TOOLS TO TACKLE DROPOUT AND RETENTION IN UNIVERSITIES

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Every time any student drops out (dropout), this situation is indicating the existence of some kind of disruption or maladjustment that has caused the student to move away from his or her goals of advancing in a specific course. The motivations are not necessarily negative, but they cause uneasiness in the academic environment, because a time and space had been set aside to contribute to the development of that student. Both the professor and the colleagues, as well as the administrative system, consider that loss with a certain amount of regret. This is clearer and more evident in private institutions, where that student is contributing to the institution's budget. But in public federal institutions there is also an impact due to the commitment of public money to finance that student, and the consideration that this same money could have been used to finance someone else's studies or be applied to other matters. Evasion also reflects on the budget allocated to each federal university, by its participation in the indexes that define the budget. Evasion can also be used as an index to understand the degree of social interest in study, for a certain population. Brazil is an example of a country in which there has been a very significant increase in the number of places in higher education in the last decades. For this reason, there is great interest in monitoring the use of these vacancies, which represent an investment by the country to improve the level of education of the population. But besides this, there is a worldwide phenomenon of change in people's interest in studying, especially evident in the younger generations. The phenomenon is characterized by an increase in student dropouts (evasion) coupled with an increase in the repetition of students in basic subjects (retention), in addition to a lower demand for existing vacancies (rejection). This situation is putting the university system in check, raising questions about the viability of maintaining courses with high dropouts and low demand. This paper analyzes this phenomenon and proposes some actions based on the experiences and testimonies collected and organized by the authors over more than 30 years, analyzed under the methodology of the critical incident theory. This theory focuses on the incidents reported by the scholars along their path, and not on the subjective opinion of students and teachers, which is often nothing more than the repetition of the justifications existing in the collective consciousness, which may be very distant from the real causes. 2 TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter 1  Chapter 2  Chapter 3  Chapter 4  Chapter 5  Chapter 6  3  GENERAL INTRODUCTION Since the 1970s, the university dropout has been worrying institutions around the world (CARVALHO et al., 2019; SOUSA; MACIEL, 2016), and from the 1990s, the theme gains prominence in the Brazilian scenario, due to the first movements focused on the quality assurance of Higher Education and its evaluation processes. The concern with indicators, such as university student evasion, marks the conjuncture of educational public policy, through the Program for Institutional Evaluation of Brazilian Universities (PAIUB) (MEC, 1994). Where higher education institutions from all over the country, concerned with the continuous process of management planning and characterization of the quality of the service provided, presented their institutional evaluation projects. The Brazilian State's commitment to democratizing access to higher education and ensuring that quality is maintained is expressly cited in goal 12 of the National Education Plan (BRASIL, 2014). Achieving this goal means raising the gross rate of enrollment in higher education to 50% (fifty percent) and the net rate to 33% (thirty-three percent) of the population aged 18 (eighteen) to 24 (twenty-four), ensuring the quality of supply and expansion to at least 40% (forty percent) of new enrollments in the public segment. Today, for every 4 (four) students enrolled in Brazilian higher education, only 1 (one) attends a public institution (JUNIOR et al., 2020). In developed and developing economies, higher education systems have expanded markedly, welcoming non-traditional audiences and driving a significant transformation in student profiles (OECD, 2014; 2016; UNESCO, 1998; 2009b). In the global scenario, the number of students enrolled in higher education grew from 28.6 million in 1970 to 152.5 million in 2007, with the most intense growth occurring from the 2000s onwards 4  In this scenario, employment and economic success were generally guaranteed to the university professional, and this created an archetype that continues to produce its influence to this day, now within entirely different external conditions (FURLAN et al., 2021). The pursuit of patents and inventions: effects of undergraduate research Fuelled by the dreams of patents and inventions that were a striking reality in the United States of the past two centuries, universities adapted to become factories of knowledge that were being needed for various applications in the global marketplace, including also applications in the humanities needed to build plausible justifications for ongoing actions, such as economic justifications for the unlimited growth of countries that was established as a permanent goal. This unlimited permanent growth leveraged the need for more and more engineers and technicians from different fields of knowledge, as well as a good number of thinkers from the humanities and economic sciences, who could either justify the procedures in progress or criticize them in light of certain more altruistic, more humane, more sustainable ideals, making a counterpoint of little practical effect, but one that calmed the mass consciousness, with the feeling that the problems were being analyzed and apparently under control. The figure of the teacher-researcher was established, with great prestige, due to its suitability to the system's objectives. The distance that this new objective or interest produced between the professor and the academics, that is, the distancing of the professor from didactic and pedagogical interests, was well accepted by the system, which saw the benefits of scientific research work far above the possible damages in the teaching-learning process. On the other hand, the expositive-test method was well adapted to the demands of research, in the 11  symbolism of the yellowed transparency slides of the professors, and the repeated tests, within certain already known standards, that minimized the time dedicated to teaching by the professor, who could also use some of his assistants to correct the tests and even to teach some classes. It was natural for graduate studies to emerge in universities as more specialized environments focused on the production of knowledge, applying the successful scientific method. This focus on research, and the prestige associated with this activity, has created a psychological impact on professors to this day, even after the effects of these for the market have ceased. The very different conditions of today's reality call for a necessary reflection in this regard, to identify, understand, and positively transform these interests (SANTOS et al., 2022). The evolution of the financial market and its impact on education With the value of money at the top, the small masses that held power and directed the great masses, throughout the 20th century, advanced in the accelerated extraction and intensive use of natural resources in favor of the production of so-called consumer goods, including food for the growing population, and for the animals that were increasingly introduced in the menus of the economically expanding societies. Money reached the pinnacle of power when it began to be produced in advance of the production process, a right acquired by banks all over the world. It became necessary only to have a destination for the money produced by the banks, which bought all the most productive industries, such as chemicals in all its forms, war, food, pharmaceuticals, agriculture and others. Likewise, more and more recruits were needed in the universities for the production of knowledge and meeting the needs of the growing market. Training the brain within the precepts 12  dictated by the market-phobia was a good business both in economic terms and for the status of social recognition, for those who could successfully submit themselves to the professionalization process that took place in university graduations. From the beginning to the end of the 20th century, a remarkable advance in terms of growth of world production, of all kinds of inputs, machines, constructions and extraction procedures, put humanity in conditions to significantly affect the planetary balance, and in all this process the legions of professionals trained in universities had a great influence. Driven by the prospect of profit, of social success, of access to numerous objects of desire created during all this time, including the industry of leisure and unbridled consumption, there was no shortage of candidates to undergo the university training process, at the technical, professional, or post-graduate level, the latter for research and development of knowledge necessary for the advancement of markets (FURLAN et al., 2021). In this scenario, it is clear that the tests of knowledge, coupled with expository teaching, adequately met the needs of a market that dictated the rules and a public eager to receive the rewards of the success achieved by the training acquired. But of course, at the same time, a population of people who failed in their attempt to climb the socio-economic ladder through study was also created, and were considered only as cases of a natural selection of the talents necessary for the good functioning of the system, supported by the precepts generated by the system itself, such as the theory of evolution and its justification for the prevalence of the strongest over the weakest. In a way, we can say that there was no room for compassion within the teaching-learning system established by the market and its influences in the universities. Many of us were raised and trained within this system (SANTOS et al., 2022; ZEQUINÃO et al., 2020). 