The increasing emphasis on STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) education globally and the rapid development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) have highlighted the importance of equipping students with technical skills, people skills, and computational thinking. These competencies are critical for addressing the challenges of modern work environments and fostering innovative solutions. This paper presents an educational initiative that combines interactive activities, including the “Marshmallow Challenge” and Tinkercad-based coding, with the “SS Chatbot UAN,” an AI-powered tool designed to enhance learning outcomes. Conducted with secondary school students aged 14–16, this project aimed to strengthen teamwork, communication, and problem-solving skills while promoting confidence in sequential coding tasks. The findings demonstrate significant improvements in students’ collaboration and computational thinking, supported by high engagement and satisfaction levels. This study underscores the transformative potential of integrating AI technologies and experiential learning methodologies into pre-university STEM education.

The evaluation of Cyber-Physical Production Systems (CPPS) using Digital Twin (DT) architectures and Asset Administration Shells (AAS) is critical for advancing flexible, autonomous, and human-centric manufacturing environments. However, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), particularly in Latin America, face significant barriers to adopting and evaluating these technologies due to resource limitations, complexity, and lack of standardized frameworks. This paper proposes a scalable and modular evaluation framework specifically designed for SMEs, integrating DTs for real-time simulation and monitoring, AAS for semantic interoperability, and simulation-based assessment methods to measure CPPS autonomy, flexibility, and resilience. A comprehensive review of recent approaches, trends, challenges, and research gaps highlights the urgent need for dynamic, standardized, and cognitive-enabled evaluation methodologies. The proposed framework addresses these needs by formalizing production knowledge through ontologies, synchronizing physical systems with digital models, and enabling systematic performance evaluation across diverse production scenarios. A case study conducted in a Latin American manufacturing SME demonstrates the practical application of the framework, showing improvements in production efficiency, decision transparency, and system adaptability. The results underline the framework’s potential to democratize access to advanced Industry 4.0 solutions for SMEs, fostering more resilient and intelligent manufacturing ecosystems. By bridging current technological gaps, this work contributes to accelerating the digital transformation of SMEs and supports the broader goals of Industry 5.0. Future research will explore the integration of explainable AI techniques and expand the framework’s applicability to multi-site production networks.

This innovative practice full paper answers the question of how high-quality accreditation promotes educational innovation in accredited industrial engineering programs in Bogota. Using the case study method, Higher Education Institutions in Colombia were selected as the context, three industrial engineering programs in Bogota as cases, and educational innovation processes in the accreditation process as the unit of analysis. In each program, a professor or an administrative involved in the accreditation process was selected, and as categories of analysis the learning experience, teaching practices, curricula, and institutional policies were studied. These categories were studied using semi-structured interviews that allowed an understanding of the experience lived in the accreditation process, and the documentary analysis was intended to make an analysis of the learning experience, the teaching practices, the curricula, and the institutional policies. It was concluded that educational innovation is a learning process in programs with only one accreditation since strong educational changes are promoted in the first accreditation. In comparison, programs with more than one accreditation do not need to include strong educational changes. Finally, it is recommended to focus the accreditation policy in Colombia on programs that want to be accredited for the first time, evaluating the learning experience in the student factor, the teaching practices in the teacher factor, and the curricula in the academic processes factor.

In Colombia, the high prevalence of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) represents a significant public health problem. Associated comorbidities, such as cardiovascular disease and cognitive impairment, emphasize the importance of early diagnosis and appropriate treatment. While polysomnography (PSG) is the best standard for diagnosis, its high cost and limitations in terms of comfort have prompted the search for accessible and effective alternatives. In this context, a biofeedback model is proposed as an innovative tool for diagnosing and treating OSA in the Colombian population. This model is compared with existing devices such as the Beddr Sleep Tuner and the Apnealink, evaluating parameters such as durability, efficacy in detecting apnea episodes, and patient comfort. The compact and comfortable design of the biofeedback device makes it a more accessible alternative to the PSG. Preliminary results recommend that this model could be a valuable tool to improve the quality of life of OSA patients in Colombia by facilitating diagnosis and treatment and reducing the impact of associated comorbidities

This study describes a systematic literature review of the research and experiential area of DEI in STEM in publications and events of Engineering Associations and Councils of LATAM and the Caribbean. The study's main questions are: 1) Which conceptual and methodological frameworks exist to evaluate and intervene in DEI conditions in educating STEM professionals? 2)What are the questions, reflections, and discussions regarding DEI that have been formulated in engineering professional education? The review was conducted in four main phases: corpus configuration phase with PRISMA methodology, corpus description with automatic techniques, processing and analysis phase using ChatPDF tool and comparative matrices, and interpretation phase. The results show that there is a predominance of studies and experiences addressing the gender gap either by diagnosing it or intervening in it. The most of experiences are about organizations promoting actions to reduce or counteract the gender gap and stereotypes and generating capacities. The theoretical and methodological used frameworks include physical and structural aspects related to inclusion, curricular concepts, standardized tests, STEM abilities, gender studies concepts and theories, rhizomatic model, and discourse analysis. Regarding the reflections and discussions, it has been found a diverse set of works showing institutional achievements in diagnosing, reducing, or counteracting academic and cultural gender gaps, and promoting equitable access to education for women. The academic community claims to strengthen institutional capacities for these challenges, specifically to deepen knowledge of how to approach the gender gap phenomenon.