional, and physical domains. We also used meta-analytic regression to examine associations between early childhood development and country-level indicators of gender inequality. In approximately one-half of LMICs, odds of being developmentally on track did not significantly differ for girls and boys; in countries with significant differences, girls were more likely to be on track than boys (odds ratio [OR] = 1.21, 95% confidence interval [CI] = [1.18-1.24], p < 0.001). Differences favoring girls were largest in the social-emotional domain (OR = 1.27, 95% CI = [1.24-1.30], p < 0.001). Country-level gender development index explained a substantial amount of variation in gender differences across countries. Overall, findings suggest that when gender differences exist, girls are more likely than boys to be developmentally on track, particularly in the social-emotional domain and in countries with greater gender equality.

Challenges from globalization, population growth, and climate change require science, technology, and engineering (STEM) professionals to have global competency. However, the impact of international experiences on STEM students' development of these abilities has not been well studied. We assessed the effects of international research experiences in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) and Europe on the development of global competency for STEM graduate students from the United States. Research placements in LAC were generally field-based, involving interactions with community members, while placements in Europe were mostly lab-based. Surveys and interviews with participants before and after their trips revealed increases in intercultural abilities for students from all groups. Students who traveled to LAC had higher intercultural abilities before the trip but experienced smaller gains than their counterparts who traveled to Europe. Despite the value in community-based activities for students outside of university settings, more effort is needed to eliminate students' barriers to understanding communication styles in their host communities.

Social media has become an important tool for universities to implement strategies to promote, position and differentiate their brand identity, to establish and foster the communicative relationship with their stakeholders. This study explores the interactivity strategy developed in digital communication by 70 leading universities from Europe, the United States and Latin America. A specific quantitative methodology was designed to analyze the universities' social media publications (90,241). The general communicative approach and the communication resources applied were studied through quantitative content analysis. Results show that the universities have an informational approach in their publications on social networks, with little differences among regions and platforms. Expositive and interactive resources are being used in a broad, integrated manner although there are some differences in each region and social network. Thus, the universities opt for a monological interactivity strategy in their digital institutional communication, with little differences between social networks. They are changing toward a model that continues to prioritize dissemination of information, but it is evolving toward more combination of various communication resources that make content more attractive to their publics. This research provides insights into interactivity strategies used by universities on social networks to develop effective digital communication strategies for enhancing engagement with publics.

In this paper, a quantitative, descriptive, and correlational research is carried out on the perceptions of the digital competence of Latin American engineering professors, their assessment of the didactic use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in different didactic areas (interaction, communication, distribution, and administration and evaluation), and on the growth or decrease in the frequency of their use after the COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, the Latin American engineering professors' perceptions of digital competence is studied. Also, the existence of gender gaps (both in general and differentiating between private and public universities, and between professors with a more or less teaching experience) has been explored in the assessment of the perceptions of digital competence and the didactic use of ICT by engineering professors, as well as in the influence that the pandemic has had on the habits of ICT use. The results reveal that the use of ICT by engineering professors has achieved increases of over 40% in some educational activities due to the pandemic, and it has had a homogenizing effect on the frequency of use of ICT tools in the different activities. Female engineering professors have increased their use of ICT more than males, and engineering professors in private universities more than those in public universities. Consequently, it is suggested to the universities to reinforce the continuous training of engineering professors, considering the pedagogical specificities of engineering education and the necessary integration of ICT in the teaching activity of female engineering professors.

Using a multidimensional, integrative approach this study examined the influence of social position factors (nativity, economic hardship, and language) and environmental contexts (community trauma, geographic location, and discrimination) on three domains of school engagement (cognitive, behavioral, and relational) among a community sample of first- and second-generation Latino adolescents. Findings from this study reveal that both social position and environmental contexts significantly and differentially predicted each of the three domains of school engagement. Participants (n = 306) included students from 11 high schools in two US cities. Fifty-three percent were first-generation immigrants and 80% were born, or had a parent from, Mexico or Central America. Results indicated that all three social position factors (nativity, economic hardship, and language) and two of the three environmental contexts (community trauma exposure and discrimination) significantly and differentially predicted each of the three domains of school engagement. Findings emphasize the direct effects of student's social positionality and environmental contexts on their engagement in school.