13  Signs of exhaustion in the educational model and scientific publications Mechanisms, machines, ideas, projects and product development at all levels happened frenetically in the world market, with significant participation of universities (FURLAN et al., 2021). A strong scientific publishing system was also developed, which gave real support, for a long time, to the development of science, until it decayed, in the 21st century, due to saturation and inadequacy to the new world realities. Only in the last decades of the 20th century, under the influence of the change of century and millennium, did we begin to perceive more strongly the signs of saturation, exhaustion, and inadequacy of the processes underway for the goal of maintaining or continuing to increase the quality of life on the planet in the decades and generations to come. Many of the processes and developments needed for the progress of industries and productive processes of different types have been achieved, have been conquered and, little by little, the needs for professionals with a high level of preparation have started to decrease and become restricted to more specific areas, such as IT and everything that has to do with information processing, process automation and artificial intelligence, because these areas allow to replace, in an efficient and economically very convenient way, the professionals and technicians who were once needed to perform the functions (Furlan et al., 2021). The university system, on the other hand, increasingly emptied of interesting scientific content for the market, degenerated into a producer of scientific articles, many of them so specialized that they did not even achieve the benefit of bringing some new knowledge, of regional interest, closer to the university or society (DAMIAN; CABERO, 2020). More and more professors were feeling, in their careers, the emptying of meaning of the specialized research they performed, negatively affecting, in many cases, 14  their dedication to the teaching-learning process, especially in graduation (GOMES; SANTOS, 2021). Education as a target of the market and financial power However, the inertia of the university machine, and the natural difficulty of people to see social changes at their onset, meant that the changes were not perceived and that the legions of those interested in gaining the benefits of the labor market kept increasing (FURLAN et al, 2021). After all, the chemical industries also continued their inexorable advance, with sales leveraged by an overwhelming system of advertising, marketing, and media domination. And health became the target of big profits in medicine, just as growing social conflict fed the law. It still had room for the myth that a professional title was equivalent to a lot of money in one's pocket (ARVOR et al., 2018). But the objectives behind the education of these people became based on the construction of yet another industry with lucrative purposes where the product offered would be the university degree that would qualify for the desired functions that would boost the achievement of juicy salaries and opportunities for material conquests within the reach of whoever had money in hand. University study is no longer a pressing market need, but a market objective within the industry of selling knowledge. Numerous private universities sprang up from this moment on, and the market's former real need for qualified professionals continued to be used as if it were still in full swing, as a form of attraction for the sale of available university courses (JUNIOR et al, 2020). A majority of the country's families have, for the first time, even had the opportunity to put a child or a member of their family 15  through university. Some veterans of the families have even quit their jobs to pursue the dream of a university degree, which had been left behind in their youth because of the need to provide for the family. It can be seen that the shift from the goals of serving the market to those of forming part of the market constituted a significant shift in the condition of the college student, who went from being a necessary labor resource for the system to the status of a customer of the market for college education services (LIMA et al., 2016). Evaluation Systems in Private Education In the scenario of the expansion of private education to a mass level, the form of evaluation should be radically changed but without calling attention to the philosophical changes taking place, because criticism of the quality of education could shake the interest of future customers and thus hinder the advancement of "market education". Evaluative methods that facilitate the chance of approval in tests, or that, at least, do not leave the person with a feeling of total failure, such as multiple choice, or valorization of work done during the course, were introduced to meet the needs of the new market, no longer demanding a high degree of preparation, but maintaining the forms of ancient times, in which was impregnated the belief that the conquest of a title would be equivalent to economic and material success (CASTRO; PEREIRA, 2019). These and other new pedagogical practices tied to evaluation allowed the advancement of less intellectually prepared groups, removing the exclusivity of university titles for the economic and/or intellectual elite of the countries, thus opening a new student market (BRUM; PURCIDONIO; FERREIRA, 2017; LIMA, 2020). 16  Change in the profile of the titled professional The criticism of this situation was not strong enough to stifle the interest created around the activity, both by the financial power and by the student customers. Like health, education is a subject in which the action of financial power is facilitated by the public support of states and countries, which in fact happened, with thousands of scholarships being provided with public money to leverage private education (COSTA; COSTA; NOBREGA, 2018; SOUSA; FORTE; OLIVEIRA, 2012). In the last three decades of the 20th century and the first decade of the 21st century, there was a marked proliferation of opportunities to obtain degrees in the private sector, which to a certain extent was changing the profile of the university professional with a degree prior to this phenomenon, who was characterized by a solid and profound education. In Brazil, the federal universities were the ones that remained, during this time, as the strongholds in which the old system's demanding training was preserved, along with some elite private universities with defined quality purposes, constituting themselves, increasingly, as environments proper of the country's economic and/or intellectual elite (CASTRO; PEREIRA, 2019). Only the most intelligent of the economically less favored layers were able to penetrate the public university structures of this period, if they were supported by their families or circumstances. The families that moved more economic resources were able to better prepare their children by providing support from private teachers, good food, and all the necessary for the students' total dedication to the training goals (JUNIOR et al., 2020). Often the most difficult stage to overcome was in the selection of the entrants themselves during the entrance exam or vestibular, whose preparation also constituted a parallel industry of teaching-learning services (BRITO; 17  COSTA; ALMEIDA, 2019). We must note that the very existence of an alternative path of less difficulty provided by private universities has already had a significant impact on the profile of the university student, undermining the previous regime of maximum demand (CASTRO; PEREIRA, 2019). The doubt was created: why go through an arduous and uncertain path if I have at my disposal a safe and facilitated path to the title? The first signs of the advance of this phenomenon of relaxation of requirements began to be observed in the Engineering careers, within federal universities, which began to have an increasingly smaller number of participating students and graduates (BRUM; PURCIDONIO; FERREIRA, 2017). It began to become evident that new students did not have the necessary preparation or willingness to go through the tests that traditionally faced their peers from previous generations. Information Age: Introduction and Expansion of the Internet At the same time, another phenomenon grew in dimension and acted in the same direction: the expansion of the internet and interpersonal communication networks. After the 1990s, in almost three decades, the possibilities of study for most people have increased in an unimaginable way, both because of the ease of finding materials on the Internet, at little or no cost, and because of the explosion in the possibility of contact with other people and entertainment content. This phenomenon, in itself, also contributed to the change in the mental preparation of students, who started to have less focus due to the exposure to a more diverse material (FRANCE; CEARON, 2012). It became common to accept the removal of the most difficult 18  subjects, generally of high conceptual complexity and with little apparent impact on professional practice, from the curricula of engineering and technical courses of all kinds, in an attempt to simplify the teaching-learning process (BRUM; PURCIDONIO; FERREIRA, 2017). Courses in the humanities, generally undervalued in the professionalizing educational system, began to be more encouraged, for presenting a difficulty more appropriate to the level of students, and also for proving to be more necessary in the context of the new stimuli that advanced on society, in its quest to analyze the complex problems of society and the environment from a more human, more philosophical point of view, and eventually propose or promote solutions or at least justify trends of the system itself (JUNIOR et al., 2020). Distance Learning Courses With the advance of the Internet, distance learning courses, increasingly adapted to the lower income strata of the population, have been growing systematically, both in terms of course offerings and the number of students enrolled. The expansion of information and communication technologies only favored this phenomenon, both because of the change in the profile of the students, who were increasingly