Student attrition in posgraduate blended programs at the Universidad Estatal a Distancia (UNED), Costa Rica: Desertion or delay?
Postgraduate student attrition in blended (traditional and distance) education programs has been little studied. Several theoretical categories have been developed to justify attrition: psychological, academic, sociological, economic, organizational, supply and demand of higher education and the market, and interaction. Through surveys, interviews and institutional data the case of a blended learning academic master program is analyzed. It was found that the problem must be rethought as a delay in graduation (68%). Desertion calculated according to academic regulations is 87%, but according to the intention expressed by the students is 19%, of which 6% transfer to other institutions. Besides this, it takes on average 16 months to submit the candidacy exam although by regulations it is expected to do so in 6 months. Therefore, applying appropriate strategies may lower the dropout rate to about 15%. Desertion (as intention expressed by the students) is negatively correlated with their opinion about: 1) degree of concordance between the career`s output profile and the labor market needs, 2) teachers teaching skills and 3) relationship between the work performed by the student and the master programm. None of the existing theoretical categories fully explain the results, so it is considered that the determining factors in the dropout may vary by sociocultural and institutional situation of each case. To reduce drop-out improvements must be made in: 1) teaching skills, 2) curriculum, 3) students selection, 4) subject ́s contents of the first block, 5) admission of undergraduate students from the same institution and 7) induction to a blended learning system. To reduce delays in graduation people in charge must: 1) restructure the seminary courses, 2) strengthen research in the courses, 3) give more supervision and assistance to student`s research project, 4) fit regulation times to students that work full time and 5) select students who really want an academic program (not a professional program).
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| Format: | Digital revista |
| Language: | spa |
| Published: |
Universidad Estatal a Distancia, Costa Rica
2009
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| Online Access: | https://revistas.uned.ac.cr/index.php/cuadernos/article/view/227 |
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