Abstract:

Students’ perceptions and experiences of the organizational attributes of the higher education institution are enrolled in exert a strong influence in their integration into the academic universe. The present paper aims at focusing on the analysis of the higher education institutional reality, emphasizing the importance of the environmental and cultural features of each institution that may act as catalysts of new students’ integration. Thus, the physical, psychological, social, organizational, political, cultural and axiological dimensions appear as a relevant framework for analysis.

The present paper reports a case study of a Faculty of Engineering from a prestigious Portuguese university. The research was carried out on the basis of two methodological approaches for data collection. On the one hand, one of the methods was a semi-structured interview, which presented topics and questions to the interviewees, without leading them toward preconceived choices. Thus, a sample of 30 first-year students enrolled in Engineering was questioned about their perceptions about the way they experienced the institutional acts aiming at their integration. Data analysis was performed through content analysis, privileging the semantic approach over the syntactic one. Transcripts were coded according to themes and analyzed using a constant comparison approach (Glaser 1992). The data were coded by paragraph and sentence as proposed by Strauss and Corbin (1990). Participants’ own categories were tabulated as suggested by Silverman (2000).

The other method used was documental analysis, namely focusing on the institutional Guide to Strategic Development and the institutional strategic plan.

Findings suggest that the physical dimension fosters the students’ feeling of belonging through the skills acquired in terms of controlling the spatial dimension. Moreover, new students’ self-concept emerges significantly increased by the feeling that they are part of an elite and the feeling of integration seems to rely basically on the inter-peers relationships. This perceived prestige represented, a anteriori, a crucial vocational demand for the Bourdieu’s “heirs”, and, a posteriori, a conquest to the first-generation students.

Keywords:

Student experience, student engagement, organizational development, first year experience, academic development.