Erasmus Experiences in Thermal Engineering: Impact of Continuity between Recipient Department and Center of Origin of Students. the Keys for a Mutual Enrichment

Abstract

Under the European Higher Education Area and within the Erasmus program, the Section of the Department of Thermal Engineering in the Engineering College of Gipuzkoa of the University of the Basque Country, has been hosting annually students from other European universities. The objective is the students to make their Bachelor's Thesis at the university that welcomes them. Over these years, there were different types of obstacles to achieve the defined objective. These obstacles were identified and quantified to sort them from most to least important, and try to provide tools for the students to overcome them. This has been possible due to the methodology of evaluation of the process for realization of the Bachelor's Thesis. This evaluation methodology consists of interviews with students performed during different periods of their stay, as they progress in their Bachelor's Thesis. Some of the most important obstacles detected did not refer to academics but to management and establishment subjects within the hosting university. Regarding the academic aspects, one of the main difficulties presented was the lack of time (or excessive workload) and lack of definition of the work to be done. Having evaluated the development process of the Bachelor's Thesis and, therefore, once determined the strengths and weaknesses of it, a new process of development for the Bachelor's Thesis, and new procedure for work mentoring and monitoring was defined. This process was defined based on the skills that students must achieve during their stay. To do this, the format of the work to be delivered was defined according to an article type format, defining extension and sections, in addition to a public defense of the work performed. One of the aspects that was proved to be most relevant to achieving the goal was the implementation of tasks based on collaborative work between the visiting students and the students from the University of destination, so that results in an educational, cultural and linguistic enrichment of all participant students. Through the applied strategy, an improvement on the results, the quality of the papers presented by students and the integration of students in the work environment of the Section and the University was reached.