Mendive. Journal on Education, january-march 2021; 19(1):246-256
Translated from the original in Spanish
The integral, sustained and pertinent development of the Special Education professional
El desarrollo integral, sostenido y pertinente del profesional de la Educación Especial
O desenvolvimento integral, sustentado e pertinente do profissional da Educação Especial
Olivia García Reyes1 
http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0318-0628
Giselvis Aguiar Aguiar1 http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5265-6093
Iris Valdés Valdes1 http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7689-6224
1 University of Pinar del Rio "Hermanos Saiz Montes de Oca". Cuba. 
olivia.garcia@upr.edu.cu, giselvis.aguiar@upr.edu.cu, iris.valdes@upr.edu.cu
Received: Octuber 1st, 2019.
Approved: February 1st, 2021.
ABSTRACT
The research is carried out based on the identification of needs related to the doctoral training process in the Special Education department specifically with the assurance of the necessary upward continuity and vitality of Careers Special Education and Speech Therapy Education. Its purpose is to show the scope and meaning of a departmental strategy to raise the quality of the training of its professionals through the integration of substantive processes for the conduct and impact of research and for its external projection in the territory, at a national and international level in a way that guarantees the integral, sustained and pertinent development of the Department of Special Education of the University of Pinar del Río. In its development methods of the theoretical level were used, such as the analytical-synthetic, induction-deduction, hypothetical-deductive of the empirical level was used the documentary analysis, observation and interview, they were also used for the descriptive and inferential statistics that they allowed to collect, interpret and process the information related to the subject. We present results that show the continuous rise of university processes since the implementation of a strategy with a systemic approach.
Keywords: doctorate; training; university.
RESUMEN
La investigación se realizó a partir de la identificación de necesidades relacionadas con el proceso de formación doctoral en el departamento de Educación Especial específicamente, con el aseguramiento de la necesaria continuidad ascendente y vitalidad de las carreras Educación Especial y Educación Logopedia. Tiene como objetivo mostrar el alcance y significado de una estrategia departamental para elevar la calidad de la formación de sus profesionales, mediante la integración de los procesos sustantivos para la conducción y el impacto de las investigaciones y para su proyección externa en el territorio, a nivel nacional e internacional, de manera que garantice el desarrollo integral, sostenido y pertinente del departamento de Educación Especial de la Universidad de Pinar del Río "Hermanos Saíz Montes de Oca". En su desarrollo se utilizaron métodos del nivel teórico, como el analítico-sintético, inducción-deducción, hipotético-deductivo, del nivel empírico el análisis documental, la observación y la entrevista; se manejaron, además, los correspondientes a la estadística descriptiva e inferencial que permitieron recopilar, interpretar y procesar la información relacionada con la temática. Se presentan resultados que demuestran el ascenso continuo de los procesos universitarios desde la implementación de una estrategia con enfoque sistémico.
Palabras clave: doctorado; formación; universidad.
RESUMO
O seu objectivo é mostrar o alcance e significado de uma estratégia departamental para elevar a qualidade da formação dos seus profissionais através da integração dos processos substantivos para a condução e impacto da investigação e para a sua projeção externa no território, a nível nacional e internacional de forma a garantir o desenvolvimento integral, sustentado e pertinente do departamento de Educação Especial da Universidade de Pinar del Río. No seu desenvolvimento, foram utilizados métodos do nível teórico, tais como o analítico-sintético, indução-dedução, hipotético-dedutivo, do nível empírico, análise documental, observação e entrevista, bem como os correspondentes às estatísticas descritivas e inferenciais que permitiram compilar, interpretar e processar a informação relacionada com a temática. São apresentados resultados que demonstram a contínua ascensão dos processos universitários a partir da implementação de uma estratégia com uma abordagem sistémica.
Palavras-chave: doutoramento; formação; universidade.
INTRODUCTION
The higher educational universe in Cuba, now, is immersed in important academic celebrations. In order to give continuity to a beautiful tradition, in February 2018 marked the XI International Congress of Higher Education University 2018, under the slogan "The university and the agenda 2030 of sustainable development, the centenary of the Reformation University of Córdoba", which marked a before and after in the relationship of this institution with society in the region.