more in tune with these technologies, and because of the reduction in costs, since the initial infrastructure of distance learning courses in the 1990s and 2000s still demanded a high initial investment in computer capacity and systems creation. The two forces were in favor of the growth of the ODL modality: the increase in the number of students less intellectually prepared for university demands, but more prepared for the use of technologies, who 19  needed more time, less pressure, but the same stimulus of real access to undergraduate degrees; and on the other hand, the decrease in operating costs and increase in the scope of associated technologies, such as Internet and programming of ODL systems (MARRANGHELLO et al., 2021; SANCHEZ; SANCHEZ; ALBERTIN, 2015). Perceived change within the federal universities We have to understand that from the earliest childhood, students, later teachers, were induced to think that a university degree would be the passport to the satisfaction of personal and family desires, and that the education market itself based its marketing on this slogan, to attract its customers. Teachers subsequently reinforced this concept, because of the need to stimulate students to study during their classes. But already in the 1990s, there was no single, arduous, and expensive way to achieve this result. So why not go down the easier, less scary paths about the possibility of frustrations, so common in the previous system that predominated for most of the 20th century. These phenomena made that, already at the turn of the millennium, professors from traditional federal universities and some private ones that also adopted this model of maximum demand to students, to meet the real needs of market professionals, realized that it was no longer possible to maintain the previous levels of demand, at the risk of not having students that could overcome the barriers of the evaluations. In other words, the percentages of students who did not pass the tests, and of students who were retained in subjects with stricter evaluations, started to increase progressively over the years. Thus, concomitantly with the decline in basic preparation and student interest, the problems of evasion and retention in public universities, which were the mainstay of the traditional system of 20  of futile products. The consumption of alcohol, smoking, participation in night parties, the unruly life based on the most primitive aspects of the human being, the use of chemicals, social gatherings, unhealthy work justified by making money, the frivolity of interpersonal family or friendship relationships, the production systems and so many other things were brought to the surface by the pandemic crisis, which in various ways ended up hindering and reducing the performance of many activities whose realization, in an objective analysis, did not bring benefits to humanity, but had never been questioned (NOTO; ANDRADE; BEDENDO, 2018; SILVA et al., 2021). Added to the impacts and imbalances of the unsustainable economic system created by humanity, the imbalance of the federal educational system, receiving fantastic stimuli one hour, and scarce ones the next; and also in private education, based on the production of graduates under the myth of guaranteed money after graduation; or the imbalance of a society increasingly distracted by leisure, dominated by cell phones; or the signs of environmental imbalance, climate and landscape changes; in this huge global sum of mismatches, the pandemic made the world stop to reflect a little on its reality, and this had a strong impact on education, which had classroom classes suspended since the beginning of 2020. We can imagine that the planet said, "go home and sit quietly there and reflect on all that you are throwing at me with this, your lifestyle. This force has notably impacted the routine of energy use by people, who, in most cases, have been forced not to keep throwing away their energy with activities that are harmful to themselves and, in a very broad view, to the planet, and to reflect on what to do to find an internal balance (SILVA et al, 2021). 27  Remote Learning enters the federal scene Even amidst general resistance from a large number of teachers, who would be forced to change their teaching methodologies and come into contact with technology, remote teaching made its way in under the circumstances of the pandemic, causing a revolution in terms of training teachers to use new technologies (DUEK et al., 2020). This change certainly accelerated the phenomena of lack of stimulus and ongoing interest in face-to-face education, requiring decision, involvement and dedication, without the bonus of face-to-face social interaction, which in some cases was one of the strongest remaining motivations for undertaking undergraduate studies. Many students were kept by their families for many years in their undergraduate studies, with their energies mostly going into social dissipation at parties and consumption of drinks and products that increased the level of unconsciousness, relaxation, or daring to perform intrepid actions. Remote education and the pandemic took this possibility out of the picture, thus causing a situation of reflection on true interest in studies. 28 CHAPTER 2 - DEFINITIONS AND IMPORTANT VARIABLES IN THE PROBLEM OF UNIVERSITY EVASION, RETENTION AND REJECTION Nelson Mario Victoria Bariani Cassiane Jrayj de Melo At this historical moment, at the beginning of the third decade of the millennium, we are faced with a strong phenomenon, characterized as a problem, of alarming evasion and retention in the structures of the federal university education networks, and also a growing lack of interest in entering them. In the following sections we will be analyzing the individual factors and variables that we understand affect this process, based on the data and experience of more than 30 years of work and transit through various universities, with the goal of being able to analyze the problem in a more systematic way, and elaborate a model of reality that can be used for positive interventions and decision-making. First we will define the phenomena or independent variables under study. Evasion We understand as dropout the sudden absence of some students from the classroom with no subsequent return and that end up creating an unexpected decrease in the number of students participating in the teaching-learning process (JUNIOR et al., 2020). The concept arises, in its importance, by the negative impact produced in the planning and organization carried out by the educational 29  institution, which reserved physical spaces and financial resources for that individual, to the detriment of other candidates. In federal universities, also, that evasion, will negatively affect the indexes that define the budget distributed to each university by the federal government (DALMONECH et al., 2016). This variable, evasion, can be differentiated into three other variables: evasion of a discipline, evasion of the course, and evasion of the university, which can be strongly correlated with each other, but can also reflect particular conditions of a certain course or institution (SOUZA; SÁ; CASTRO, 2019). Retention Retention, on the other hand, is the phenomenon of accumulation of students who fail to pass a certain subject, and has its negative importance in the fact that it lengthens the expected time of student permanence within the course and the university, thus occupying a vacancy that could be used by someone else from the end of the normal training time (OLIVEIRA; BARBOSA, 2016). Rejection It is the denial of using the opportunity to access higher education by students whose situation would be favorable to grow through this path. Particularly important is the non-identification of low-income students with the university path, even though it is free and with opportunities for student support for maintenance. Another ongoing situation is the lack of interest of higher income students in undergraduate studies, in favor of other more 30  immediate possibilities for success. This trend can certainly be related to the stimulus of the internet, famous youtubers, numerous stories of immediate success making money on the internet, anxiety to buy products and games, unawareness of the difficulty of getting the basic means to study. materials that support them, among other causes (SANCHEZ; SANCHEZ; ALBERTIN, 2015). Groups of Subvariables These major variables are affected by others that we can classify as internal psychological, external psychological, the teaching system or method, the general economic situation, and the overall social situation. We will analyze each variable individually and then associate it with some category. Psychological aspects of entering university Social recognition Even today it is common to see posters hanging on doors and windows of houses, greeting some person, usually a young person, for entering university in some course, usually at federal universities. Although this entrance is nowadays facilitated to the extreme that many times it is not even necessary to take a selection test, even so, in the collective psychological, the situation of decades ago is still present, in which the conquest of the entrance in a public university was, in itself, a great success, which automatically placed the person in a superior social status, in his or her condition of approved for entrance in a federal or state public university course (GOMES; SANTOS, 2021). 