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Despite the continuous efforts of governments and universities to avoid the underrepresentation of women entering engineering degrees, the trend has not reverted, and this is a general fact all over the world. This fact goes against the tendency of a growing ratio of women in tertiary education, so causes must be investigated. This research examines two main questions: Is it possible to break the invisible barriers that prevent girls from entering in engineering degrees by means of an engineering project or activity? And are there important misconceptions about the role of women in engineering professions and about engineering itself among high school girls? An extensive survey has been carried out between three groups of students: students of the last years of high school (834), students of the first year of engineering degrees (319), and students of the first year of sciences degrees (209). A set of visits to the high schools was developed and a contest of engineering projects was carried out too. The results show that there are important misconceptions in the knowledge that high school students have about engineering degrees and engineering. The visits and the project contest had a good impact that encouraged girls to take engineering activities in their curricula. The main finding is that even though girls see engineering professions as very well valued, they are convinced that engineering is not a profession for women, which suggests that there are educational barriers acquired during earlier stages of their lives.

Research Finding: The present study estimates the long-term effects of Chile's national public Early Childhood Care and Education program (ECCE) on children academic achievement, grade retention and school dropouts, to better understand if ECCE is helping reduce the socioeconomic achievement gap. The present study uses a quasi-experimental design and propensity score matching (PSM) to estimate the ECCE effect by comparing ECCE participants with those who did not attend but share similar family and contextual characteristics. We follow a cohort of 80,000 children from preschool to the end of schooling. Results show that ECCE participants had better academic outcomes than their peers who did not participated in ECCE in national tests in 4th, 10th, and 12th grade. ECCE participants also were less likely to repeat a grade or to dropout of school. Practice or Policy: These findings suggest that public ECCE might play a key role in both reducing the socioeconomic achievement gap and supporting futures opportunities for children.

The aim of this study is to compare the results of successful mergers in terms of ranking performance of the so called 'world-class' universities in a European Union context, with a view to identifying the challenges these universities face in their post-merger situation and strategies. After a content analysis, four themes emerged: crucial factors at the pre-merger phase to ensure a successful merger, the best actions to be performed at the merger phase to ensure a successful merger, the main challenges faced at the post-merger phase, and post-merger strategies in the last phase. Then, we analysed the institutional post-merger strategies to find differences between different mergers. Our research shows that in all cases there is a mix of various local and national/international factors that need to be analysed in the post-merger phase before a merger can be deemed to be 'successful' overall, and before the various dimensions of the global impact of the merger can be assessed.

Informational literacy and the use of technologies by Secondary Education students in Spain: A descriptive study. The development of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), together with their application to research carried out on educational areas, are factors which contribute to the promotion of a new educative model constructed on literacy-based competences and skills, and which sets technologies as essential tools for a life-long learning process (UNESCO, 2005). This is the framework where we can insert the research that we are currently carrying out, funded by the research Program I+D+I of the Spanish Ministry of Education, and in the frame of which we are developing a diagnostic assessment of informational literacy competence in students between 14 and 16 years (Secondary Education), based on the fact that one of the main aspects in knowledge generation and acquisition is the capacity to use information extracted from documents and electronic resources, available in informational networks in a correct way. In this paper we present the results obtained from evidences on the contrast existing between the level of use of technologies (videogames, social networks...) and the level of informational literacy shown by students. The data were gathered from a sample of more than 1000 Secondary Education students who are around 15 years old. The article also contains bibliographical notes.

The main goal of this paper, based on a content analysis of the literature about models of inter-institutional collaboration between higher education institutions, is to establish the characteristics that set them apart, contextualize each of these models in terms of the features of the setting in which they are implemented, and ascertain their advantages, drawbacks and potential benefits for the institutions that use them. This has involved employing appropriate keywords to identify the most relevant studies that have examined models of inter-institutional collaboration. The paper concludes that detailed study is required when choosing a particular model of inter-institutional collaboration, especially mergers, as the desired economies of scale do not always materialize, research and teaching results may not improve and it is unclear what the optimal size for achieving efficiency is.

The level of science skills in Spanish students are significantly below the average of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, and university teachers agree that the level of freshmen students' skills is too low. Moreover, the number of engineering enrollments has been declining in recent years. The purpose of this study is to improve both the level of knowledge and skills of students upon entrance into engineering programs and their general opinion about engineering studies. The aim is to establish the importance of proper coordination between groups involved in the overall educational process and to avoid, at least in part, the decline in recent engineering enrollments. The project had the following four phases: (1) determination of the freshmen's weakest concepts; (2) assessment of high schools students' knowledge; (3) development of educational activities; and (4) re-assessment of high school students. These measures were complemented with the high school teachers' opinions about the students improvements and analyses of the evolution of engineering enrollments. Most of the participants significantly improved their knowledge and skills. Similarly, high school teachers believed that the attitude of the students toward engineering improved significantly.