Purpose: This study compared approaches to school closures in four Latin American countries (Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru), describing the impact on the health and educational wellbeing of school-age children and youth, and evaluating their approaches in regard to continuing education through the pandemic. Design/methodology/approach: We collected 75 publicly available documents including scientific and gray literature (government documents and news releases), that referred to school closures and their impact on children's health and wellbeing. We did thematic analyses using open, axial, and selective coding and applied the latest Health Promoting Schools standards and indicators to the findings. Findings: Results showed that countries followed epidemiological reasons for prioritizing school closures while adopting some policies that abide by Health Promoting School principles. While they emphasized the need to reopen schools so that instruction could continue, school closures were among the longest in the world. The most significant impacts on wellbeing identified in the four countries were related to food security and mental health. Research limitations/implications: This study focused on a particular set of documents, and it may not capture the full spectrum of relevant information in different contexts or regions. Practical implications: By comparing school closures approaches among four Latin American countries, this study highlights the importance of context-specific interventions. In a post-pandemic era, lessons learned from these experiences should help foster more resilient and inclusive educational systems and explore the paths forward for following the new Health Promoting Schools framework in the region. Originality/value: Cross-country qualitative analyses on this topic are rare. This study adds to the knowledge base by eliciting lessons for future health education research and policy efforts.

The study of language maintenance and shift (LMS) has attracted a large body of empirical work in language policy and planning (LPP) contexts, including allochthonous (immigrant) and autochthonous (indigenous) languages. However, some critical ontological questions that relate to the scope and terminology of language maintenance studies remain unanswered, and there seems to be a lack of consistency in the definitions of the relevant terms, such as what 'heritage' language refers to, whose heritage it is when a language can be classified as a heritage language, and what 'language' is at all. Therefore, this review summarises existing literature on LPP for language maintenance by employing a scoping review methodology, providing an overview of empirical studies of LPP in migration context over the past two decades (2001-2023), focusing on terminology, geographical settings, research focus and methods. The findings reveal that most studies (66.3%) use the term 'heritage language' to refer to the 'language of transnational minorities' among other terms. The results also highlight geographical gaps and imbalances in the literature, calling for more LPP studies from South American and East Asian contexts. In addition, further investigations are needed to explore the transnational and translocal aspects of language maintenance.

Do international large-scale assessments influence education policy? How? Through scripts, lessons, or incentives? For some, they all produce similar outcomes. For others, different assessment data, shaped by different designs, and mediated by international organizations' (IOs) policy directives, prompt different policy decisions. For some, participation in these assessments may be linked to lower repetition rates, as per the policy scripts hypothesis inspired by world society theory. For others, assessments' comparison strategies (age vs. grade) influence repetition in participating countries, according to policy lessons or incentives hypotheses, respectively inspired by educational effectiveness research and the sociology of quantification, and particularly the notion of retroaction. Fixed-effects panel regression models of eighteen Latin American countries (1992-2017) show that participation in assessments is associated with changing repetition rates in primary and secondary, while controlling for other factors. The findings show statistically significant differences between some assessment types. The conclusions spur new questions, delineating a future agenda.

This article critically examines the intersections of translanguaging, raciolinguistics, and curriculum studies within the context of Latin America. It interrogates how dominant discourses and practices perpetuate coloniality and linguistic hierarchies in the region. Through an analysis of a special issue of the "Journal of Curriculum and Pedagogy," the paper explores how emergent scholarship challenges the hegemony of Global English and disrupts colonial narratives embedded in national educational policies. By theorizing curriculum at the intersection of translanguaging, raciolinguistics, and sociopolitical contexts, this article advocates for a counter-curriculum that prioritizes the epistemic agency of historically excluded communities. Translanguaging practices emerge as a form of resistance, underscoring the role pedagogy plays in subverting dominant language ideologies. They challenge Eurocentric ways of knowing by advancing inclusive pedagogies rooted in local knowledges and linguistic diversity. Ultimately, the article advocates for a decolonial curriculum that prioritizes linguistic autonomy, cultural pluralism, and epistemic justice in Latin America and beyond.

