Survey on student motivation and approval of educational environment at Universidad Politécnica de Madrid within the European Higher Education area implementation

A recent study elaborated by Vicerrectorado de Ordenación Académica y Planificación Estratégica of Technical University of Madrid (UPM) defines the satisfaction of the university student body as "the response that the University offers to the expectations and demands of service of the students, considered in a general way ". Besides an indicator of academic and institutional insertion of the student, the assessment of student engagement allows us to adapt the academic offer and the extension services of the University to the real needs of the students. The process of convergence towards the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) raises the need to form in competitions, that is to say, of developing in our students capacities and knowledge beyond the purely theoretical-practical thing. Therefore, the perception and experience of the educational process and environment by the students is an important issue to be addressed to accomplish their expectations and achieve a curriculum accordingly to EHEA expectations. The present study aims to explore the student motivation and approval of the educational environment at the UPM. To this end a total of 97 students enrolled in the undergraduate program of Civil Engineering, Computer Engineering and Agronomic Engineering at UPM were surveyed. The survey consisted of 40 questions divided in three blocks. The first one of 20 questions of personal character in that they were gathering, besides the sex and the age, the degree of fulfilment, implication and dedication with the institution and the academic tasks. In the second block we identify 10 questions related to the perception of the student on the teaching quality, and finally a block of 10 questions regarding the Bologna Process. The students personal motivation was moderately high, with a score of 3.6 (all scores are provided on a 5-point scale), being the most valuable items obtaining a university degree (4,3) and the friendship between students (4,2). Any significant difference was shown between sexes (P=0.23) since the averages for this block of questions were of 3.7±0.3 and 3.5±0.4 for women and men respectively. The students are moderately satisfied with their graduate studies with an average score of 3,2, being the questions that reflect a minor satisfaction the research profile of the teachers (2,8) and the organization of the Schools (2,9). The best valued questions are related to the usefulness and quality of the degrees, with 3,5 and 3,4 respectively, and to the interest of the courses within the degree (3,4). For sexes, the results of this block of questions are similar (3.1±0.3 and 3.2±0.3 for men and women respectively=0.79). Also, there were no differences (P=0.39) between the students who arrange work and studies or do not work (3.1±0.2 and 3.2±0.3 respectively). In conclusion, students at UPM present an acceptable degree of motivation and satisfaction with regard to the studies and services that offer their respective Schools. Both characteristics receive the same value both for men and for women and so much for students who arrange work and studies as for those who devote themselves only to studying. In a significant way, students who are more engaged and are in-class attendants present the major degree of satisfaction.Overall, there is a great lack of information regarding the Bologna Process. In fact to the majority, they would like to know more on what it is, what it means and what changes will involve its implementation.

Higher education in industrial engineering in Peru: towards a new model based on skills

This article analyzes the progress of Industrial Engineering in Peru, the relationship to major trends in Europe and North America, and the projected outlook for the future. It is determined that the need for this engineering specialty includes a significant degree of resource management, and the formation of engineers through education requires not only the acquisition and strengthening of technical knowledge, but also the development of the competences that are required by both employers and the recipients of the benefits of engineering: society. Conclusions have been drawn based on state-of-the-art analyses from Europe and North America, and definitions of trends for engineering.

Fostering English-taught higher education programs in a Spanish university: the "TechEnglish" innovative project

In recent years, coinciding with adjustments to the Bologna process, many European universities have attempted to improve their international profile by increasing course offerings in English. According to the Institute of International Education (IIE), Spain has notably increased its English-taught higher education programs, ranking fifth in the list of European countries by number of English-taught Master's programs in 2013. This article presents the goals and preliminary results of an on-going innovative education project (TechEnglish) that aims to promote course offerings in English at the Technical University of Madrid (Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, UPM). The UPM is the oldest and largest of all Technical Universities in Spain. It offers graduate and postgraduate programs that cover all the engineering disciplines as well as architecture. Currently, the UPM has no specific bilingual/multilingual program to promote teaching in English, although there is an Educational Model Whitepaper (with a focus on undergraduate degrees) that promotes the development of activities like an International Semester or a unique shared curriculum. The TechEnglish project is an attempt to foster courses taught in English at 7 UPM Technical Schools, including students and 80 faculty members. Four tasks were identified: (1) to design a university wide framework to increase course offerings, (2) to identify administrative difficulties, (3) to increase visibility of courses offered, and (4) to disseminate the results of the project. First, to design a program we analyzed existing programs at other Spanish universities, and other projects and efforts already under way at the UPM. A total of 13 plans were analyzed and classified according to their relation with students (learning), professors (teaching), administration, course offerings, other actors/institutions within the university (e.g., language departments), funds and projects, dissemination activities, mobility plans and quality control. Second, to begin to identify administrative and organizational difficulties in the implementation of teaching in English, we first estimated the current and potential course offerings at the undergraduate level at the UPM using a survey (student, teacher and administrative demand, level of English and willingness to work in English). Third, to make the course offerings more attractive for both Spanish and international students we examined the way the most prestigious universities in Spain and in Europe try to improve the visibility of their academic offerings in English. Finally, to disseminate the results of the project we created a web page and a workspace on the Moodle education platform and prepared conferences and workshops within the UPM. Preliminary results show that increasing course offerings in English is an important step to promote the internationalization of the University. The main difficulties identified at the UPM were related to how to acknowledge/certify the departments, teachers or students involved in English courses, how students should register for the courses, how departments should split and schedule the courses (Spanish and English), and the lack of qualified personnel. A concerted effort could be made to increase the visibility of English-taught programs offered on-line.