The curious method applied by a teacher to get 128 students to join UNI

With this methodology, she managed to get her students a vacancy at the National Engineering University (UNI). One of her students is from Ayacucho and at the age of 19 she managed to take the first place in the entrance exam.

Memorial stories that allow students to know how to move forward in the face of adversity, especially at the stage where they are preparing to enter university of his dreams. And for this, there are teachers who apply methods to help them with their learning, such as Professor Aníbal Melgar, who together with his team at the Eureka Academy, managed to get 128 students to the National University of Engineering (UNI), which is one of the most prestigious in the country.

The also researcher of Methodology in Sciences and Mathematics, told the newspaper La República that one of the achievements mentioned that that of Asucena Sihuay, a 19-year-old Ayacuchana who took first place in the face-to-face admission exam. In addition, she managed to be the second woman to have won the first place in general computing to enter the UNI. “Asucena's income is an example for many women. It is not an accidental job, it is continuous, since we have been training students for UNI for about 25 years,” Melgar told LR.

THE SECRET

In this regard, he commented on the secret he applied to his students to successfully take the entrance exam: he applied the scaffolding method, inspired by the Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky. “It is a technique that is in educational theory but that has not been widely disseminated. There are many ways, but not of application, so it works more in pre-university than in school. Sometimes, there is not much need in school because they focus more on training, but in pre-university if it is more competitive, he explained.

The secret is to go step by step, a student must lean on his partner to practice on the basis of which he already worked. Vygotsky said that in order to get from a real area to a nearby development zone, I need help and create a scaffolding. And that is what we have noticed, we are going from less to more, explaining and solving. The student is getting more confident, he already knows how to do such an exercise, he has more variants,” he told La República.

Aníbal Melgar and the method for 128 students to enter UNI. Photo: Eureka.

In the sense, he mentioned that this technique is very little used by teachers due to patience and external work. “Very few teachers have the patience to do it. Our work is external, we have to build. We see that it could come to them in the exams and we are creating the exercises from point A to B, he added.

He did the latter in reference to the Engineering degree, since he considers that many students see a path full of difficulties both in the preparation and the type of exam they take in universities. Therefore, he pointed out that with a year and a half of preparation, you would be ready to enter the National University of Engineering, without neglecting human talent. Learning in humans is a slow process and the student, during that process, feels desperation. Everything can be achieved if you have the qualities and the technique, the place gives you the mechanisms and the tools”, he concluded.

ABOUT UNI

The National Engineering University is an educational institution which was founded in 1876 by the Polish engineer Eduardo de Habich. For the first time, the institution was registered as a Special School of Civil Construction and Mines of Peru, traditionally known as the School of Engineering. By 1955, it was converted to what we now know as UNI, becoming the first and main training center for engineers, architects and scientists in our country.

KEEP READING