"Cuerpo-territorio" is a method stemming from Latin American geography, which recognizes the centrality of situated and embodied experiences as a form of knowing. We engaged with this method in the classroom to understand how students through their embodied and situated experiences had absorbed a post-development geographic course content and how these notions had remained with them. Given that emotions, particularly when elicited by images play a major role in consolidating knowledge, we asked students to explore their embodied feelings related to the course content by reflecting and representing them in a visual form on a poster. Through this paper, we aim to contribute to the debate on the importance of applying decolonial strategies in the classroom by widening the methodological toolbox of our geography colleagues. We find that, given the diversity of the students' population, working with a boundary object such as the posters helped students to relate to each other via the course content. Finally, reflecting and assimilating the course content through "cuerpo-territorio," we argue, was conducive to consolidating learning outcomes, while students experienced knowledge co-creation with their peers.

Background: Nutritional interventions can help to develop healthy eating patterns during the transition to university, which is a critical transition for all college students. Purpose: This research aims to analyze eating behaviors and food choices through sustainable nutritional education interventions with college students from a multinational university in Latin-America. Methods: The nutritional intervention had eight sessions emphasizing lifestyle nutrition patterns. There was an intervention group (n = 85), and a control group (n = 80). This research evaluated the eating behaviors and food choice motivators before and after the intervention. Results: The nutrition education interventions showed that the group under intervention improved, changing from unhealthy to moderately healthy habits, whereas the control groups remained in unhealthy eating behaviors. Food choice motivations slightly differ from the two groups after the intervention. Discussion: The control group students reflected on their lack of awareness of good eating habits so that current trends could influence their food choices in social networks associated with the pandemic, economic factors, and supply. Translation to Health Education Practice: The findings from this research highlight opportunities for Certified Health Education Specialists focused on project development and evaluation.

This review aimed to provide an overview of teacher professional development programmes for teacher training carried out in Latin America, considering the critical characteristics for PD reported in the literature. The 34 studies were analysed based on six critical features that were identified as being important in order to achieve a positive impact on the practice of teachers. The analysis allowed us to identify the presence of the following critical features: (i) duration; (ii) content focus; (iii) active learning; (iv) programme type; (v) collaborative participation; and (vi) coherence in the professional development programmes studied. The characteristic of collaborative participation is expressed in the opposite way to what is reported as effective in the literature. While the five critical features are not explicitly mentioned by the most studies analysed, a tendency to consider these features in the design of PD programmes was identified.

Standardised International Large-Scale Assessments (ILSAs) have gained prominence in global and national educational discussions. ILSAs claim to offer valuable insights for improving education systems, but their impact on educational policy varies and has become a contested arena. This article analyses how these assessments fed educational policymaking in six Latin American countries based on a review of policy documents; the article advances three theses on how ILSAs are used by policymakers: First, there is a tokenistic usage of ILSAs; second, ILSAs must be considered more as political devices bolstering national reputation rather than studies in the academic sense; third, ILSAs can serve as leverage tools that can be mobilised for broader political ends. The study shows that the promises, designs and reporting of ILSAs are not necessarily aligned, that participation in ILSAs has become a symbolic gesture, and that ILSAs' data are often cherry-picked to support pre-existing diagnoses and policy agendas.

This paper provides a Latin American perspective on ESD, with a focus on transformative and participatory learning in community contexts. With a long history of critical pedagogies, Latin America provides a fertile ground for exploring alternative forms of education as a means to address deep-rooted challenges in western traditional strands of education. We start by providing an overview of pertinent educational currents present in Latin America, then ground these perspectives in two case studies carried out by the authors -- one from Colombia, the other from Brazil -- which explore grassroots initiatives in community settings that utilise different forms of education and learning. We then propose an integrative model to foster alternative educational approaches that might lead to decolonial and regenerative praxis, finishing with a discussion on how Latin American-rooted regenerative decolonisation perspective and praxis can inform global ESD discourses.

Introduction: Short sleep, physical inactivity, and being locked up are risk factors for weight gain. Objective: We evaluated weight gain according to sex, age, hours of sleep and physical activity in university students from 10 Latin American countries during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: Cross-sectional and multicenter study (n = 4880). Results: The average age was 22.5 ± 4.4 years. 60.2% were currently locked up. 73.6% were women, 48.2% increased their body weight, 66% reported insufficient sleep hours, and 65.9% were inactive. Women gained more weight than men (73.2%) and younger students gained more weight (85.1%). Those who had insufficient sleep hours gained most weight (67.6%). Inactive participants gained most weight (74.7%). Students who have insufficient sleep are 21% more likely to have changes in body weight compared to students who have optimal sleep. Conclusion: The increase in body weight and its risk factors during confinement should be considered as emerging from public health.

