Receipt date: 21/03/2023 / Revision date: 30/06/2023 / Acceptance date: 07/09/2023

Introduction

Interest in teaching 

Teaching is of great interest when it comes to establishing public policies on youth education. Traditionally, from the decision-making spheres, if anything, it has been based on the analysis of quantitative performance standards with respect to the knowledge that students achieve.

In this sense, there are two major spheres of impact on teaching: on the one hand, its dimension as a life project, which challenges at a personal level, as teachers; on the other hand, the one referred to the fact that teaching is not only represented by the will of individuals, but that it is always oriented, institutionally, by the socio-pedagogical policies that are promoted from the curricular discourse, the practices and worldviews that are privileged in the school and the de facto conditions offered to develop a certain teaching profile; therefore, it also determines the focus for investments, actions and State policies.

Thus, by paying attention to the above and the direct relationship that exists with the area of influence of the school as an institution, it is possible to understand why the state is interested in what policy it should direct towards education.  Thus, it is necessary to note that such problems should be investigated and that this gives rise to the research presented below, which also implies a great contribution to the current national reflection on the revaluation of teaching and the pedagogical proposal of the New Mexican School (NEM), especially because the nature of the study is theoretical and also because it invites reflection on the point that the study covers and which is its main objective: how students see the knowledge they acquire in school and what makes them stay in it. This means to know how young people themselves value staying in school and to see what is significant for them to do so. In other words, the research makes it possible to address the complexity of the students' perception of their time in the classroom and the knowledge they learn there. 

Thus, this study notes the need to emphasize the direct perspective of the subjects of the right to education, in an effort to move in the direction of an inclusive perspective, as well as to focus on a more comprehensive and humane vision when establishing the analysis for decision-making.

It is necessary to emphasize that the research proposal presented here is the creation of the researchers and that there is no other study like it, so it is not possible to compare it.

Institutional and formative context

Student discourse was collected in the framework of the State Program for Educational Evaluation and Improvement (PEEME 2016-2020), led by the Ministry of Education (SEDEQ) and coordinated by the State Council for Planning and Programming of Higher Secondary Education (CEPPEMS). The program established two evaluation projects focused on the effectiveness of programs against school dropout and on formative evaluation practices in the classroom, aimed at taking practical actions for educational improvement. The deployment carried out was very important, since it was possible to work without resources, based on the sum of institutional, professional and personal will; involving 14 institutions and 19 specialists assigned to committees and 20 other supports; deploying four major evaluation instruments, taking up here the discussion groups with students in the last cycle.

The richness of the data provided ample opportunity to explore issues that could not be addressed, given the timing and focus of the PEEME. Among them, the role of affective and interrelational factors in the assumption of the EMS pathway; especially in view of the insistence of the literature in granting the symbolic processes of "hooking" with schooling a decisive role when it comes to school dropout, as do Mena, Fernández and Riviére (2010); Román (2013); Carranza and Sandoval (2015); Pogliaghi, Mata and Pérez (2015); Cano, Sánchez and Massot (2016); Miranda (2018); Weiss (2018); Quintanar, Uribe and Vallejos (2020).

In order to categorize symbolic processes, name the underlying value patterns in collective expression, conceptualize their nature and glimpse their sociocultural origins, a theoretical analysis of symbolic processes was carried out; the selection of authors reveals the transversality existing between symbolic processes, collective imagination and functions of myth, particularly with regard to the psychic, sociocultural, even epistemic and evolutionary construction of the human being.

The theoretical inquiry allowed us to configure our own methodology, corroborating that hermeneutics focuses on the interpretation of the symbolic structures of discourse, highlighting the importance of making explicit the point of view and the narrative baggage with which the hermeneutist establishes the dialogue, through the construction of discourse as a singular collective.

The current research, therefore, seeks to generate basic science from the establishment of an interrogative and scriptural method focused on hermeneutics, which unveils symbolic, imaginary and mythical structures that underlie the discourse issued by the student body; with the intention of extrapolating them to a conceptual status that contributes to the creation of theory around the symbols that give cultural (collective) meaning to school permanence.

