Abstract:

Research on learning in higher education established association between the way students learn and their perception about the contexts in which this learning takes place.
Given the relevance of the course experience to the quality of learning in higher education the aim of this study is to identify the differences between students of the courses of Social Sciences and Science and Technology.
In the current study we pretend to evaluate the link between the student’s perception about is course using the CEQ - Course Experience Questionnaire (Ramsden, 2005). This questionnaire evaluates different aspects: quality teaching, clear goals, appropriate workload and generic skills. The instrument was standardized to Portuguese population (Chaleta et al, 2012) and then applied to a sample of 1025 university students. We intend to investigate if the instrument’s statistical qualities discriminate intelligibly differences between different scientific areas. The results indicate significant differences among students. Students of Science and Technology courses obtained higher values in the scales of good teaching and appropriate workload. Students of Social Sciences obtained higher scores on generic skills and higher level of satisfaction with the course attending.

Keywords:

CEQ, Higher Education, Science and Tecnology Courses, Social Sciences Courses.