Abstract:

Educational spaces are scenarios that promote the capacities of individuals as a result of the habitus or environment in which the life of university students develops. The impact of the university on the student is reflected in the way in which it addresses problems of its discipline and the assessment of its impact on the social world. Since the relationships of power, social roles, available resources and experiences within the university are exclusive to each group, this research has as its main objective to study the transformations of a group of students and their family and social environment as a result of their college life.

The study was conducted with 330 students who began in the first period of 2015 at the Universidad de la Salle in Bogotá Colombia, the sample is proportional to the number of students who entered in that period in each of the 21 different programs offered by the college. These students have been monitored since their entry through surveys that include some dichotomous questions, others with rating scales, open questions, etc. In addition, focus groups were conducted at different times. On the other hand semi-structured interviews were conducted with the directors of each of the programs. This allowed the collection of a large quantity of qualitative and quantitative information, which has required various data analysis techniques. Among others, (PCA) Principal Component Analysis, which is a multivariate statistical analysis technique, which allows to know the relationship between elements of a population when it is perceived that in this relationship, a set of variables or properties influences in an unknown way and in different proportions of the elements; which in our case are aspects of university life. In this sense, the PCA allowed to identify indicators of the transformations of university students in the sample. The systematization and analysis of the results allowed describing the transformations of the students and their environment in the social, economic, academic and professional dimensions, as well as the concerns, goals and evolutions represented by the transformations within their families. In view of the above, this type of evaluation represents a practical basis in relation to educational management and can be applied by other universities, since it reduces the dimensions of study to significant elements that serve for educational diagnosis and the design and implementation of policies and institutional actions oriented to the creation of a habitus in accordance with the reality of this generation of students, in the promotion of their capacities and the strengthening of social and cultural capital within the university.

Keywords:

University life, transformations of the students, educational diagnosis, indicators and principal component analysis.