The present study allows us to visualize the background of the causes of dropout in the current scenario by reiterating the importance of interpersonal relationships in the significance of school, which were drastically altered during the pandemic. From what the young people interviewed express about the processes of character formation, we discover some basic human references that give meaning to permanence; common factors that enable the construction of temperance to visualize, choose and forcibly clear the various causes for their own human condition that, at the time, allows them to project a purpose, make decisions, build challenges and stand up towards a transcendental mission: to conclude the EMS to go beyond (when the material conditions are met).

The present work, therefore, contributes to the rethinking of the definition and the transcendental purpose of being a student, in order to tie unprecedented bonds that sustain life itself and the socio-cultural fabrics around the education of our youth.

Review of relevant literature

The literature review was fundamental to the research, which is why it is so extensive. Here, it is stated in general terms.

A first section corresponds to research references in Mexico and the locality, in search of studies focused on symbolic processes from the student perspective, from 10 years ago to date; where a wide range of works were reviewed, taking as references the Electronic Memory of the XV National Congress of Educational Research (COMIE, 2020) and the book La investigación educativa ante el cambio de gobierno en México (Educational research in the face of the change of government in Mexico). Reflections and proposals for the future (Buendía and Álvarez, 2019).

The closest study to the current one, is presented by Ventós (2017), when talking about the meanings of the school trajectory, recovering some common base authors; however, it is carried out in Uruguay. The first study diverges in the methodological plane and the scope of the sample, as well as focusing on the concepts of experience and meaning; while the current study approaches the symbolic plane through the imaginary and mythical; however, in both cases, they coincide in validating the collective discourse as representative of a broader social group.

From this, we conclude that there are important references to support and counteract the present research, but it is evident that it maintains its own nuance at the local level (state-national dimension); therefore, it is clear that it is necessary to strengthen the research with a focus on students in secondary education, as in the innovation of the thematic approach and the precision of the theoretical-methodological design provided here.

Another section deals with preliminary approaches to school permanence as a focus, as opposed to dropout. When reviewing official antecedents of educational policy and states of the art around the topic and level discussed here -López, Sañudo and Maggi (2013); Fonseca, Ibarra and Escalante (2015); Ventós (2017); Buendía and Álvarez (2019); Salgado and Hernández (2020); Magaña (2020); Alanís (2020); Osuna and Díaz (2020); Ortega, Alejo and Estrada (2020); Vuelvas (2020); Gómez (2020); Ilinich Matus (2020); Gazga (2020); López and Reyes (2020)-, it was discovered that, in the local and national context, actions are based on combating risk factors that condition school dropout; therefore, we wanted to look at the other side of the phenomenon, analyzing what gives personal and sociocultural meaning to school permanence.

School dropout, however, is relevant when considered as a mirror phenomenon of the problem, especially because of the serious social and economic implications it entails. At any stage of the school trajectory where dropout occurs, it generates exclusion, has negative consequences on human capital formation and social integration processes -Alonso (2014); Blanco, Solís and Robles (2014); SEMS (2015); Carranza and Sandoval (2015); OECD, (2016); Miranda (2019).

Regarding dropout, there is consensus, even at the international level, on certain factors that trigger it -OECD (2016); Miranda, 2018; INJUVE, 2010; Abril, Román, Cubillas and Moreno, 2008; Navarro, 2001-. Some studies coincide in characterizing it as the climax of a process in which students gradually disengage: "an accumulated process of misunderstandings with the school", in the words of Mena, Fernández and Riviére (2010, p. 122); related to a series of situations of vulnerability -social, family and school- identified as red hotspots. Leaving school is not a decision taken "lightly" or by a sudden outburst, but rather a gradual disengagement, defined as "the slow and progressive accumulation of sources of alienation from the scale of values, patterns of action and symbols of identification with the school" (Mena et al, 2010, p. 23).

