Abstract:

Failed subjects and school desertion of university students in the majors of the area of Engineering and Technology has become a complex problem in Mexican universities. This phenomenon directly affects permanence and graduation rates, as well as terminal efficiency indexes.

According to figures from the Department of Public Education, in the school year of 2012-2013 in higher education, only 52.7 of students completed their course of studies and of these, 32.3% obtained their degree. Over 47% dropped out at some point during the program, it is believed that the main factor is the failing of subjects. A systematic bibliographical review, supported by the experience and perception of students and professors, in addition to the application of surveys to a sample of students, professors and administrators at the Graduate School of Computer Science Mazatlan, in the Universidad Autónoma de Sinaloa, (UAS), led to detect that students are not adequately selected for admission to a university major, leading to a high index of subject failure and, consequently, drop-outs, mainly between the first and second years. At the Graduate School of Computer Science Mazatlan, besides the seven courses in mathematics taken by students in the first degree programs of Computer Science and Information Systems Engineering, the subjects of Introduction to Programming and Programming I define students’ permanence in the two programs offered, according to professors, and in voice of their own students.

In the subjects corresponding to the areas of mathematics and programming the index for failed subjects reaches up to 90% some years, according to the professors in charge of these courses.

It is common to hear that the subjects of programming are a filter for students to continue in the program or simply desert, which warrants tackling this problem and studying it in depth. This paper addresses the case of the Graduate School of Computer Science Mazatlan, of the Universidad Autónoma de Sinaloa, (UAS), nevertheless, desertion due to subject failure is not distinctive of a single institution or country, or even a level of schooling.

Keywords:

Subject Failure, Drop-outs, Terminal Efficiency, Higher Education.