31  With the great expansion in the number of openings that took place in Brazil, consolidated in a large percentage already in the second decade of the 21st century, there was no longer a great difficulty in entering the public university. Many of the last vacancies of each course ended up, progressively and increasingly, being left vacant as the 1920's approached, being handed over to the candidates by simply enrolling directly at the university secretariat and by the selection made on the spot with those enrolled using the grade from ENEM, the national high school exam, or the grade from high school itself, a method unthinkable in previous decades, where each vacancy was disputed by dozens of people. This means that the simple entrance to the university reported to the person who got it at least a momentary social status, which would last for a few months, for having won the entrance to the university. Why not take advantage of this energy of success that had only the cost of an application and a small procedure? With the arrival of the first exams, a good part of the charm ended, because many would get zero in the first grades, and it was no longer worth staying in that environment, until that moment so pleasant and enjoyable (CABRAL et al., 2014). We conclude then that this psychological factor was a cause of dropout that was generally present mainly in courses with lower demand and that were left with many open positions. Psychological pressure from teachers Soon after the first tests, the results ended up being frustrating for both students and teachers. From that moment on, there was an exponential increase in the pressure exerted by the teachers, who blamed the low preparation of the students, with everyone blaming the causes of failure on the low preparation of the high school, thus increasingly leading the whole 32  group to an energy of low quality, low esteem, and mutual charges between teachers and students, who retorted the criticism whenever possible (DUEK et al., 2020). This variable also influenced the decision to drop out of the course, because many of the newcomers did not have the necessary structure to support this situation for a long time. Search for university sociability It is very clear in the collective imagination that the university environment allows a series of opportunities for sociability that one normally does not have access to, including relationships with peers, the existence of meetings and parties, and a whole university social spree that takes place on various levels. Variables related to teaching method inadequacy These variables should be considered in great detail because of their potential to have high weight and also because they are variables with the greatest possibility of intervention within the university. Rigorous assessment In the description of the history of the dropout problem it became clear that the initial university model of education intended to meet the demands of the labor market, in terms of the needs created by the English industrial model, later spread all over the planet. This situation was true, it was connected to reality, because in fact, there were in the world, in all 33  branches of agricultural and commercial industrial activity, countless problems to be solved and for this the presence of skilled people was needed, who through their creativity and inspiration managed to bring solutions to the various problems faced. Until the 90s of the last century we can say that this scheme worked. However, the ability to solve productive technical problems began to be concentrated in some places in the world that had advanced faster in developing the ability to solve them, such as the United States, Germany, China, Korea, and Japan, and the demand for qualified professionals for the labor market became less intense in many places in the world, because the solutions came from outside. It began to be frequent to see professionals trained in engineering or medicine or other areas, who did not practice the profession and engaged in tasks that did not require that specialized preparation (SOUSA; SOARES, 2021). The myth that graduating from a university degree was a passport to wealth, to material satisfaction, has begun to lose steam, reaching the beginning of the third decade of the 21st century remarkably weakened. With young people unmotivated and insecure about the cost-benefit of facing undergraduate studies, the rigorous assessment found in the initial basic undergraduate disciplines such as mathematics, physics, chemistry, Portuguese, biology, statistics and others of the style, constituted sufficient reason for many students to abandon their courses, with only those who managed to be trained more determinedly by their families or who brought a more naturally favored intellect remaining (JUNIOR et al., 2020). The application of rigorous tests, paradoxically, ends up being supported by teachers who have often not suffered from such harsh evaluation regimes. But when they become professors, they still maintain in their psychology the model that makes them heroes of a demanding system, and it is not unusual for them to fail the whole class. If a more modern 34  evaluation system has already been implemented in the university, these professors make efforts and carry out reforms that return the evaluations to their previous format. This is a natural reaction, which happens repeatedly with beginning professors, but which must be made aware of to avoid its devastating effects on entering students (DUEK et al., 2020; LIMA, 2020). Previous training Within this line of factors is also the unrealistic expectation about the education of entering students In the previous, mercantilist regime, entering students were solidly prepared in basic skills such as logical reasoning, mathematics, languages, physics, chemistry, and computers. However, in the current practice, newcomers are further and further away from this level. Neither logical reasoning, nor text interpretation, nor basic mathematics, including multiplication tables, nor the ability to listen, to have patience until they understand, are part of the average skills of the entrants. This lack of ability of the students, blaming it on the high school, is the preferred element in the imagination of the teachers and also of the students as the cause of academic failures. It is a psychological projection, which projects the energy of failure, it is an external and unattainable factor, which exempts teachers from blame, and takes the pressure off students, who can do nothing about the past (SOURCES, 2016). However, this is an immobilizing factor, which contributes to discourage effective actions that will change the situation, which is constantly acting over time, while the indicators show the worsening of dropouts. Within this variable are also the cases of students who resume their studies after a long time without studying. They feel the psychological pressure of having to live with younger classmates who may have greater abilities than them, which weakens them to continue the course. 35  Insufficient time available Some students are very busy at the beginning of the course, or sometimes later, with work and family activities. Although they would be able to advance in the course, they end up giving up due to lack of time to fulfill the activities. Procrastination and low energy Most students who arrive at university in Brazil have not yet developed a study routine and the ability to persist in the face of the difficulty of the academic subjects presented in class. They simply watch the classes, with almost zero participation, are unable to answer the professor's questions, even the most elementary ones, get home and dedicate their time to other things, such as social networks, movies, games. They do not necessarily fall into the previous category, but it is possible that they are also drawn to parties and social gatherings (NOTO; ANDRADE; BEDENDO, 2018). Too much seriousness in class As an inheritance from the previous mercantilist system, the contents are passed on with military seriousness, which ends up creating a permanent tense atmosphere for the students and also for the teachers. Many are not prepared to maintain this tense atmosphere for very long, because they are immersed in a system where fun and leisure are stimulated to the maximum, and there are rarely highly demanding situations. The result is student dropout and teacher frustration. Nobody likes not understanding, not being 36  (2) Plan and develop the specifications for raising the factual incidents related to the activity. The author draws attention to the need for the instructions to the people who are to report their observations to be as specific as possible in terms of the standards that will be used in assessing and classifying the behavior to be observed. (3) Collecting the data. This phase, whose purpose is the identification of the critical incidents themselves, Flanagan (1954) states that it becomes easy when the collection planning is well done. In this case, there are four different ways of obtaining the information to be treated: individual interviews, group interviews, application of questionnaires or recordings. Regarding the pre-testing of the questionnaire, the seminal articles by Flanagan (1954), Gremler (2004), and Bitner, Booms, and Tetreault (1990) bring recommendations aimed at the effectiveness of its result. In addition, Star and Star (1978) indicate that the instruments for recording critical incidents can be used both for indirect and occasional observation and as a basis for the development of instruments for direct and systematic observation. Whether through interviews or observation, recording the events and behaviors collected will lead to understanding about the success or failure of a specific task (Ronan; Latham, 1974). (4) Analyze the evidence. Here the purpose is to summarize and describe the findings efficiently enough for them to be used for various practical purposes. (5) Interpreting and reporting the results. In this final phase of the work, the possible biases and implications of the decisions of the procedures recorded in each of the four previous phases must be reported in a clear manner, with the researcher must point out not only the limitations but also the degree of credibility and value of the final results obtained. It is worth noting an issue that makes a difference in the quality of the 43  evidence obtained in the survey: the respondent's level of certainty and or recollection regarding the facts narrated. The model demonstrated by Flanagan (1954) suggests, if the application is not remote, that: 1) the respondent be invited to think about, or remember the last time he participated in a certain situation with the interviewer, indicating the phenomenon to be analyzed; and 2) wait until the interviewee demonstrates that he remembers some related fact. The challenge is to successfully retrieve the incident in the interviewee's memory and, from there, to reliably record their answers. The author also reports that the accuracy of the answers is fundamental for the validity of the collection, translated into the