Globally, the private school share of enrollment increased from about 14 percent in 2000 to about 18 percent in 2019. We estimate the systemic effect of private enrollment share on learning outcomes. Estimates of the systemic effect of private school enrollment capture any competitive effects as well as any differences between public and private schools in raising student outcomes. We use new data from the World Bank on harmonised learning outcomes for mathematics, reading, and science to produce an unbalanced sample of 120 countries from 2000 to 2017. We find that, all else equal, on average, a one percentage point increase in private enrollment is associated with null to at most weakly positive effects on country-level learning outcomes. Countries that increased private school enrollment experience as much or slightly more learning than countries with no change in private school enrollment.

Occupational mismatch is a highly debated phenomenon in developed countries, but rarely addressed in developing economies. This study investigates the magnitudes of overeducation and overskilling in four Latin American countries in which tertiary education has expanded rapidly (i.e. Chile, Ecuador, Mexico and Peru). Using objective and subjective measures derived from PIAAC, we find that overeducation affects between 29% and 43% of the workforce and has a regressive nature. Overskilling is significantly lower than overeducation in Peru and Ecuador, and this can be related to more years of education failing to translate into more skills. Overskilling is higher in the OECD than in Latin America, and differences measured using subjective indicators are not related to additional basic skill attainment of OECD workers. This indicates that workers' perceptions about how their skills compare against the performed tasks involve abilities additional to the basic skills considered in the objective indicators.

There is a deficit in character education research in Latin America and a lack of clarity about conceptual issues relevant to values and virtues. This lack of conceptual clarity has practical importance. The research sought to investigate empirically how school managers and teachers understand and practice character education, with particular attention to the distinction between educating values and virtues. The study was carried out during the first semester of 2022 on a sample of 160 schools in 17 countries, mainly in Christian schools in Spain and Mexico. The results show that there are differences according to the type of school and country. There are important findings regarding the concept of virtue and its relation to the concept of value, which virtues and values are most relevant for schools to teach, and which are the most used strategies in character education programmes. The research points to moral education as a central theme in schools, which considers both virtue and values education. There is a genuine interest on training teachers in virtue education.

This study described integrative community therapy (ICT) in the online modality as a health promotion resource in the context of COVID-19 in Latin America, characterizing the ICT circles, the ICT training centers, and the community therapists involved in this practice. It is a descriptive, observational, and cross-sectional study with a quantitative approach. Data were collected from November 2020 to July 2021 through an online questionnaire created on the Google Forms platform. The study's first stage involved the participation of ICT training centers, while the second involved community therapists. Forty-three centers participated in the first stage; 86.1% offered online ICT in the period evaluated, and 74.4% trained professionals to implement this modality. In the second stage, 66 community therapists responded to the questionnaire. Of these, 49 (74.2%) resided in Brazil, 84.8% were female, and 72.7% performed the work voluntarily, with an average of 6.1 hours per week dedicated to online circles. Community-based circles were the most cited, followed by those linked to the public sector, with an average of 20.7 participants/circle in the period. The most frequent themes were stress and negative emotions, problems with work/unemployment, and family conflicts. Strengthening self-care, participation in ICT circles, and personal empowerment stood out among the coping strategies. In conclusion, online ICT proved to be an innovative resource for health promotion during the pandemic through the articulation and engagement of community therapists and different institutions, expanding solidary social networks, and showing itself as a sustainable practice in the Latin American scenario.