The relationship between affection, expectations and school permanence, entails talking about Bourdieu's habitus (1999), understood as a continuous process that "implies a knowledge that allows anticipating the course of the world" (p. 188); indicating that interactions shape destinies and ways of "doing": what gives meaning to daily practice by assuming structures valued as "harmonious" for a group. The interaction between school trajectory and sociocultural evolution moves away from the quantitative references of performance and efficiency to recover its psychosocial and communicative dimensions; these are related to affections and meanings constructed during the school experience . The journey is understood as a "process of transformation that occurs over time and involves the appropriation, signification and contextualized use of both intellectual and institutional objects and resources" (Gutiérrez, Granados and Landeros, 2014, p. 6); which is in agreement with authors who insist on the need to understand exclusion as a continuous process: Murillo, (2003), Román (2013); UNICEF (2016), De Hoyos, Rogers and Székely (2016); Quintanar, Uribe and Vallejos (2020).

A crucial section is the one dealing with the central research categories, summarized in Table 1.

Table 1

Literature review on central research categories

CATEGORY	REFERENCES	CENTRAL CONCEPTS	AUTHORS REVIEWED
Symbols, signs and supersigns	Norber Elias and supersymbolic structures	Plans of the representation Symbolic or supersymbolic structure Higher symbolic structures	Elias,1994 Garcia, 2003 Valencia, 2004
	Ernest Cassirer and the second-degree image (mental image)	Symbolic devices and networks The symbolic warp	Amador, 2008 Cassirer, 1968, Magallanes, Donayre, Gallegos and Walter, 2021
	Notes from symbolic interactionism	Herbert Blumer: stream-of-consciousness and self-indication Vygotsky and the processes of cultural mediation	Blumer, 1982;  Cassirer, 1968 De Rosa, 2018 Magallanes, Donayre, Gallegos and Walter, 2021 Pons, 2010 Quintanar, 2017 Vygotsky, 2015 Wolf (1999)
Imagination and collectivity	Castoriadis and the social imaginary	Brief review of social imaginary studies Reservation of meaning in the imaginary signification Radical imagination and instituting social imaginary	Aliaga and Carretero, 2016 Cabrera, 2004 Castoriadis, 1997 and 1998 Urribarri, 1998 Fressard (2006)
	Social representation and symbolic imagination	Jodelet: common sense and symbolic restitution of absence Gilbert Durand: allegorical signs and direct consciousness	Durand, 1971 Jodelet, 1986 Jung, 1995
The mythical line and fantasy	The primordial time and image	Alan Watts and the indeterminacy of mythical time Carl Jung: primordial image and access to the self	Castoriadis, 1997 Jaffé, 1995 Jung, 1995 Matos, 2019 Watts, 1998
	Approximating and fulfilling: functions of fantasy	Norber Elías and the symbols of fantasy Gianni Rodari and approaches to the uncanny	Elias, 1994 Rodari, 2008

Finally, the review of theoretical principles for the construction of the hermeneutic model was worked on, where mythification based on the hero myth is used as a procedure to establish the hermeneutic point of view. For this purpose, the discussions with the aforementioned central categories were recovered and, for the center of the methodological proposal, three contemporary works are focused on: Hans-George Gadamer (2013), Paul Ricœur (1965 and 2003) and Maurizio Ferraris (2000). The study led to think of hermeneutics as a process of mediation between symbols; in the case of interaction with discourse, between what is said and its meaning; evidenced through rewriting - a hermeneutic point of view.

Method

Central scheme, phases and instruments for discourse mythologizing

The research is based on the analysis of the discourse emitted in interviews by a group of 77 students in the last cycle of High School Education (EMS), enrolled in six of the most important subsystems in the locality and whose content makes up a total of 21 hours of videotaping, 243 pages of transcriptions and 21 pages related to observation records collected during the interviews, developed under the technique of discussion groups by a diverse collegiate. The results reveal a variety of details regarding the symbols that give meaning to the school trajectory in secondary education and, given their breadth, it is interesting to comment on those related to teaching.

The methodology yields a theoretical scheme where it is possible to observe the personalities and teaching practices that contribute to the valuation of school permanence, which are significant from the perspective of the young people themselves. The research addresses the complexity of student perception on the subject, which invites us to avoid falling into the temptation of reading the results as terms, since it rather yields archetypes, that is, symbols, which are analyzed from the perspective of authors such as Jung, Durand, Jodelet, Cassirer, Castoriadis, De Rosa, Magallane, Blumer, Ricœur, Ferraris, among others.