Elevating the quality of higher education is the essential purpose to the development of Cuban education, clearly expressed in the guidelines of the economic and social policy of the Party and the Revolution and so explicit in the strategic objectives of the Ministry of Higher Education.
Research and doctoral training are linked at the base of higher education. Strengthening the preparation of doctors is an urgent need of the country and requires some changes in its conception and organization that take into account the best national and international experiences (Saborido, 2018).
The department-career of Special Education in Pinar de Rio, consisting of the careers Special Education and Education Speech Therapy, knowing the importance of achieving that goal, proposes to be inserted from the year 2014 in the Assessment System and Accreditation of University Degree (SEA.CU). This system, in Article 31, states that the Evaluation Commission will use for its work, among other documents, the doctoral training strategy (National Accreditation Board, 2014).
This requirement led to the elaboration in the Department of Special Education of a doctoral training strategy, when taking into account the results of the balance report of the National Commission of Scientific Degrees (2017), which made evident the link of the quality of the two careers with the future projection of their assurance and improvement, in correspondence with the accelerated dynamics of science and technology, the need for science to become more and more in a productive social force and the growing demands of the training of competent and committed professionals. (Llanio, Lazo, Iñigo, Surós &, Espín, 2013).
Initially, the Department of Special Education had a schedule that showed the number of professors expected to start their doctorate in certain periods and there was no strategy for doctoral training that would really play a guiding role and that of coherently contribute to power the development of substantive university processes in the Department of Special Education.
The existence of strategies for doctoral training as an essential factor to achieve the integration of the substantive processes of higher education and a truly developer learning, as support for the formation of significant and relevant professional competences, necessary to train a committed professional (Castañeda, Rodríguez, & Díaz, 2015; Hernández, Rodríguez, Piñón, Canto, Guerra & Portela, 2009).
In response to these situations this work is made that aims to propose a strategy of doctoral training for the period 2015-2021, to ensure the full development, sustained and relevant to the Department of Special Education at the University of Pinar de Rio "Hnos Saíz Montes de Oca".
To manage this strategy there were drawn, within the system of strategic planning department, organized actions, coherent and integrated that will enable ensure achievements in doctoral training and, as a consequence of the hierarchy of this process with respect to the areas of key results, ensure the quality, continuity, vitality and visibility of the Special Education and Speech Therapy careers.
MATERIAL IS AND METHODS
In carrying out this study, the materialist dialectic was assumed as a general method, which allowed to analyze the phenomenon under study, its historicity, multifactorial, multidimensionality, concatenated with other facts and phenomena in its constant transformation and development, supported by methods of the theoretical and historical-logical levels that allowed to analyze, assess and take positions in relation to the historical evolution of the doctoral training process in the Department of Special Education. The analytical-synthetic and the inductive- deductive were used throughout the research process, from the bibliographic search to the strategy assessment process. In addition, the hypothetical-deductive was used in the analysis of scientific theories related to the object of study, which made possible the systematization of scientific knowledge.
Methods of the empirical level that enabled to characterize the state of the doctoral formation process, under investigation were used.
The documentary analysis facilitated the filing of data about the work carried out for the development of the doctoral training process by reviewing documents; in this case the analysis of doctoral training strategy of the Department of Special Education, the certificate of the Scientific Council, the annual plan of activities and the monthly and individual work plans of the cadres and teachers.
In addition, they performed interviews to teachers and managers to obtain information about the process of doctoral training in the Department of Special Education.
RESULTS
Doctoral training presupposes an important body of knowledge that allows the professional to have an intellectual leadership with a high degree of independence and creativity that radiates to all areas that favor progress university, hence its importance for the development of a country (Hernández, et al., 2009); (Alarcón, 2016).
In a more offensive position, as required by current conditions, it is estimated that this highly qualified mass of scientists is one of the calls to step forward and drive development, due to the increasing urgency of putting the advances of science into the daily life of our towns with greater speed (Pérez, Pardo, Sotomayor, & Terrado, 2017).
