This paper provides some considerations on the importance of ethical responsibility in higher education institutions for both teachers and students. Its purpose is to identify the causes of corrupt behavior in some university graduates once they become part of the labor force or public service. It also points out some ways through which an ethical worldview can be formed and promoted in society. It is concluded that education, seen as a privilege and as a commitment, leads to the virtue of gratitude and, consequently, to a humanistic ethical behavior.

This article is a result from the orientation process carried out for the first-year students of four study programs of the Basic Education Division at the Center for Research and Teaching in Education (CIDE), Universidad Nacional, Costa Rica, in 2012. Information from 110 students was collected and analyzed with the purpose to identify the students’ identity traits and possible pedagogical challenges associated. The actions taken during the design and execution of the orientation process and the data collected through different instruments were taken into account for the analysis. The findings include strong areas, as well as areas “to be developed” which represent the pedagogical challenges of the academic unit. The Basic Education Division (or School of Basic Education) plays a fundamental role in the country’s social and cultural transformation preparing professionals in Education and providing students with the necessary tools for developing better skills in areas such as art, writing, technology, sports, and public speaking. These are some of the challenges emerging from the analysis of the orientation process for first-year students.

This paper discusses ethical and philosophical assumptions on how the writings of students are seen in the education context, in terms of subjectivity and knowledge. Foucault’s concept of power is associated to writing as a “truth-effect” on the subject and to the reified concept of thesubject’s writing, understood this as a mirror surface of thought. This stands in contrast to the spacing between the self and the sign implied in writing; spacing where subjectivity emerges, according to Derrida, in the sense produced by the difference. The conclusion suggests seeing writing as a gesture along the lines proposed by Agamben, because by overcoming the means-ends logic, the gesture becomes evident in the writing as a communication of communicability and of the pure power of thinking, i.e. an event. If, when writing, students are called to produce sense not only on a “specific” area of knowledge, but about their own selves within language as historical and desiring subjects, writing is assumed as a gesture toward knowledge, emerging therefore the ethical-political dimension on how we understand, evaluate and respond to students’ writings.

Researchers of the Institute for Interdisciplinary Studies of Childhood and Adolescence (INEINA) have been interested in studying the current activities developed during recess time in public schools and what children require for this period from the point of view of the child population. This paper is the result from a research conducted on this matter with the participation of a group of children, in order to collect ideas from the participants and provide recommendations on possible strategies to enhance and strenghten recreation time at schools.

This literature review is focused on physical accessibility, a basic requirement in educational institutions to ensure that all members of the education community have access to inclusive settings, where they can exercise their duties and rights by themselves. In addition, it summarizes theoretical proposals –the universal design, for instance–, which can guide staff members from these institutions and professionals related to space management, in assessing and achieving appropriate spaces.

This study focuses on the work of teachers in the Open Education Program of the National Psychiatric Hospital (Costa Rica) and identifies the learning barriers of the student population. It aims at promoting educational delivery strategies adapted to the needs of the community attending the literacy level. This is a qualitative study with a participatory action research design. Information was collected through interviews to teachers, observation, and pedagogical mediation with the teachers of the program. The results indicate that the pedagogical mediation methodology contributed to improve the access of students to the curriculum. Among the conclusions, it is recommended to implement significant curriculum modifications focused on the student population and a classroom methodology adjusted to the different learning needs. Finally, it is recommended to have an interdisciplinary team to support the teaching staff working with students with mental illness.

This paper reports on the findings obtained from a study conducted in 2009: “Exclusión educativa y abandono (deserción) escolar en la enseñanza secundaria en Costa Rica” [Education Exclusion and Dropping out in Costa Rica], focused on the students from the 7th to the 11th grades of the General Basic Education. For this research, fieldwork was carried out in 22 institutions, in different educational regions of the country. Interviews were conducted with the school principals and counselors in each of the institutions visited. Focal groups were organized with students and parents in order to –as naturalism and qualitative focus suggest –understand the meaning of education exclusion and dropping out from the point of view of the different agents involved– principals, counselors, students, parents. A relevant conceptual aspect included in this study is the analysis of the problems related to dropping out and exclusion, generally, in a nonjudgmental way, to characterize this phenomenon.

This paper summarizes a didactic experience. It has been used in a research course taught in a Mexican university for the preparation of scientific papers. It highlights the importance of scientific papers as dissemination channels for science and describes the steps for publishing in specialized journals. The concept and structure of scientific papers are explained. This study includes the analysis of the main sections in a scientific paper: introduction, methods, results, discussion, and conclusions, as well as the connecting sections: title, abstract, key words, acknowledgments, references, and annexes. It provides recommendations on writing these sections, preparing the manuscript, and the steps to accomplish in the publication process. In addition, based on interviews to six researchers, this paper points out limitations and provides recommendations on writing and publishing a scientific paper.