The study was conducted through interviews with schoolchildren before the global contingency for Covid-19 -initiated in Mexico at the end of 2019 and extended to the present-; then they worked in a face-to-face manner and today they transition to multimedia, hybrid or under the "new normal" models. However, since our research is basic, we foresaw the need to go beyond the immediate application of the basic evaluation, since it allows us to appreciate the deep human values through which the student community proposes certain paths or dreams and how these intercept the socio-cultural meanings that give meaning to permanence, beyond the modality or precisely to visualize the ideal one for the Subjects of Law and the social development of the entity under study, where the presence and human interactions take on a high value.

For the research, a hermeneutic procedure is developed, based on the mythification of the discourse, with the intention of making it collective by transferring the diversity of voices to the singular, where the hermeneut is placed in a position to accept the diversity of answers of the interviewed subjects as if they were only one, in order to narrate from a single collective voice. By taking up the structure of the hero myth as a scheme for the ordering of discourse, the hermeneut takes a position, that is, a point to maintain the thread of the story; in this way, it is the taking of an objective position, but only in the sense that the scheme allows the hermeneut to appropriate the image (the symbol), in the manner of a camera lens: as a lens to sift and focus on those aspects that are common to collective feeling and thinking.

Figure 1

Narrative structure of the hero myth

Note. Own elaboration based on information from Jung (1995).

Since the position of the hermeneut is to tell the story of the collective, it is observed how the mythical structure can coincide with the classic moments of the narrative; which allows orienting the interpellation by positioning oneself as if one were going to write the story or the plot of a movie, telling the story of the EMS student who manages to reach the last steps of the trajectory. Thus, Jung's (1995) myth of the hero functions as a ladder to order situations, actors and episodes of the journey through the school adventure. This implies considering the discourse as the subject of the sample, but not the people who emit it. Here, we resort to the analysis of discourse containers, with emphasis on the codes produced by Atlas Ti® when screening the transcriptions in this program.

It is fair to point out that the procedure is complex and takes time, since it is necessary to read and reread in order to extract the concepts of interest; for this purpose, a very specific resource was carried out, involving several moments and instruments specific to the researchers.

Figure 2

Study phases

Specific discourse sample

Although all the discursive containers were integrated into the overall interpretation, it was decided to select some of them as specific references. This discursive sample is determined by convenience, justified by the elements revealed by the integral scheme of symbolic analysis.

We began with a representative transcription, choosing to select the first group interviewed because it included both urban and semi-urban populations. Also, six codes from Atlas Ti® are recovered: meaningful teaching, family skills, personal goals, obstacles or challenges and socialization; as they are significant according to the references given by the first filter of analysis (corresponding to the review of the preliminary material)this is because they are significant according to the references given by the first analysis filter (corresponding to the review of the preliminary material).

The discursive sample privileges the study of codes that account for the establishment of affective and interpersonal relationships, since the theoretical study establishes that the construction of meaning and culture, as well as tools for survival itself -as a framework of collective meanings- are generated within human interactions, under the protection of a reference group, in relation to a life context and as a need or search for knowledge. It was also necessary to review other transcriptions and codes, although, for reasons of space, it was not possible to analyze them in their specificity.

Data analysis

The methodological approaches and reading instruments (integral scheme of symbolic analysis, analytical grids and synthetic tables) function as filters that allow organizing, grouping, synthesizing and categorizing thoughts, assessments, moments and actors that influence the assumption of the EMS journey as possible and desirable. Rewriting techniques refer to synthesis, reordering, categorization and paraphrasing.

The procedure results in the construction of subcategories where associated expressions are grouped and common concepts are distinguished; as well as in the simple count of mentions associated with each one. The latter gives rise to the elaboration of pie charts that allow us to observe areas of symbolic classification. In this case, specific quantities are omitted in order to avoid the emphasis on the quantitative aspect, since this serves as a support for the hermeneutic qualification as a central methodology.