A to take into account the criteria of Ochoa and Rodriguez (2010) and Castañeda Rodriguez Diaz (2015), and in the proposed strategy it has been taking taken into account that doctoral students should be trained to be autonomous researchers, creative, critical and capable of taking intellectual risks; doctoral training should take place in an open research environment, providing opportunities for interaction among different disciplines, it must provide international projection and development of transferable skills, For example, communication skills, teamwork, processing and project management, ethics, among others.
The members of the departmental scientific council played a leading role in the development of this strategy. It began to take shape at the end of the course 2015-2016 and beginnings of the course 2016-2017, where actions planning and control were set up during the annual plan of activities of the Department of Special Education and, therefore, in each individual and monthly work plan of the cadres. The departmental scientific council agreed that the analysis of compliance with the doctoral training strategy and its continuous redesign would constitute the first point of analysis in each work session of the department.
It is intended that in the doctoral training process of the Department of Special Education, expenses and fatigue are minimized, profit and satisfaction are maximized, and time is rationalized and simplified. For this, the human resources that we have were organized, taking into account the personal and professional characteristics and the potentialities of each individuality, depending on the community; the teaching load was balanced in each semester and the individual results plans of all the teachers were redesigned.
This strategy is presented, not as a complete action program, but on the ability to transform, adapt. It is conceived in a way that guarantees opportunity, innovation, flexibility and mobility to materialize it; autonomy and intelligence to put it into practice.
Doctoral training strategy
The training of teachers of the Bachelor of Special Education career began in the Pinar del Río territory in the 1985-1986 school year and the Bachelor of Speech Therapy Education career in the 2007-2008 school year, from the reopening as an independent career in the modality of regular day course. In the elapsed time, both careers show significant achievements, a high degree of recognition and social prestige from the experience in teacher training and specialized scientific and methodological preparation of the Special Education professionals .
The cloister of this career is composed of 51 teachers who are staff of the University of Pinar de Rio "Hermanos Saiz Montes de Oca", which have experience in Special Education and Higher Education. Of these , 43 (84.3 %) hold higher categories of Titular Professor and Assistant Professor, 20 (39.2 %) hold the scientific degree of Doctor in Pedagogical Sciences, of which 75 % were trained in the last 5 years (15 doctors). The academic category of Master's degree is held by 27 (52.9 %). Because of this, positive results have been obtained in different research and development activities that give prestige to educational activities nationally and internationally.
There are 17 professors who are part of the faculty of the career, which represents 33 %. In the Period 2015-2024, the 62.7 % of the faculty are trained as doctors in Pedagogical Sciences. The progressive doctoral training in the career will ensure the generational renewal of the faculty and its continuous improvement.
In a particular way, in the department of Special Education, of 23 professors and others, three are cadres; seven are doctors, for 30 %; of them, seven trained in the last five years and nine in doctoral training, representing 39 % of the total number of professors. In the period 2015-2024, the 69.5 % achieve the scientific degree of Doctor of Pedagogical Science.
The doctoral research process of the applicants articulates with the research projects of the department and others of the Faculty and the University, responding to the priorities of the territory and it is oriented to the following lines of research:
- Comprehensive educational care for schoolchildren with special educational needs associated or not with disability.
- Initial and permanent training of teachers of schoolchildren with special educational needs associated or not with disability.
- The didactics of Special Education.
- Speech therapy care for communication and language disorders.
Due to the importance of doctoral training, as a guarantee for the development and consolidation of the fundamental processes, in the career department a follow-up and monitoring is systematically developed, in correspondence with the work of the tutors and what is established in the work plan of the candidate.
Diagnosis
The need for science to become increasingly a productive social force, together with the growing demands for the training of competent and committed professionals, makes it necessary to have an objective diagnosis that ensures continuity, vitality and continuous improvement of training doctoral degree in Education, Speech Therapy and Special Education then the strengths, weak, opportunities and threats related to doctoral training, as a result of the balance of science and technology of the career department, corresponding to 2016 are identified.