respondents offering complete and accurate details about the reported event - vague descriptions would indicate that the incident is not well remembered and that some of the information may be incorrect. As for the number of incidents, Flanagan (1954) states that if the activity to be surveyed is relatively simple, it may be satisfactory to collect between 50 and 100 incidents. It is worth noting that Gremler (2004) identified a wide spectrum in sample sizes: according to his research, they ranged from nine to 3,852 incidents collected. Once the incidents have been collected, a classification system must be applied to categorize them in order to make the data useful for answering the research questions and objectives. This is a process of analytical induction, consisting of repeated and careful readings and the separation of incidents into groups and categories, according to the similarities reported in the experiences. According to Bitner, Booms and Tetreault (1990), after the researcher has read several incidents, the similarities begin to become apparent. After this phase, the process of articulating or identifying the exact 44  nature of the similarities that form the basis of the labeling of each incident category begins. Incidents should be separated and combined until all incidents in one category are showing the greatest possible similarity to those in another category. Finally, other levels of classification should be identified that consider general behaviors perceived in the reports. Flanagan (1954) recommends defining a frame of reference that is directly related to the research objective. Bardin (1977) teaches, based on the content analysis technique, that this coding is the beginning of the categorization process, in which a thematic analysis is made to discover "sense nuclei" in the communication, whose presence or frequency have meaning for what is being analyzed. From there, the categorization and judgment of the categories that emerged from these "nuclei of meaning" identified in the reports is performed. Bardin (1977) explains that categorization can be done by semantic, syntactic, lexical or expressive criteria. An important example of the usefulness of ICT in Services Marketing was that presented by Bitner, Booms and Tetreault (1990) in cataloging 700 critical service encounters in distinct service segments, providing the identification of employee behavior types, which were classified into three groups: recoverability (employee attitude in a service failure situation), adaptability (meeting customer needs and requests), and spontaneity (proactive employee attitudes). Gremler (2004), referring to other authors, points out that there are five benefits to using ICT in service delivery research: (1) The evidence comes from the respondent's perspective and is collected in their own words (Edvardsson; Ross, 2001). This allows the respondent to determine which incidents are the most relevant to them with regard to the research topic, considering that, in this type of research, there is 45  no bias or determination about what is important to the respondent (Ruyter; Perkins; Wetzels, 1995). From this possibility, the method reflects, for Stauss (1993), the client's line of thought. This is because, during an interview using ICT, the respondent is asked to remember moments, and may use their own terms and language; (2) This type of research is inductive in nature (Edvardsson; Ross, 2001) and is especially useful for improving knowledge about some little known phenomenon. This technique does not require hypotheses, and the patterns formed emerge from the responses (Olsen; Bertil, 1992); (3) This method provides an empirical starting point for generating new research evidence about phenomena of interest from patterns of responses (Kolbe; Burnett, 1991); (4) The answers provide rich details coming directly from the respondent's experience, as the narratives can revive or provoke insights into the phenomenon, and are able to define a strong, relevant, unambiguous, and concrete testimonial for market intelligence systems; (5) Finally, ICT seems well suited to be applied to ascertain the perceptions of customers from different cultures. Thus, this technique was qualified by Ruyter, Perkins, and Wetzels (1995) as a culturally neutral method, to the extent that it invites respondents to present their perceptions based on an open-ended question. In other words, in this type of research there is no predefinition of what is important or a priority. The epistemology of ICT ICT fits as a resource to the qualitative approach, grounded in methods of interpretive and naturalistic origins, and utilizing varied empirical materials that aim to seek significance in the lives of individuals. 46  Indeed, Flanagan's (1954) description of the essence of CIT indicates that it lends itself to exploring social or human problems by helping the researcher build a complex and holistic picture through word analysis, detailed reporting of informants' views, and conducting studies in natural settings, as taught by Creswell (1998). In specific terms, when it comes to using ICT the researcher is the key instrument in gathering evidence (obtained via interviews or via participant observation or via responses to open-ended questions), analysis of the evidence occurs intuitively, and the focus falls on participants' perspectives. Although ICT was developed at a time when the positivist paradigm dominated scientific research in all fields of science - including the social sciences - according to Murray (2003) its qualitative characteristic came to be consolidated as the world has moved into the post-modern or post-structural era. Chell (1998), in turn, is of the opinion that ICT can be used in both positivist and postmodern research paradigms, in the latter case, it becomes - more than a scientific tool - a research tool. For this very reason, "It is critically important that the researcher examine his or her own principles (and predilections), carefully consider the nature of the research problem to be investigated, and think about how the technique might be most appropriately applied to the case being studied" (Chell, 1998, p. 51). ICT Credibility A legitimate question that emerges from the study of ICT, as with any qualitative method, concerns its reliability and validity. A brief look at the foreign literature in the early days of the technique shows a very diverse picture when it comes to the elaboration of these 47  checks. The seminal research by Andersson and Nilsson (1964), for example, used saturation and categorization checks. Ronan and Latham (1974), in turn, applied three measures of reliability (inter-judge, intra-observer, and inter-observer) and four measures of validity (content, construct, relevance, and simultaneity). These two studies, it is worth remembering, have come to be frequently cited as evidence of the reliability of ICT, as have Proulx (1991) and Young (1991). On the other hand, about three decades ago Stano(1983) pointed out that the credibility of the results brought by ICT had often been studied through positivist lenses, such as standard deviation testing - procedures that, in his opinion, purify the categories and make them more homogeneous, but do not guarantee their validity or completeness. The evolution of research in the following decades-for example, McCormick's (1994), Alfonso (1997), Butterfield (2001), and Eisner (2003)-indicates that there would be no standard line for this type of assessment. It is possible that this is because CIT, originally a procedure relying on observations or self-reports of observable behaviors, has expanded in scope as it has been used to explore personal experiences, psychological constructs, and emotions. Methodology Used The records linked to the authors contained in surveys, forms, emails, interviews, comments, testimonials, evaluations, activities accumulated in virtual remote teaching environments, reports from the computerized system of registration of academic activities, grade records, and transcripts of conversations with students by any means (personal, messages, telephone, social media) were analyzed and organized systematically aiming to apply 48  the precepts of the critical incident theory, that is, trying to find, in the testimonials, the links with variables related to the problem of dropout and retention. Some examples of frequent manifestations of critical incidents, their description, their period and their intensity (high, medium and low) are found in the Table, derived from the spreadsheet Table Critical Incident Manifestations - Evasion and Retention Incident Epoch Pol ari t y Int ens ida de Related Variable Psychological disturbance or intense mental fatigue from not being able to pass the tests 1979 - 1990 Ne g High Assessment Requirement, Block Subjects Low number of approved 1986 - 1990 Ne g High Inadequate assessments, inadequate methodology Lack of time due to involvement with family and work 1986 - 2020 Ne g Half day  Finding it too difficult Ne g   Finding it easy but not being able to move forward due to the previous weak base Ne g   49  To be thinking about another course. I actually want to pass in (a more prestigious course than the current one), or in (another course that is also in high demand). Ne g Focus Not feeling comfortable with the class Ne g   Having created friction with teachers  Ne g   Get involved in parties and meetings Ne    evening social g  Not being able to do the jobs Ne g   Not finding time to study Ne g   Facing scarcity of economic resources Ne g   Facing illness Ne g   Expectations not met by the course or university Ne g   Deep stress from anxiety or mental agitation Ne g   I don't like to do assignments, nor remote teaching, I like to listen to the class and then study close to the exam Ne g   Everything is fine, everything is smooth, but I can't actively participate in class or do the assignments. Ne g   50  I don't understand anything, I don't think the teacher can explain; he is very good, very prepared, but I don't understand. I even feel a little bit of anger. Ne g   The teacher doesn't do the exercises, and then we don't know how to do them. Ne g   Nobody understands anything, the class is outraged, and I have decided to talk to the teacher on behalf of everyone. Ne g   I'm here helping with the family work and family care activities, and I haven't been able to face the university work yet. Ne g    I have met, here at the university, with an ex-boyfriend, and I am enjoying an affinity with him again; I dedicate myself enough to continue in the course, but I don't care much. Ne g   There is a married colleague who is getting involved with the teachers, and also with some students. She says she is enjoying it. And she can also do the assignments. She is very beautiful and seductive. Ne g   There's another colleague who leans on the teacher, and the teacher is very attracted, you can see it. They are scheduling meetings outside o f class time, or they stay until the end, when everyone has left. Ne g   51  I was very excited but a little scared at first, I kept talking to my classmates in class, but avoided actively participating. I did very poorly in the exams and saw that it's not for me. Ne g   I really enjoyed it at the beginning, being at the university, having new classmates, everyone excited about going to the university. But when We zeroed in the first few races, the atmosphere got bad, and I quit. Ne g   The teacher is very demanding, so I didn't even have enough time to do the test. Almost the whole class got a zero, but there were two classmates who did well. The problem is me. It was not difficult, really. Ne g   The test was very fast, I didn't even have time to think straight, I couldn't do anything, but it wasn't difficult, I just got in the way and I have a very weak base from high school.  