Desempeño académico y curso de iniciación universitaria: Un análisis de regresiones discontinuas

This study evaluated the impact of the University Initiation Course (UIC) of the Andres Bello Catholic University, Montalban, Caracas, Venezuela, from 2008 to 2011, under the hypothesis of a better academic result for the students that participated in this program. The research was based on a quasi-experimental design in which it was possible to define from an allocation index who benefits or not from the treatment, and this criterion is a unique value depending on the career and is not affected by other criteria of the institution or the applicant. In this type of design, an index is used to order the units of analysis and a certain value of that index as a criterion of selection of the groups, so that the individuals chosen for the treatment cannot be chosen not to be treated. The estimation of the magnitude of the impact for each parametric and non-parametric methodology at least locally indicates that the UIC reduces school and institutional dropout at a minimum 9% and 11% respectively, although it does not reduce the prosecution, on which there is no empirical evidence indicating a better performance for the treated students.