Strengths
- Commitment and disposition of the faculty to assume the tasks that allow advancing in the scientific work, constituting a priority.
- The doctoral training strategy represents a continuous significant change in the percentage of faculty doctors.
- Good participation of students in research teams.
- The systematic work of teachers and students in educational institutions or teaching units that make them active entities for the development and implementation of tasks associated with projects or linked to the socio-cultural development of communities.
- Results are obtained from project work and there is coherence between scientific and postgraduate activity.
- Link between the professors of the department - career and the national institutions that investigate in the area of early childhood education, specifically in the area of Speech Therapy and its relationship with the "Ricardo Cabana Comas "Chair of Speech -Language Studies, as well as with other universities in the country.
Weaknesses
- The socialization of scientific results in national and international events is insufficient.
- No significant results are achieved in the management of awards.
- The participation of applicants in international projects and research grants is insufficient.
- Little publication of the results of the doctoral theses in high-impact journals.
- Absence of forms of academic improvement with its own faculty.
Opportunities
- Presence of research projects in joint coordination with the Provincial Directorate of Education.
- Stable partnerships with organizations and institutions of the territory and the country.
Threats
- Difficulties with resources for conducting research or implementing scientific results.
General purpose
Develop the process of doctoral training in the area of Pedagogical Sciences that will raise the quality of training of professionals by integrating essential processes for driving and the impact of investigations and for the external projection of the career Education Speech therapy and Special Education in its territorial, national and international environment.
General actions of the doctoral training strategy
1. Systematically evaluate in the departmental scientific council the relationship of completed and / or ongoing research with the awards obtained and its link with the disciplines, professional problems and objectives of the curriculum.
Compliance date: bi-monthly
Responsible: president of the scientific council
2. Guarantee the influence of postgraduate programs and research in the career training process.
Compliance date: January
Responsible: career manager
3. Activate the participation of students in research teams as associated with doctoral training from research projects.
Compliance date: September-February
Responsible: project coordinators, main teachers of the academic year.
4. Agree in the individual results plans of the professors the possible topics to be developed for the doctorate, the projects to which they are linked, the entry deadlines and the fulfillment of the schedule of their doctoral training.
Compliance date: January
Responsible: Chief of the department
5. Systematically plan individual and collective control activities with future applicants, to verify compliance with the planned tasks.
Compliance date: monthly (dispatches, work sessions of the career department and scientific councils).
Responsible: Chief of the department
6. Hold scientific sessions in the department in order to control the progress of the strategy, including workshops to present results with partial cuts.
Compliance date: quarterly
Responsible: president of the scientific council
7. Incorporate applicants to the informational skills course and the English language course, to contribute to their doctoral training.
Compliance date: July
Responsible: Chief of department and careers.
8. Manage the insertion of teachers from the faculty in national and international networks, which promote the exchange of scientific information.
Compliance date: according to monthly work plan
Responsible: activist of internationalization
9. Identify areas of knowledge that are of institutional and country interest, in which it is convenient to manage postdoctoral stays in prestigious foreign universities or institutions and determine possible doctors who may be chosen to study them.
Compliance date: according to monthly work plan
Responsible: activist of internationalization
10. Determine the areas of knowledge in which it is convenient and feasible to organize courses and postdoctoral stays at the institution itself or in collaboration with other institutions in the country or abroad.
Compliance date: February
Responsible: scientific council
11. Identify areas of knowledge that are of institutional and country interest, in which effective collaborations of tutorials thesis are established with the participation of several institutions, through scientific sessions where issues related to the development of these areas are exposed and debated,
Compliance date: May-October
Responsible: scientific council
12. Identify external institutions of the territory and the country where there are conditions for the development of research, properly of the careers, and constitute potential for mentoring with applicants to establish collaboration agreements.
Compliance date: systematically
Responsible: department head
13. Manage the approval and opening of the Master's Degree in Special Education from the Latin American Reference Center for Special Education (CELAEE), with its own faculty, so that its articulation with undergraduate training guarantees the pool of future aspiring doctorates.