Ne g    The whole family is depending on me, I have to cook, do laundry, take care of everyone, even the grandchildren. I decided to leave for a while and went to university. People are complaining, but I like it. But I might have to quit. I'm not doing well in some subjects because I had a very weak foundation. Ne g   52  Many adolescents do not are more interested in graduation, including my son, probably out of immediacy to earn money. money and by access to remote media that puts others stronger interests in them.     There is a lot of distance learning courses on offer, but there is no way they can be of the same quality as face-to-face courses     I went in to see these distance learning courses, even enrolled in some and found that the content that      promise is in there, yes. It is not with any simple face-to-face class that you are going to rebut this possibility. The teacher has to update his or her proposal.     I for one would take all the students to the field and do the lesson there, to force them to associate it with practice.     My brother is an agricultural technician and took an EAD course, he is an example, he studied everything correctly, but he is the exception.     The students tell the coordinator that there are teachers who can't take it anymore after the first period, but there are others who teach all the way to the end that they can't get enough of.     There is no way to give 4 hours in a row     59  Teachers who talk to us a little at the beginning o f class seem to flow more smoothly afterwards     I will prioritize the theoretical because I see that later, in practice, they don't have the minimum preparation to relate the concepts to the application.     Those who can make a funny class, that stimulates the students' attention     The students told me that there are teachers who don't like to have students as friends on social networks, so they hadn't added me; I was surprised.     I was tougher, now I am calmer, closer, and I see good results.      It got me sleepy and I couldn't keep my attention, I had to stand up to resist.     I was 30 hours straight in the online game, so I slept in class.     Immediacy is a problem with students, they want everything fast     Students don't sleep, take energy, and then can't stay awake in class     Classes vary, but there is a trend toward increased lack of concentration and ability to understand what is being said.     60 After the return to face-to-face I am having a hard time finding the students and professors at the university. It has become emptier. Students learn more in the classroom, this varies with the profile of the teacher, I prefer face-to-face to remote. Lack of transforming knowledge into problem solving If you need alignment and affinity of the professors with the course. Interdisciplinarity can make a positive contribution to education, for example, by participating in a project on subjects such as the collection and disposal of solid residues, studying the reality o f rural settlements, or others. 61 CHAPTER 4 - EVALUATING THE VARIABLES INVOLVED IN EVASION, RETENTION AND REJECTION Nelson Mario Victoria Bariani Cassiane Jrayj de Melo In order to deepen the analysis of the problem using the scientific method, after organizing the most significant manifestations in table form, we now proceed to the process of identifying the variables involved in each situation, and, therefore, related in some way to the dropout and retention processes. Thinking about producing tools to evaluate the magnitude of the problem in a given circumstance, weights will also be proposed for each of the variables. Variable categories To facilitate the understanding of the analysis of the situation (or system) and the proposals developed from it, the variables will be considered within categories. Later, the tables may shed more light on the categories identified, and some of the sub-variables contained within them. Physical Variables in Evasion, Retention and Rejection They are those related to all the material aspects of the individual's life, from his or her body to all the external material elements that influence, by their availability or lack, the expression of the maximum academic and 62  human potential. General subcategories: external and internal External are categories that refer to the outside of the individual, such as factors that refer to the organization of the outside environment (social, university, home), often arranged without the scholar's participation, or with partial participation by the scholar. Internal are categories related to physical well-being: food, health, physical activity. Grade of the categories We can complement, for a better understanding of this effort, that many variables represent extremes of a degree, and could unify if we consider presence of or lack of. For example, let us mention two large categories that are superior to all the previous ones and that can be considered in all human problems: lovingness and unlovingness, the former being associated with a positive, pleasant situation, and the latter with a negative situation, of imperfection and suffering. External categories: Economic, family, physical environment, food, physical health, relationships, available time, occupations, initial impact of starting a degree; exposure to alcohol, drugs, medication use, study method. 63  Internal categories: Emotional control, mental control, sensitivity to the opinions of others, prior knowledge, values, habits, degree of willingness and willpower, expectations, view of university reality, knowledge of self, ability to maintain focus and persist, degree of mastery of personal pride, ability to step outside one's comfort zone, humility to recognize lack of knowledge and skills without giving up, permeability to others' opinions, degree of faith in every human being's capacity for development, ability to forgive peers, professors, and oneself for failures, mistakes, ignorance, offenses, relationship problems, lack of patience, anxiety, aggressive or offensive speech or behavior. Physical Variable Definition Weight Palliatives Bounding Housing Lack of minimally appropriate home environments for study Bass University Environments Family work with dependents and environments Daily commitment to directly attend to other family members and keep the house running Medium Hybrid education Productive family work Commitment to serve productive family, commercial, agricultural, and business activities, but with a certain flexibility. Medium Hybrid education External work Academics hired in companies, with little schedule flexibility Medium Hybrid education One-time health problem Illness that takes the scholar or family member away intensely for a period of time Strong Hybrid education 64  Chronic health problem Permanent condition that affects the scholar and forces him to take medication Medium Strategy to minimize side effects Locker room, school supplies, cell phone, computer The scholar may be less able than the majority of the class, and be affected by shame High Psychological and physical support  Feed Nutritional deficiencies due to lack of resources or bad habits Medium Restaurant. Nutrition education Addictions Frequent exposure to alcohol and drugs that stimulate states of low consciousness and physical and psychological deterioration Medium Awareness of the problem. Support strategies. Sedentary lifestyle Absence of the benefit of physical activity that purifies and balances the body, favoring anxiety and physical imbalance and purification. High Awareness. Sports or dynamic activities. Emotional and mental variables  Variable Problem Emotional or Mental Definition / Manifestation Weight Palliatives Shame Lack of communication and initiative to do the work required High Psychological guidance Hybrid education Low self-esteem Tendency to view the normal difficulties of the e-a process as personal defects Medium Psychological guidance Hybrid education 65  Pride/anger Having high expectations on one's own academic performance and being disappointed/angry with failures Download a Psychological guidance Hybrid education Immediatism, Lack o f patience You are looking for quick results, especially economical ones, that do not require much effortMedium Psychological guidance Hybrid education  Procrastination You have everything at home, room with computer, cell phone, good food, internet, clothes and supplies taken care of High Motivational orientation Hybrid Teaching Study methodology Dispersion Lack of concentration. Lack of training on how to stay too long thinking about the same subject High Exact Education Hybrid Education Unconscious use of energies Intense dedication to games, movies, videos, social networks, entertainment. High Motivational orientation Hybrid Teaching Study methodology Lack of stimulus and life goals No desire to work hard on the academic path or in the job market High Awareness Motivational orientation Hybrid Teaching Study Methodology Intense dissipation You are attracted to parties, seduction, sexual dissipation. Med io Awareness Motivational guidance 66  Poor Mental Preparation Difficulty in initiating deeper mental thinking High Awareness Motivational orientation Hybrid Teaching Study Methodology Anxious mind Changes thoughts too fast and can't go deeper, can't stay focused Méd io Motivational orientation Hybrid Teaching Study methodology No identification He likes the idea of studying but doesn't feel in tune with the university environment. Sometimes no one in the family has studied. Medium Motivational orientation Hybrid Teaching Study methodology  Lack of organization Cannot organize orderly participation in subjects: absences, tardiness, and ignorance of assignments.  