Abstract:

Universidad de las Fuerzas Armadas ESPE, in order to respond to the social needs and technological transformations of the contemporary world, provides society with professionals trained in early childhood education, who work in public, private or municipal schools, ONGs and programs for early childhood, serving in core functions as direction, coordination, pedagogical promoter, teacher and support assistant. To fulfill this commitment, the university has prepared a pre-professional internship program that constitutes a relevant factor in the training of efficient and competent professionals to face a globalized world. On the other hand, as an institution of higher education, it is imperative that the university observes the Organic Law of Higher Education which establishes that pre-professional practices constitute a curricular requirement to obtain a professional degree.

The objective of preprofessional internship is to link the competencies specified in professional profiles and developed in classrooms with professional reality; it consists on the demonstration and improvement of skills. In other words, it is about the incursion of future professionals in real work situations. Internship does not always fulfill its function, in some circumstances students have been seen to carry out activities very different from those related to teaching in early childhood education. This situation takes place due to the lack of commitment of educational centers which prevent from developing skills in the future professionals and by the same university that does not have strategies and regulations for the realization of the internships and their follow-up as well as supervision.

The research about the Impact of pre-professional internship on the academic training of students in Early Childhood Education School was carried out taking information from two periods: the first from 2009 to 2014 and the second from 2015 to 2017. This research has a correlational, non-experimental, cross-sectional scope, being a quail-quanti study. The information was compiled with the use of instruments such as: a survey applied to 153 graduates and 102 career students, as well as an interview applied to expert teachers at the university.

The research was focused on knowing the level of satisfaction with academic training improved by the development of pre-professional practice, management of internal processes and development of professional competencies. Two populations were compared for which the Pearson's Chi-square formula was applied to obtain the level of significance and the common and uncommon factors.

The results show that the students and graduates are satisfied with the academic training; however, some subjects are required to be strengthened, such as curricular planning, teaching methodologies for early childhood education and special educational needs. Regarding compliance with the exit profile, the cognitive, social, political, cultural, and personal impact of the development of the practices were analyzed.

Keywords:

Pre-professional internship, academic training.