An earlier diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder might lead to an earlier intervention, yet knowledge and awareness of autism spectrum disorder in Latin America and Caribbean Countries are limited. A later autism spectrum disorder diagnosis has been associated with negative consequences, as it might imply later access to services. This study aims to identify factors associated with the age of autism spectrum disorder diagnosis as reported by 2520 caregivers of autistic children from six Latin America and Caribbean Countries. Results indicate that on average, caregivers were concerned about their child's development by 22 months of age; however, the diagnosis was 24 months later. Current age of autistic individuals, better language abilities, and having public health coverage increased the age of diagnosis. On the contrary, the presence of medical comorbidities, severity level, and type of diagnosis decreased the age of diagnosis. The age of diagnosis of autistic individuals in Latin America and Caribbean Countries corresponded to the start of formal schooling despite a much earlier age of first noticed developmental concern, highlighting the need to reduce this age gap and increase children's probability of benefiting from early intervention. Taken together, autism spectrum disorder personal/clinical characteristics and access to health service are the main determinants for the age of diagnosis.

Purpose: This study aims to present a conceptual framework aimed at promoting educational innovation in supply chain management and logistics (SCM&L). The framework can help to design active learning experiences regarding student learning outcomes that tackle current challenges in the discipline. Emphasizing the significance of linking students' learning to real-world scenarios, the framework enables reflective learning through hands-on engagement in a constructive alignment, overcoming existing pedagogical limitations in the field. Design/methodology/approach: This study presents a qualitative research methodology that relies on the case study method. Three instances are presented to illustrate educational efforts of active learning in countries of Latin America, Bolivia, Mexico and Peru, linking real-world relevant situations to disciplinary teaching and learning. Findings: The innovative learning experiences introduced in this study transform real-world SCM&L operations into distinctive educational opportunities. These experiences facilitate learning not only within traditional classrooms but also in urban areas of the Latin American region, enabling students to interact with educational partners in authentic settings to achieve their intended learning outcomes. These experiences are characterized by their focus on establishing meaningful connections between learning and local communities, businesses or specific contexts. Research limitations/implications: The study recognizes various limitations of conceptual, methodological, execution-related and research process aspects. First, not all academics in the SCM&L discipline may universally acknowledge the importance of educational innovation and active learning experiences because of limited pedagogical awareness. Moreover, execution-related limitations arise from the demanding nature of incorporating active pedagogical approaches into courses, as they can be resource-intensive and time-consuming. Regarding research process limitations, the case study limits generalizability and broader inferences because of its particular views and locations, which require further investigation with other instances across other disciplines and geographical regions for validation. Practical implications: The practical implementation of this framework within the MIT SCALE network for Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) demonstrates its potential in meeting diverse academic and institutional expectations and providing educational benefits to students. Social implications: The study makes a valuable contribution to prioritizing and coordinating pedagogical research by investigating the success of learning outcomes achieved through active and experiential implementations in various contexts. It provides inspiring examples of innovative learning experiences that can drive new developments not only within the LAC region but also in other areas, prompting a shift away from traditional educational approaches. Originality/value: This research presents a conceptual framework, which is developed from the insights obtained in the three learning experiences to guide future efforts in SCM&L education. The findings demonstrate how to structure active learning experiences based on authentic assessment and illustrate the potential for increased cooperation among institutions in Latin America. It also promotes the recognition of novel SCM&L active learning experiences and highlights some of the benefits of this approach.

Several studies have indicated that stakeholder engagement could ensure the successful adoption of learning analytics (LA). Considering that researchers and tech developers may not be aware of how LA tools can derive meaningful and actionable information for everyday use, these studies suggest that participatory approaches based on human-centred design can provide stakeholders with the opportunity to influence decision-making during tool development. So far, there is a growing consensus about the importance of identifying stakeholders' needs and expectations in early stages, so researchers and developers can design systems that resonate with their users. However, human-centred LA is a growing sub-field, so further empirical work is needed to understand how stakeholders can contribute effectively to the design process and the adoption strategy of analytical tools. To illustrate mechanisms to engage various stakeholders throughout different phases of a design process, this paper presents a multiple case study conducted in different Latin American universities. A series of studies inform the development of an analytical tool to support continuous curriculum improvement, aiming to improve student learning and programme quality. Yet, these studies differ in scope and design stage, so they use different mechanisms to engage students, course instructors and institutional administrators. By cross analysing the findings of these three cases, three conclusions emerged for each design phase of a CA tool, presenting mechanisms to ensure stakeholder adoption after tool development. Further implications of this multiple case study are discussed from a theoretical and methodological perspective.