Motivational orientation Hybrid Teaching Study methodology  Education System Variables Emotional or Mental Problem Variable Definition / Manifestation Weight Palliatives Excessive difficulty The teacher goes straight into more advanced subjects High Use of ICT (videos, research) 67  Inadequate Rhythm The rhythm of the classes does not take into account the problems of accompaniment High Use of ICT (videos, research, projects) Division and postponement of subjects Inadequate valuations Few assessments, using a minimum threshold for passing each one High Include continuous assessment using ICT and EaD pedagogy Lack of sensitivity The teacher does not know about the students' situation until the results of the first exam, near the middle of the semester High Include continuous assessment using ICT and EaD pedagogy Few teaching resources Use of passive method, with preferential expositive classes (slides and board) Med io Include use of ICT and EaD pedagogy (videos, research, projects, outreach) Knowledge Blocks Mainly in the basic areas, the subjects are taught in blocks, at the beginning of the course, not allowing time for the student to mature High Splitting and postponing courses  General Discussion of Variables Currently there is a very large mismatch between the proposed teaching system and the students' learning ability. Teachers set out to cover the subjects in the syllabuses, which is correct, but without taking into consideration the students' initial situation. This happens because the 68  belonging to the Federal Education System. In its Art. 2 it establishes: The HEIs may introduce the offer of course load in the EaD modality in the pedagogical and curricular organization of their face-to-face undergraduate courses, up to the limit of 40% of the total course load. § 1 The Course Pedagogical Project - PPC must clearly present, in the curricular matrix, the percentage of distance workload and indicate the methodologies to be used, at the time of the protocol of requests for authorization, recognition, and renewal of course recognition. § Extracurricular activities that use EaD methodologies will be considered for the purposes of calculating the 40% limit mentioned in the caput. Art. 4 The offer of distance workloads in classroom courses must include teaching-learning methods and practices that incorporate the integrated use of Information and Communication Technology - ICT to achieve the pedagogical objectives, specific teaching material as well as the mediation of teachers, tutors and education professionals with training and qualifications at a level compatible with the provisions of the PPC and the teaching plan of the subject. Sole Paragraph. The PPC must detail the way in which the course load of the disciplines offered partially or entirely at a distance will be made up, and the discipline teaching plan must describe the activities carried out. Art. 7th In the Final Opinion phase of the authorization processes for classroom courses, the possibility of offering distance learning course load, up to the limit of 40% of the total course load, in addition to the criteria established by MEC Normative Ordinance No. 20 of December 21, 2017, is subject to the course obtaining a concept equal to or higher than three in all the following indicators: 75  I - Methodology; II - Tutorial activities; III - Virtual Learning Environment - VA; and IV - Information and Communication Technologies - ICT. Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) Information and communication technologies, ICT, are the body of DE. Recent changes in the status of ICT, both in terms of the quality of the technology, and in terms of the experience of intensive use with worldwide reach, make it possible today to apply them effectively on a large scale, thus reaching face-to-face courses. Videoconference Room and EaD Hubs: situation overcome Until 2020, the implementation of DE was conditioned to the existence of an infrastructure beyond that normally found in the university environment. Besides classrooms, auditorium, space for study, computer lab, tutoring or monitoring room, environment for technical-administrative support, all of which exist on a federal university campus, the infrastructure for videoconferencing was necessary, involving camera, microphones and special high-cost computer equipment, in addition to requiring a high quality and speed internet connection that was not yet commercially available in the region covered by Unipampa. In the infrastructure of the classroom courses there was no place with adequate conditions for videoconferencing, hence the need for a university campus to be transformed into an EaD pole, basically by installing technological resources for videoconferencing, along with internet of the best possible quality. The normal federal university 76  campuses already had, in their basic facilities, the conditions to fulfill all the other requirements. With the installation of a videoconference room, any federal campus could easily become an EaD center. Even so, this equipment never worked efficiently because of slow connections, and the insufficiency of having only one space available for this purpose, due to the high cost of the equipment, and the complexity of the connection, which requires the support of local technicians to be implemented, and also due to the need of remote institutional technical support, because of the use of large computers (servers), belonging to the university or university network. Most videoconferences were disappointing in terms of technical quality, with long and frequent interruptions, and difficulty of understanding among participants. The daring few among the teaching staff who experimented with these technologies quickly realized that widespread use of these means by a large number of teachers would not be convenient. It also established a negative concept that the methodology, as a whole, did not work, a concept that would only be able to change significantly after 2020. The situation in the early years of EaD improved with the implementation of web conferences, starting in 2012, which were implemented in their entirety over the internet, using computers from the university's server network as a base, and then reached directly to the personal computers of all participants, thus enabling the use of common computer equipment for their realization. But even then, the quality of the videoconferences was very oscillating, unpredictable, ranging from total failure to acceptable, but far below the communication achieved in face-to-face teaching. But the situation for DE made an evolutionary leap from 2020, when the pandemic put the focus on remote learning worldwide and accelerated the convergence of various situations: 77  I - Internet supply services have reached a satisfactory level of quality and pricing suitable for the general public applying for EaD use, and for universities. II - The smartphone has put in the hands of virtually the entire population, an ideal device for communication, sweeping away the difficulties of using EaD equipment for videoconferencing, which have become obsolete. III - The large global computer companies, notably Google, developed the technological bases, in terms of software, online computing capacity and communication speed necessary to enable videoconferencing with "face-to-face quality", through Google Meet, which was offered free of charge to universities, including the possibility of recording the class. And also a virtual teaching environment superior to Moodle, Google Classroom, was developed, with all the file storage and sharing technologies developed by the company, with storage capacity that appears as "infinite" to the user. These technological advances were tested by thousands of users, among them professors and academics from around the world, during the period 2020-2022, showing largely satisfactory performance for most people. At the new level, videoconferencing thus reached a level of personal communication that surpassed all the problems previously mentioned, showing itself, in some aspects, superior to face-to-face meetings, and thus being able to become a tool of great value for face-to-face courses. In the current situation, any classroom equipped with datashow can be converted into a videoconference room, using the user's personal computer or computers from the University. At Unipampa, the great majority of the classrooms are equipped with projectors, and there are still manual projectors to be used, which guarantees the transformation of any classroom into a videoconference environment. The installation of speakers and the availability of microphones can further enhance the virtual experience, at 78  low cost. Another consequence of this recent process was the practical proof, by a large worldwide community of teachers, of the great didactic and pedagogical usefulness of ICT, and of its capacity to satisfactorily solve some of the bottlenecks in face-to-face teaching, which will be described in the teaching methodologies. Adaptation and generalization of federal university campuses as EaD hubs For the above reasons, all university campuses today have initial basic infrastructure to be EaD hubs, but some adjustments need to be made to better fit the new reality. Some of these adjustments will be suggested below: 1 - As many classrooms as possible should have good quality internet and electrical installations capable of meeting the connections of academics and teachers, either with computer equipment or smartphones. 