Perceptions of the impact and effectiveness of tutorial action in four Chilean public universities

This research has its genesis in the observation and participation of the researcher in the personal, academic, and professional fields of the students at their home university, the University of Tarapacá, as well as in their professional motivation for contributing to the educational system. Chilean.

However, we can say that the orientation and tutorial action must be improved and organized in such a way that it produces a more adequate impact on the retention of students and contributes to improving the quality of education. It can also be highlighted that the orientation and tutorial action carried out by the different actors involved — academics and peer tutors from the University of Tarapacá, in addition to the researcher of this thesis — have been fundamental in the academic performance and motivation within the careers. studied.

Now, being such the relevance of the tutorial actions, there is little research on the process that students go through when they enter the university for the first time, including the actions of the university to support them.

In this sense, the purpose of the study is to analyze the perception of the impact and effectiveness of the tutorial actions implemented in Chilean public universities. The methodology used consists of applying a questionnaire to a sample of 541 participants from four Chilean public universities. The results show a favorable perception regarding the implementation of the tutorial actions in all the participants of the different universities. Together, the presence of significant differences was found among the participating students regarding the perception of the implementation of the tutorial actions, depending on the different execution processes developed in each house of studies. These results show the importance of evaluating the effectiveness of the tutorial action processes and guiding new implementation modalities, which allow a better academic performance of the students in their university career.

For this research, a parallel convergent mixed study was carried out, with the application of a questionnaire which was validated by experts, which has adequate psychometric properties, clarity of its items and an appropriate internal consistency in each of the dimensions with indices of reliability ranging between 0.785 and 0.907, a Cronbach's α —internal consistency— of 0.978 for the total scale, in the qualitative part, a documentary analysis, in-depth interviews and focus group were carried out, which also underwent a piloting of the techniques data collection.

On the other hand, the development of this research has made it possible to verify that the competencies —for example, soft skills or attitudinal skills— that must be developed by students who graduate successfully and enter the world of work, also They require an improvement with the appropriate contributions that guidance and tutorial action implies in this period of completion of the cycle of Higher Education.

In conclusion, the importance of this study lies in the fact that it partially covers a gap in knowledge, and it does so by incorporating the perspective of three of the main actors involved in the process of tutorial actions: academics, tutors and tutors, constituting a first approximation at the level national and regional to analyze the perception of the impact and effectiveness of tutorial actions, also seeks to be a contribution to the problem of abandonment, desertion and lag of students entering higher education, either at the national and international regional level.