Profile of the student entering the Faculty of Agricultural Sciences of the National University of Córdoba (Argentina).

Abstract

The purpose of this work is to characterize students entering the School of Agronomy at the National University of Córdoba, Argentine. The description includes the analysis of education, personal and family background. Information was obtained from closed structured survey and personal interviews carried out during 1992, 1993 and 1994 to students entering that school (259, 351 and 311 respectively). Twenty one socio-demographic and educational variables were processed by a factorial analysis of multiple correspondence. The analysis indicated that educational characteristics were strongly linked to the provenance of students. The profile shows two types of students: 1) those of rural origin (8 %), who attended agrotechnical high schools, which express the strongest interest for studies linked to agriculture during high school (80 %). Sixty four percent of these students choose Agronomy with an aim to contribute to the development of agriculture; 2) students of urban origin (92 %), derived from commercial or common humanistic high schools, showed interest for biology and expressed difficulties for Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry in high school, and have a more ample scope of professional interests. For these students, the biological component of the career dims the importance of other areas such as social sciences