In threading the results, we also take up, as discursive content, the control questions inserted in the survey for senior students, as well as the results from the analysis of the anecdotal records, the subsequent descriptive report, the entrance survey applied at the beginning of the focus groups and the report on the interview with significant teachers.

Results

Symbolic complexity of meaningful teaching

The symbolism attached to the teaching figure is complex. The resulting archetypes show the non-existence of a single form of significance referring to the action of this figure; they act as helpers in the student's story. It is important to point out that the attributes anchored to teaching significance cannot be read as immovable types or applicable to "a" teacher or to "all" the flesh-and-blood people who work or want to work as teachers in secondary education. Since they are archetypes, they refer to  idealfigures; that is, they express potencies of being. At the same time, the specific teachers referred to by the students, in effect, orbit between these attributes, and generally present more than one.

It is necessary to emphasize that the characteristics attributed to meaningful teaching are not those that a specific teacher performs de facto , but what the students bring to memory, what they project when they look back on the path they have traveled, when they bring to mind the image, the memory of that teacher who challenged them, the teacher who motivated them or whom they understood, the teacher who infected them with passion.. In a few words, the teaching that leaves a mark and helps you to solve the path or give meaning to school permanence and knowledge as a cultural value and value for oneself.

Figure 3

Symbolic composition of meaningful teaching

In the section dedicated to teaching, it was necessary to establish a special section directed to teaching archetypes, for which we took as a base the previous knowledge provided by the studies of the Master's Degree in Educational Sciences, our own experience in the Doctorate in Education where the research is framed and the continuous reading of official pedagogical models assigned to the EMS; besides, we looked for a nomenclature that synthesized the student's sayings , rather than defining the categories from pre-established models. On the other hand, other aspects were obtained related to what students value in terms of the ways of being teachers that marked their journey through the EMS, as shown in Figure 3.

The complexity that teaching acquires in the student imaginary presents attributions that may seem opposed and even become so, since, as already noted, these are not characteristics that can be grasped in a single stroke, nor can they be transferred to instructions for being a "good" teacher; rather, they are intermingled, they go from one side to the other, some emerge and others are depressed. There is no one way to be a meaningful teacher. What is clear is that this is a figure who impresses, knows, is enthusiastic, shows energy or passion; someone who loves (loves his craft, his subject, being with the youth). This implies considering teaching as a life project, since, in the interview with teachers pointed out by the students as significant, they say they feel alone and state that it is through contagion that they can influence other colleagues to embrace this teaching position; it is in the experience, the closeness and the daily life where significance is created; as well as in the assumption of the profession and the relationship with their students.

The Atlas Ti® yields 220 labels on meaningful teaching; while, when performing the hermeneutic reading, 340 are established, from the analysis of which eight conceptual subcategories are obtained. It should be remembered that, more than the number of times referred to, it is of interest to observe the symbolic composition of the teacher as a significant figure in the student's trajectory. The simple exercise of counting the mentions and then visualizing the quantitative area resulted in the pie chart, which is highly illustrative in visual terms.

In the analysis, the concept of symbolic compositionarises, when it is observed that the pay allows to observe, literally, the compounds of a body; in this case, of a conceptual entity , a social actor or a symbolic actor ; arising from the mixture and abstraction of the collective voice; which does not omit diversity, but, precisely, incorporates it by abstracting it into large symbolic categories that evoke the commonsense and feeling. Given the rigor of the analysis procedure and its mixed wink, it is possible to establish these categories as symbolic components.

The significant teacher is a category or concept that symbolizes a sort of nucleus where the diversity of positions and human actions detected by the collective come together ; although it also shows a root or a meeting point among the diversity of tendencies. The symbol, then, is an inclination, a tendency or integral disposition towards these virtues, rather than a single fact or a fragmentary series of facts or actions; since it would be virtually impossible and very improbable that each and every one of the mentors would fully gather the complex virtues attributed to the significant teaching figure, having abstracted them from the specific diversity of their enunciation, from their personal coincidences and dissidences. However, there are specific teachers who, in fact, bring together many of them; and, on the other hand, in the totality of mentions, what is common among these categories or what links others is presented.