Compliance date: April 2017
Responsible: scientific council
14. Prepare international project
Compliance date: January 2018
Responsible: department head
15. To deal internationally with institutions, universities, associations such as the World Association of Special Education (AMEE), World Council of Academic University (COMAU), Opened University for Adults (PACU) of Santiago de los Caballeros in the Dominican Republic, Foundations of Special Education in Latin America, University of Chile, Specialized University of the Americas in Panama and others, to initiate research projects that constitute source of funding for scientific development careers.
Compliance date: systematically
Responsible: department head
16. Projection of scientific information bases related to the research lines of the cloister, organized in digital format and with software to help researchers for their management.
Compliance date: March-October
Responsible: scientific council
17. Disseminate the doctoral training strategy among the faculty and students, as an important potential force in the development of research.
Compliance date: monthly
Responsible: department head
Strategy evaluation criteria
- The 90% of applicants argue in the time provided in the strategy.
- That at least two young doctors defend themselves.
- The 100 % of the applicants involved in upgrading courses related to ICT and scientific publishing.
- That at least two applicants participate in international scholarships.
- That the participation of applicants in international projects is increased by at least one.
- That at least three scientific sessions are held, per applicant, in the course.
- That each doctoral thesis has, at least, the participation of two students.
- That at least one publication per applicant is achieved in group I and II magazines.
DISCUSSION
In Pedagogical Sciences, the index of doctoral defenses remains high, reaching a figure of 357, for 57 %. This data is favorable, there are not too many or will not be too many doctors in pedagogical sciences, much less after the recent integration of higher education, so it is appropriate to maintain that figure or achieve a modest growth in this branch. The change should be mainly in the qualitative, since it is necessary to achieve that it is better reflected in good publications, awards from the Cuban Academy of Science and, especially, in the impacts of the theses in increasing the quality and efficiency of the system of the Higher education, where there are many problems that must be faced on a scientific basis (Saborido, 2018).
The results obtained with the application of the exposed methods and the search for bibliographies on the subject show the need to deepen it, due to the importance it has to raise the quality of the university faculty and, with it, the quality processes.
The strategy of doctoral training proposal exceeds the acting, to the ensure the quality rising of the Department of Special Education, the results achieved with its implementation have the accreditation of the career Special Education by the National Accreditation Board in the year 2016 as certificate career and the accreditation of the career Education Speech Therapy in the year 2017 as a certificate career.
The results obtained show that the doctoral training strategy constitutes the integrating nucleus of all the university processes that are developed in the Department of Special Education to contribute, in a decisive way, to science becoming a productive social force that guarantees the achievement of the necessary impact for the development of this educational policy in the territory (Diaz- Canel, 2012).
In the Department of Special Education they were drawn projections of strategic character through the Strategy of doctoral training conceived, which guaranteed the quality rising of substantive processes and their national and international visibility.
The proposed doctoral training strategy is novel, since it has a systemic nature and is articulated with the research projects that are developed in the Department of Special Education, the management of human resources, material, financial and administrative assurances, in such a way as to ensure the vitality and quality of the different processes that are developed.
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Conflict of interest:
Authors declare not to have any conflicts of interest.
Authors´ Contribution:
Olivia García Reyes: Conception of the idea, authorship coordinator, general advice on the topic addressed, literature search and review, application of instruments, preparation of the database, writing of the original (first version), review and final version of the article.
Giselvis Aguiar Aguiar: general advice on the topic addressed, literature search and review, translation of terms or information obtained, preparation of instruments, statistical analysis, preparation of tables, graphs and images, writing of the original (first version), rreview and final version of the article.
Iris Valdés Valdes: preparation of instruments, application of instruments, compilation of information resulting from the instruments applied, writing of the original (first version), review of the applied bibliographic standard,review and final version of the article.
This work is under a licencia de Creative Commons Reconocimiento-NoComercial 4.0 Internacional
Copyright (c) Olivia García Reyes, Giselvis Aguiar Aguiar, Iris Valdés Valdes