Global university rankings (GUR) have become increasingly influential as a proxy measure of higher education quality. The more recent development of regionalised forms of rankings has increased their global reach, drawing a greatly expanded range of institutions into their orbit. As a result, regionalised GUR have developed an increasing potential power to shape social perceptions, institutional actions, and everyday academic practices. In this paper, the perceived impact of regionalised forms of GUR is analysed from the perspective of Latin American higher education. Based on a critical meta-synthesis framed by a "glonacal heuristic" (Marginson and Rhoades, Higher Education 43:281-309, 2002), the tensions arising around the application of regionalised forms of global rankings are mapped. Specifically, the impact of rankings on conceptions of the mission of universities is foregrounded. The meta-synthesis identifies three primary tensions around the regional application of GUR in Latin American contexts: how conceptions of regional higher education quality are most effectively developed, how the local university is imagined under the weight of global expectations, and the relativised value of local agency in assessing quality outcomes. The findings suggest that GUR have created strong fissures in Latin American higher education regarding the missions of institutions, particularly in confronting the powerful hegemonies of the epistemologies of the Global North imposing themselves on Latin American higher education. The paper concludes that the stratification and social anxiety caused by the regional applications of GUR may not be necessarily productive in encouraging regional institutional diversity or in enhancing the local relevance of higher education.

Intercultural competence (IC), a desired outcome in many international schools, comprises the necessary knowledge, skills, and attitudes to effectively navigate intercultural situations. However, international schools are often elite institutions catering to affluent expatriates and host country nationals, thus aligning the development of IC to elite norms. This study explored the perspectives of six local scholarship students in a Central American international school, finding that these students have internalised this elitism as part of their IC development. This suggests that international schools could better serve the broader community by incorporating a critical stance towards IC that promotes equity without reinforcing elitism.

For the past four decades, intercultural bilingual education (IBE) has been a common policy prescription to address Indigenous/non-Indigenous education gaps in Latin America. Initiatives have grown from small, localised pilots to national and state-level initiatives across thousands of schools. While there is some rigorous evidence of the effectiveness of IBE pilot initiatives at a small scale, there is very little evidence that expanding them to a larger scale benefits learners to the same extent. This article reviews the existing evidence on IBE's effectiveness and identifies a number of challenges in replicating success at scale. The authors identify factors which have limited our understanding of IBE's effectiveness, as well as factors which may have contributed to less-than-ideal outcomes for larger programmes, including uneven coverage, varying teacher quality, and limited resource availability for smaller Indigenous languages. Addressing these issues will be crucial for improving IBE programmes' ability to operate successfully at scale.

Imagining Spanish America as Eden and sublime force, colonial environmental aesthetics inaugurated American "disponibilité," figuring environment in the colonial matrix of power as the non-place outside of European time and space. The image of the garden evoked by this aesthetics corresponded to the desired, secular transformation of environment, which delimited the location of a colonial vegetal-human relations of extraction. I contend that in the transition period from colony to republic, cultural, political, and scientific discourse used the image and language of the garden to reestablish claims over territory by shifting from the Edenic to georgic mode. I offer the Garden State as a (neo)imperial environmental aesthetic to lay bare the politics and poetics of place-making and its entanglements--through agriculture and horticulture--as part of a response to the rise of liberal agro-economic policy and the proliferation of the plantation model in the work of naturalists, politicians, Neo-classical, and Romantic writers. By placing ecocriticism, environmental history, and plant studies into conversation with garden theory through this framework, I argue we can better attend to the concentric material and literary gardens and garden-like formations tied to plantation logic and the ordered cultivation and civilization of space and human-vegetal relations in Latin America's nineteenth century.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to understand the influence of the transformational, transactional and laissez-faire leadership styles and collaborative integrative behavior of the team with respect to organizational ambidexterity (the combination of exploration and exploitation learning) in university research groups. Design/methodology/approach: From a survey conducted with a sample of 506 researchers, members of 165 research groups, working in an emerging economy, a multiple regression model analysis was performed. Findings: Findings of this study provide evidence that the coordinator's transformational leadership and the collaborative integrative behavior of the team positively influence organizational ambidexterity of research groups. Transactional leadership and laissez-faire style do not show any significant influence. Originality/value: This study addresses the lack of knowledge regarding organizational learning in research groups to explore and exploit knowledge through research result transfer processes based on the organizational ambidexterity logic in higher education institutions (HEIs) from emerging economies. The study aims to contribute to the literature on leadership styles and ambidexterity in HEIs in emerging economies, particularly in Latin America, where there is still a scarcity of research on the attributes of effective leadership.

