International Journal of Innovative Research in Advanced Engineering (IJIRAE) ISSN: 2349-2763 Issue 01, Volume 3 (January 2016) www.ijirae.com _______________________________________________________________________________________________________ IJIRAE: Impact Factor Value - ISRAJIF: 1.857 | PIF: 2.469 | Jour Info: 4.085 | Index Copernicus 2014 = 6.57 © 2014- 16, IJIRAE- All Rights Reserved Page -25 Approaches and models of professional competence: Definition of competence in the training of engineers in Latin America Martín Palma Department of Industrial Engineering University of Piura, Perú Dante Guerrero Department of Industrial Engineering University of Piura, Perú Ignacio de los Ríos Carmenado Department of Projects and Rural Planning Polytechnic University of Madrid, Spain Abstract- The article discusses the review of the state of professional competence art, presenting a compilation of indexed research in the two most comprehensive multidisciplinary databases: "Scopus" and "Web of Science" from 1950 to 2012. By analyzing scientific domain of research literature the existence of eight approaches of professional competence is shown, some related to the corresponding international system of competence certification which are supported by different philosophies with a common base. These theoretical and visually positions presented are compared with each other and serve to approach the competence analysis for higher education in engineering. From the presented approaches, it is emphasized that the holistic approach is the most appropriate for coding competence for higher education in engineering. In the analysis of competence in engineering the Tuning Project in Latin America is described and two competence encodings are presented: CDIO and IPMA, both are compared to the Tuning Project for Latin America in order to answer the question of what would be the most useful to cover professional competence needs in Engineering in Latin America. Key words- professional competence, competence in engineering, analysis of scientific domain. I. INTRODUCTION In today's academia, there are a variety of definitions and different approaches of professional competence used in the various disciplines of science. Initiatives and strategic processes of change have led to the term "professional competence" to be part of a discourse and innovative training proposals more "professional" such as: the rapprochement between the labor world and education/training; the adaptation of workers to technology changes and social organization of production and work; the renovation of education/ training institutions, of professors /instructors, of the educational/training offer itself; and of the methods of acquisition and recognition of occupational qualifications [1], [2], [3], [4]. This renewal of approaches has led us to revise the two most comprehensive multidisciplinary databases: "Scopus" and "Web of Science", and the research literature of professional competence from 1950 to 2012, in order to define the models in which they are based and to be able to have a visual outline of the state of the professional competence art. Through scientific maps generated by specialized software the display of information is achieved: Citespace II and VosViewer. Eight models were found which are algorithmically classified based on the characteristics, research themes in common and the relationships established by the authors in formulating hypotheses and in developing their research. For every model a description of their characteristics, findings and principal representatives were presented. This was done in order to establish which features are the most important for training in higher education in engineering and thereby find professional competence coding which are useful for the training of engineers. The results lead the researchers to consider, as suitable, three encodings competence: CDIO (from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology MIT) based on the life cycle of a process: Conceive, Design, Implement and Operate. The second from the Project Management of International Project Management Association (IPMA), and the Tuning Project for Latin America. The comparison of encodings reveals which one that will have better results in the training of engineers in Latin America. II. METHODOLOGY The methodology for reviewing the state of the art of professional competence through the analysis of scientific domains is based on the methodologies proposed by Börner, Chen and Boyack [5] Marsden [6] and McCain [7] including: a) Previous bibliographic analysis, b) Selection of sources and data extraction, c) Quality of data, d) Analysis level and software selection, and e) information display and interpretation. The work review of Sergio Tobon [7], of Weinert [9] and of Guerrero, De los Rios & Diaz-Puente [10] are highlighted in the literature review. In the data extraction 3641 documents of Scopus and 1279 documents of Web of Knowledge were collected. The level of analysis of this study involves a mixed co-citation of documents [11], [12], [13] and co-occurrence of words [14], [15]. By using the software Citespace II, considered the most appropriate for our level of analysis, 2 graphs (see Figure 1 and 2) that are interpreted in the results section were made.