Student Motivation and ‘Dropout’ Rates in Brazil

This study analyses the complex relationships between labour markets, academic performance, student satisfaction, and student disengagement. It argues that in order to reduce drop-out rates in Brazil’s Higher Education system, students should perhaps be encouraged to postpone their specialization choices, and to instead experience a variety of different disciplines and potential job environments. It suggests also that some of the entrance exams for public universities could be modified, to include high levels of socio-emotional skills as a further parameter for eligibility. Expectations of upward social mobility (defined here as the gaining of better living conditions, and the accumulation of professional achievements) are held by most, if not all, students entering university: acceptance to any given college does not however guarantee that such initially high levels of motivation will be sustained or indeed that students will perhaps ever complete their chosen course of undergraduate study. In sum, there is a need for deeper discussions both within and about Universities, about the nuanced relationships between academic and subsequent professional performance, to take into account conditions within the labour markets at any given time.