The main theories of the thriving field of study of public policies have been formulated at institutions of developed countries, mostly by the American academy, based on the particular conditions of policy-making processes of their own country. However, its heuristic premises are considered, initially, as universal and are used extensively in teaching and academic studies around the world. This paper examines the complexities derived from the application of such predominant theoretical approaches to the study and teaching of public policies that are implemented in Latin American countries. Based on an extensive use of specialized literature, 10 public policy variables are identified and organized into two dimensions, one institutional and the other procedural. It is argued that the values of these variables in the countries of this region differ significantly from those observed in the United States, which reveals the explanatory shortcomings of those approaches to account for the particular modalities of public policymaking in these countries.

Purpose: The article aims to identify the determinants of the urbanization process given the magnitude of this phenomenon and also its economic, social and environmental implications and pressure on public authorities to find viable solutions in the context of sustainable development. Design/methodology/approach: The research is based on regression analysis with urbanization growth being the dependent variable and enrollment in higher education, GDP, value added by industry and female labor force as independent variables. Findings: The main factors that favor urbanization are the increase in population, industry value-added and the female labor force. Urbanization is an objective that must be pursued differently by public authorities in developed and developing countries, given the different realities they face-population growth in developing countries, and population aging and international migration in developed countries. Research limitations/implications: The present research has limitations generated by the selection of independent variables, which is why in future directions, the research will consider the use of other indicators such as the number of graduates, exports as percent of GDP or migrations as a percentage of the total population. Given the complexity of the phenomenon of urbanization, future research will focus on groups of countries as they resulted from the clustering made by this article. Practical implications: The impact of higher education on urbanization is low, which is why the intensification of partnerships between municipal authorities and universities could be a solution that ensures not only the transfer of knowledge from academia to the public sector but also from entrepreneurs increasingly aware of the importance of promoting SDGs for urban development in the context of the challenges posed by global warming. The involvement of women in the labor market is essential for the intensification of the urbanization process. The increasing presence of women in the labor market generates an increase in the income of families, an increase in the level of education and an intensification of national and international migration. The research findings can be used by policy and decision-makers to develop appropriate urbanization and education policies and strategies. Originality/value: The existence of inhomogeneous clusters is noticeable, which demonstrates the complexity of the urbanization phenomenon that is present in all countries around the world, but under the influence of different factors such as the export of natural resources (mainly oil) or the intensification of industrial activity. Taking into account the variables used, this study stands out in the multitude of articles published in the international mainstream.

Virtual Reality (VR) is a computer-generated environment with noteworthy didactic applications in different educational levels and areas of knowledge. The study of the perceptions of the agents involved about the use of VR in lectures is a fruitful line of research because it has implications in terms of the measures to be taken to improve the training and competence of professors in its use. In this paper, a quantitative, descriptive, and correlational research is carried out on the assessments of a sample of 1638 Latin American university professors on both (i) the didactic use of VR and (ii) the influence of the professors' area of knowledge on these assessments. For this purpose, a validated questionnaire was used, the responses to which were subjected to statistical analysis. As a result, it was found that the ratings of VR are very high, but professors believe that their digital skills for its use are insufficient. In addition, the professors' area of knowledge significantly influences their ratings, being higher in the areas of knowledge in which professors have a better self-concept of their digital skills. Furthermore, gender gaps have also been identified in the answers given, which behave differently according to the area of knowledge. Finally, some conclusions, implications, and recommendations are drawn from the results obtained.

This comparative case analysis aims to understand what organizational conditions are related to the differences in the development of research among four traditional private universities in Latin America. Based on imprinting theory, the study analyzes how historical events and the founding conditions of each case study influence the processes of adaptation to local and global institutional pressures related to research development. Findings of the qualitative analysis of interviews with authorities of each case show that adaptative responses related to their policies and plans, allocation of universities' resources, tenure rules, and the development of a critical mass of professors with research capacities are influenced by their historical legacies: elements such as founding values, the stamps that the founders imprint, and the routines of selection of their members are maintained over time, intervening in the choice of the different options for the research development.