It is clear that there are communicating vessels and dissolution of frontiers between categories; however, a very clear and revealing theoretical scheme is stabilized. In this same sense, the category called passion-taste-uniqueness is one of the most imprecise, since it was difficult to synthesize the conceptual or abstract nature of this attribute, when referring to that latent I don't know what in the heart of the significant teaching figure. In the graph, this category occupies the smallest visual area; it is quite possible that this is due to the fact that its semantic attributes refer to higher virtues that go beyond being a teacher per se, although they are closely linked to the rest of the symbolic components.

At the level of fusion and abstraction of the expressive diversity at which we now arrive, it is insisted that it is not possible to achieve each and every one of the fields of teaching "personality", in a literal or specific sense, nor its quantitative measurement; since the scheme presented here is a symbolic construct, an idea, an ideal. The symbol is a seed that accounts for the diversity of possible interpretations and, in this case, for the multiple references to concrete subjective entities, to human beings of flesh and blood, whose actions, in synthesis, orbit around these great human qualities, related to values and virtues.

Table 2

Archetypes and symbolic conception of meaningful teaching.

#	Arch-type	Attribution	Symbolic conception
1	The strategist	Active teaching	Experimental and practical. Analytical and collaborative teaching. Exemplary and contextual teaching.
2	The wise man	Knowledge and dedication	Knows (is wise), is focused on his subject, dedicated and well prepared. He knows not only his subject, but others, all subjects. He knows how to teach and prepare his class; he shares "something that lives", in terms of his wisdom, his intelligence, his knowledge of the path to a trade and of life itself. He leads by example by exercising order, study and congruence.
3	The warrior-priest	Demand and discipline	Strict; it comes to pressure, stress and provoke adrenaline because of its demands, since it seeks the establishment of a series of values to face reality, be realistic with the difficulties to come and achieve a good future: discipline, responsibility, respect, order, attention, compliance, constancy, attendance, punctuality, commitment, self-demand and sense of duty; focus on a goal: to have good grades, to be good at what they do. He scolds, sets limits and rules: "brings us short", "does not let go of the rein"; which is valued when accepting the youthful tendency to disorder; it is for the good, in order "not to be mediocre or good for nothing".
4	The counselor	Empathy and reliability	Helps, advises, encourages, attends, understands, listens, understands and supports. He is empathetic, honest, trustworthy, understanding and caring. "He lets you be the way you are" -as long as you comply, that is. At times she becomes almost "a friend" or a sort of therapist. Supports other educational activities of interest outside the classroom: chess tournaments, dance rehearsals or sports practices; in situations of vulnerability, pregnancy or illness, flexible delivery times and spaces for the integral development of the activities.
5	The guardian	Academic perseverance	Patience and sensitivity in explaining academic subjects. He explains in detail, step by step, in a variety of ways; over and over again to exhaustion, in and out of class. It seeks understanding by various means.
6	The power giver	Empowers and encourages	Empowers, encourages, encourages. Motivation to succeed in the face of adversity; overcoming exclusion, fears, shyness and laziness; for example: "You can"; it empowers or encourages empowerment.
7	The crazy - friendly	Pleasant and dynamic	It possesses vital energy, enthusiasm; it "is moved" and moves. The tone, volume and intensity of his voice stand out. He is lovable -susceptible to be loved-; kind: "good vibes". Pleasant, cheerful, playful, amusing, joking, satirical and... Crazy: sometimes he or she "goes goats", is cheerful and light-hearted.
8	The deity	Admirable and unique (uniqueness)	Unique, special, passionate. It manifests a dedication that guides, excites, inspires, influences, transmits a desire to learn. An interesting, admirable, exemplary, respectable, memorable and celebrated figure; he is impressive, charming and attractive (beauty), radiates love ("it is a real love"). It is unclassifiable, charming and incredible. It is a "she is a master-teacher" (master among masters). It guides, inculcates, initiates and inspires -inwardly-; therefore, it is even conceived as a God.

