How to prevent dropouts in introductory programming classes: a study involving factors from student perspectives

In Brazil, more and more students come to college with deficiencies related to writing and comprehension skills regarding the Portuguese language, logical and mathematical reasoning as well as a lack of researching habits. These deficiencies have been identified as impacting and relating to dropout rates in Algorithms and Programming courses. Brazilian and international studies point out the need to create methodological strategies and extracurricular activities in order to help students overcome their lack of background. However, most studies present the issue from the teacher’s point of view regarding the factors he/she judges to be involved in the dropout process. Usually, these factors are derived from elements related to formal assessment (tests, tasks and exercises). The differential of this study is to analyze student perspectives and see how much this truly connects with reality, considering today’s incoming digital generation of university students. We sought to identify which other motivational and structural factors lead these students to drop out from the courses considered. This study was carried out in two parts. Part one was published in [14] when we presented a case-based qualitative, descriptive analysis using testimonies from undergraduate Computer Science students who dropped out or canceled the course before the end of term during three semesters (2012-2013). We sent the same online questionnaires to another group in 2013, during the second semester, and the results did not change. This research enabled us to reorganize the way we teach these students in a methodological approach. Though these results are related to the Brazilian reality, we believe these result