2 - An increasing number of classes should be made available for the use of laptops and smartphones in distance education classes. This equipment can be owned by the students or provided by the university, both laptops and smartphones. 3 - The classrooms should have security cameras for easy viewing of the internal situation, as they are low-cost equipment that can facilitate the release of classrooms to the academics, with greater freedom, favoring the release of the necessary spaces for EaD activities. This activity of periodic visualization of the environments can be done by the EaD interface or another employee considered appropriate for this purpose. 79  EaD interaction possibilities In the case of face-to-face courses with an EaD workload, the main campus will be the campus itself. Other Unipampa campuses can also act as secondary poles, duly approved by the course committees and higher authorities, as required by law. The previous resolutions facilitate the teacher-student interaction in intra and inter-campus situations, when properly planned and approved. Several positive situations, some of them innovative, arise from this configuration: I - Teacher and scholars in face-to-face class at the main campus; II - Teacher and scholars in totally remote class; III - Teacher at the main campus and remote students; IV - Remote teacher and students in class at the main campus; V - Hybrid situation, with the teacher in class at the main campus, and the students optionally face-to-face or remote. If we also consider the possibility of having professors and students from other campuses of Unipampa, the possibilities multiply even more, among which we highlight: VI - professor from the main campus and remote students intercampi; VII - remote professor intercampi and students from the main campus. Each one of these possibilities adds up to expand the viability of carrying out the teaching-learning process in a practical, economical, sustainable, flexible, and efficient way, with a gain in quality and economy in the use of available human and material resources, and attending to a whole range of situations, some already mentioned, that, in the past, were precariously attended to or ignored. 80  Virtual Learning Environments (VLE) The support platforms, such as Moodle, which was the first to be instituted by Unipampa, being asynchronous, depended only on the existence of internet and computers, for which they have managed to do a good job since 2008. But even with the Moodle environment working properly, frequent periods of downtime were recorded, and even a serious event of loss of information contained in Moodle, which would have been very serious if not for the small number of teachers who made use of the platform. This instability repressed many initiatives of DE applications as support for classroom teaching, especially in terms of seeking a generalization of its use, which, in the technological conditions existing at the time, would be a risky adventure with chances of becoming a great failure, added to the difficulty for the adoption of these technologies by teachers who had their teaching-learning process based on strictly classroom teaching, and who were predisposed to criticize any failure in the functioning of the system, and fall into the old negative positioning in relation to DE. The decrease in the universities' budgets from 2014 onward also negatively affected this perception, since EaD would depend on large computer structures in permanent growth if it continued to be based on the university's computer network (servers), which was the only possibility made feasible in that period. In the case of Unipampa, all campuses depended on the service provided by the computers of the Alegrete and Bagé campuses. These and other factors placed limitations on the development of DE within classroom courses. As a consequence, very few courses used the possibility of delivering, in the DE format, up to the limit of 40% of the total course workload, as allowed by the legislation in force. 81  In the year 2020 this VLE situation changed radically, just as it did with the videoconferencing possibilities already analyzed. Google has made Google Classroom available and accelerated its development. The environment uses Google's servers both to store and to provide the data, and adds in a natural and intuitive way all the possibilities of participative work developed by the company. Within the virtual environment, text, presentations, spreadsheets, images, and also other types of files could be created by Google applications such as G. Docs, G. Presentations, G. Spreadsheets, G. Drawings and others. Google partnered with universities through the Google for Education initiative, providing the services for free. This was a true revolution in DE, notably expanding the teacher's ability to manage the materials developed in class and stored in Google Drive, with a capacity that appears to the user as "infinite". Classroom recording and video production A major limitation of strictly face-to-face teaching, more and more evident every year, is to face the difficulty of concentration that students have today, due to the amount and type of information and the degree of exposure to it to which they are subjected. Today's brains are less and less prepared to remain attentive to weak stimuli, such as those produced by a classroom. Academics are more accustomed to watching videos than to attending a lecture. People today live more in the virtual world than in the environmental world. Face-to-face lectures have long since lacked sufficient appeal to keep a good percentage of the audience in a state of attention. On the other hand, increased communication has also increased the degree to which people are committed to multiple tasks and activities, making the absence of academics in the face-to-face classroom more frequent, and more 82  likely. On the other hand, it doesn't even need to be pointed out that the existence of a worldwide pandemic state makes it much more frequent for students and teachers to be absent from the classroom, as the symptoms of a common cold or flu are enough to motivate the absence of people from public environments. The teacher would then be frequently involved in class recovery, repeating the same content and exercises already explained at a previous date. Aside from juggling tasks that can be rehearsed, the practical and effective solution to all these problems is the video recording of the class content. This tool was already used in DE, but demanded time and skill that exceeded the energy available by most teachers, thus constituting another reason for frustration and rejection of the use of ICT, symbolized by DE. This situation spread until 2020, when Google launched G.Meet as a videoconferencing tool, with integrated recording, and made the system available to universities at no cost. The fact that it has no storage space limitations also solved the difficult and time-consuming problem of video editing, saving the teacher, since all the students would have to do is skip the uninteresting parts of the video, also having the possibility, in the configuration, to control the speed up or down, depending on the need. From that moment on, EaD had a decisive point to contribute to face-to-face teaching, avoiding the exhausting and inefficient repetition, by the teacher himself, of the same explanations countless times, required when each scholar "wakes up" for attention or recovers lost content. Videos also avoid the teacher's traumatizing tendency to take a harsh and confrontational stance in the face of students' attention spans and seeing his or her energies wasted in repetition, with little result. 83  Methodology The methodology applied in the DE teaching-learning process is closely linked to the actors in the process, to the availability of technologies and the environments where they can be used, and to pedagogical aspects that involve the use of techniques best suited to the academic groups and the current situation. Besides the teacher and the students, other collaborators in the process can be considered to optimize the use of face-to-face learning (PE) interaction, also called Hybrid Learning, which constitutes a synthesis with a high probability of creating a new standard, much more advanced and adequate, for the teaching-learning process of our times. Mediators of the DE Process: DE Interface, tutors and monitors. Among the duties of the EaD interface, in the new scenario, are the following: I - Take care of the evolution of the physical structure of the classrooms and computer rooms, for their effective use in DE situations, including the provision of good quality internet, classes, computer equipment (cell phones or notebooks), electrical installations, installation of security cameras, for which the interface will act as a mediator, pointing out the needs and following up on the processes II - Mediation between students, teachers, coordinations and academic secretariat to contribute to the good flow of DE activities and a good connection, compatibility and harmony with classroom activities. III - Mediate the organization of the logistical aspects of the work of tutors and monitors who work as support for EaD, together with the teachers. 84  discussion in the elaboration of modifications to the PPC of classroom courses. 91  BIBLIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES AMORIM, M. C. M. DOS S. et al. 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Physical punishment at home and school failure related to bullying. Brazilian journal of human growth and development, v. 30, n. 3, p. 434-442, 2020. 95 KS OmniScriptum Publishing Brivibas gatve 197 LV-1039 Riga, Latvia Telefax: +371 686 204 55 [email protected] www.omniscriptum.com Buy your books fast and straightforward online - at one of world’s fastest growing online book stores! Environmentally sound due to Print-on-Demand technologies. Buy your books online at www.morebooks.shop Kaufen Sie Ihre Bücher schnell und unkompliziert online – auf einer der am schnellsten wachsenden Buchhandelsplattformen weltweit! Dank Print-On-Demand umweltund ressourcenschonend produzi ert. Bücher schneller online kaufen www.morebooks.shop