Table 2 presents the archetypes resulting from the discussion between the graph and the various discursive containers. In the analysis, the concept of symbolic compositionarises, when we realize that the pay allows us to observe, literally, the compounds of a body; in this case, of a conceptual entity , a social actor , a symbolic actant arising from the mixture and abstraction of the collective voice; which does not omit diversity, but rather, precisely, incorporates it by abstracting it into large symbolic subcategories that evoke the commonsense and feeling. Given the rigor of the analysis procedure and its mixed wink, it is possible to establish these categorizations as symbolic components.

The significant teacher is a concept that symbolizes a sort of nucleus where the diversity of positions and human actions detected by the collective implodes ; although it also shows a root or a meeting point between the diversity of tendencies. The symbol, then, is an inclination, a tendency or integral disposition towards these virtues, rather than a single fact or a fragmentary series of facts or actions; for it would be virtually impossible and very improbable that each and every one of the flesh and blood persons would fully gather the complex virtues attributed to meaningful teaching; having abstracted them from the specific diversity of their enunciation, from their personal coincidences and dissidences. However, there are specific teachers who, in fact, bring together many of them; and, on the other hand, in the totality of mentions, what is common among these categories or what links others is presented.

Among these specificities of the discourse, there are cases where it is expressed that the same teaching figure may be loved by some and repudiated by others; at some point the one, at some point the other: "It is hated by many, but valued by many as well, because it is very demanding", Therefore, we are invited not to fall into the temptation of the stereotype, but to stay in the dimension of the archetype. It is not possible to "train" a teacher to develop these values; not in the literal or fragmentary sense, at least. It has more to do with processes and life projects; and, in any case, with continuous training. The teachers themselves, cited here only as a reference for what has been said, insist in asking not to be labeled.

When asked how to train or motivate other teachers to be or act like them, they expressed that it is transmitted by contagion; they also emphasize that it is not possible to "qualify" the processes of formative and cultural interaction with the students, since they take place in "the intimacy of the classroom", in the relationship itself, in the evolution of the common journey; and only from there is it possible to evaluate or, rather, to assess. Another element that makes us think about the difficulties experienced when implementing distance education during the pandemic, where personal interaction was completely lost; in this sense, the symbiosis in movements, gestures and corporal and non-verbal expressions had already been observed, where students emulate attitudes of their significant teachers, especially when referring to academic and life concepts that these figures instilled in them.

The strategist: active teaching

The allusion to the type of teaching implemented by the significant teaching figure presents more area, since in the preliminary evaluation it is a topic of interest raised a priori. However, precisely because of the number of mentions tracked, subcategories are opened here, with the intention of balancing this bias and contributing to the discovery of three major archetypes of teaching: exemplary and contextual, experimental and practical, analytical and collaborative.

It is called active teaching from the student perspective, when talking about the deployment of actions that go beyond the dictation or the mere reading of texts -commented as a counterpart, but not devoid of its own meaning in the active logic-; approaches where one creates, experiments, analyzes, exemplifies, discusses, travels, lives together, talks, acts, dances, produces, thinks, reads, reflects, laughs, participates, exposes, executes, solves, practices, exercises, moves... In short: motor, social, mental and cultural activity; with respect to the "knowledge" or the knowledge that is intended to be inculcated.

 Exemplary and contextual teaching presents the smallest area; due, perhaps, to the difficulties in activating study trips or attending conferences; since, certainly, it implies the deployment of economic, logistical, management and time resources and, of course, human resources.

On the other hand, experimental and practical teaching has a very similar area to analytical and collaborativeteaching; perhaps because they can be activated from the basic resources of the campuses. This diversity of practices is related to the nature of the disciplines of study. The following is the extraction of keywords extracted from each subcategory.

Table 3

Archetypal active teaching activities

Table 9. Activities related to the types of active teaching detected.

TEACHING	RELATED ACTIVITIES
Exemplary and contextual	Field trips, attendance at conferences and artistic events, projects, observation, real life examples.
Experimental and practical	Experiments, practices, construction of apparatus and models, workshops, exhibitions, staging.
Analytical and collaborative	Interrogative method or triggering questions, systematic and orderly explanation, reading, essay, analysis and teamwork, case studies.

