At the UNAM, one way to obtain a professional title is a professional exam before a jury. The rules of the Faculty of Engineering call for juries of three examiners and two alternates. The protocol of the College of Library Science states that the exam will not take place under any circumstances unless all three members of the jury are present.
At the end comes the oath. The candidate raises the right hand and answers Sí protesto, “I do so swear.”
In Mexico, a university of poor quality is called a universidad patito, a “duckling university.” In a 2005 study, the UNAM researcher Rodríguez Gómez described such schools as establishments of “sospechosa o francamente mala calidad académica” (suspect or frankly bad academic quality).
In December 2025, Vanguardia reported 62 complaints in the state of Coahuila against about 11 schools, mainly for offering programs without official validity.
In 2017, an Expansión article on Carlos Slim included the sentence “El ingeniero es propietario de la gigante de telecomunicaciones América Móvil” (The engineer is the owner of the telecommunications giant América Móvil). Slim graduated as a civil engineer from the Faculty of Engineering of the UNAM.
A medical prescription in Mexico must show the number of the doctor’s cédula profesional, the professional license. Guidelines published in the official gazette in October 2025 list among the required data the “Número de Cédula Profesional o autorización provisional para ejercer como pasante” (number of the professional license, or provisional authorization to practice as an intern).
Under the General Health Law, a doctor who performs specialized surgery must hold a “Cédula de especialista legalmente expedida” (specialist’s license legally issued) and a current specialist’s certificate.
Miguel de la Madrid earned a master’s degree in public administration at Harvard on a scholarship from the Bank of Mexico. Carlos Salinas de Gortari took two master’s degrees and a doctorate at Harvard. Ernesto Zedillo completed a doctorate in economics at Yale in 1981. All three became president of Mexico.
The political group around them is known colloquially as the tecnócratas, the technocrats.
The style manual of Mexico’s National Electoral Institute (INE) sets a rule for titles: “Los tratamientos se escriben abreviados, con inicial mayúscula, cuando acompañan al nombre” (Titles are written abbreviated, with a capital initial, when they accompany the name). Its examples are “Dr. Gustavo González Ortiz,” “Mtra. María Rosa Madrigal Hernández” and “Ing. Rodolfo Contreras Martínez.” Its examples of titles written out in full are in lowercase, as in “licenciado Armando Contreras.”
In 2025, the FES Aragón, a campus of the UNAM, created a commemorative program to help former students obtain their professional title. It is open to “egresados de la UNAM con todos sus créditos y más de diez años de haber concluido la carrera” (UNAM graduates with all their credits and more than ten years since finishing their degree).
According to Xataka México, “más de 5,000 personas solicitaron ingresar” (more than 5,000 people applied to enter). The first group had 1,110 graduates. A second group of about 1,000 was then opened.
On December 1, 1946, Miguel Alemán Valdés became president of Mexico. He was a civilian and a law graduate of UNAM. According to México Desconocido, official protocol used his academic degree “como título de su investidura” (as the title of his office).
Many politicians then began to use licenciado as a title of prestige. Mi licenciado became “sinónimo de poder” (a synonym for power) in politics, the law and the bureaucracy. From there the use spread to the rest of society.
In Mexico, a university degree becomes a form of address. Licenciado or licenciada is used for “anyone who has a degree in any number of fields,” one guide explains. Engineers are addressed as ingeniero or ingeniera, and teachers, university professors included, as maestro or maestra. Another guide notes that calling someone simply Ingeniero is “completely acceptable” even when the speaker knows the person’s first name.
Article 250 of Mexico’s Federal Penal Code punishes anyone who claims the standing of a professional without the legal title. The penalty is one to six years in prison and a fine.
The title rests on the cédula profesional, which the Ministry of Public Education issues through its Directorate General of Professions. The cédula is required in fields such as health, law, architecture and engineering.