Although the theoretical categorization is achieved, it is necessary to observe that there are important divergences in terms of methods, personality and teaching positions that, nevertheless, coincide in being positively valued by the student body. This shows that the archetypal background of this teaching figure is beyond the didactic method, although it contains it. This is evident when analyzing the topic of exigency and discipline, as an attribute of a significant teacher, appearing in 32 discursive extracts; versus the one related to pleasant and dynamic (play, joke, laughter), with equal mentions. On the one hand, not everystrict  teacher is a joker or flexible , nor vice versa; on the other hand, there are many cases where there is a coincidence between both characters in the same teaching figure, which is also related to the pedagogical-didactic approach.

Discussion and conclusions

The current study focuses its attention on the heroic path taken by students in their transit through EMS in the State of Querétaro, Mexico; however, it also takes into account some characterizations of teachers, provided by the same student group, also related to the heroic path taken by some teachers in their eagerness to achieve the interest and learning of their students.

In this regard, it is important to highlight some details. There are committed teachers, who make their practice their life project, and those who were immersed in the system and only "comply" with the work for which they are hired. Regarding the former, it is important to note that, as Piaget says, they take into account that their main goal is to do new things, they have the idea that they work with a creative humanity and that it is important to form critical minds, which is what the teachers participating in the study point out. To achieve such an undertaking, the teacher must be enthusiastic, love what he or she does, be interested in getting the students engaged in learning and in the subject; that is, take into account their way of learning, how they have been learning (their cognitive structure) and how they relate the new knowledge, which will enrich not only their understanding but also their way of learning: this makes teaching meaningful. But the paths are diverse, depending on the preparation, the theoretical basis used, the goals set... This is related to what Coll (1999) calls pedagogical help, in which diverse strategies are used to favor the learning process. 

With the study, regarding the learning and teaching process, it is important to note that both mentors and students manage to categorize and point out important divergences in terms of methods, personality and teaching positions; but they coincide in the archetypal background of these figures, the human sense, which includes the didactic method. This is manifested by rescuing specificities in the discourse of both teachers and students. According to the student collective, demand and discipline are placed as opposites, but they also complement the pleasant and dynamictopic (play, joke, laughter); which establishes a thread with the pedagogical-didactic approach assumed. Or in the case of teachers, when they express that their way of acting is transmitted by contagion, it is emphasized that it is not possible to "qualify" the processes of formative and cultural interaction, since they happen in "the intimacy of the classroom", in the interaction itself, in the evolution of the common path; and only from there it is possible to assess where personal interaction shows how the students imitate attitudes of their significant teachers, as well as refer to academic and life concepts that these figures instilled in them.

In addition to the actions proposed in the study, it is important to follow up on this practice in order to adapt the process generated by the intervention, inform colleagues about the didactic structure used and rotate the project and the knowledge, so that teachers become aware of their practice (Sanjurjo and Vera, 2001), and perhaps infect their colleagues. 

Specifically, learning, as well as meaningful teaching, are closely related to what Piaget proposes with the concepts of balancing and adapting; with balancing knowledge and the way of learning or unbalancing the structure that one possesses in order to make the change, achieving new cognitive structures. This is what Caramón (2019) alludes to when proposing how to work the ideal strategies for the group and the individual at that moment, where factors such as interrelation, affectivity, concerns and dreams must be considered, contributing to the formation of identity (as proposed in the study of archetypes), in order to achieve the leveling of learning channels and lateralities in their way of approaching knowledge; which acquires meaning both for the students and for the teaching figure: it engages them.

Thus, it is possible to affirm that in the evaluation of school permanence, the manifestations that are significant from the point of view of the young people themselves, for them, there is not only one way of being a significant teacher, if they are compared, there are as many as theoretical supports and projections of each actor and, with this, as already pointed out, in teaching and learning, the teacher becomes a figure that impresses, knows, is enthusiastic, shows energy or passion; someone who loves... Loves his subject, loves to teach, loves to be with the student body: speaks of the need to consider teaching as a life project.

If one were to elaborate the mythical story, one could not speak of a master, but rather of a variety of characters or possibilities that the student community may encounter on its heroic journey.

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