El SENA - Servicio nacional de aprendizaje es una de las instituciones más reconocidas y con mayor cobertura a nivel nacional, actualmente ofrece 465 programas (260 técnicos, 146 tecnológicos, 34 de especialización tecnológica y 25 de profundización técnica), lo que la convierte en el principal eje articulador entre la educación media articulada, la educación terciara y la educación superior. El presente ejercicio investigativo se enfocó específicamente en el programa "Análisis y desarrollo de sistemas de información (ADSI)" del Centro de Servicios Financieros, de la coordinación académica de tecnología e informática (CA TI). Esto debido a la tasa de deserción que oscila en un 70%, por lo tanto se evalúa la pertinencia laboral y académica del programa y se identifican los principales factores que inciden en este fenómeno. A partir de una investigación cualitativa, enmarcada dentro del paradigma interpretativo; se recolecta y analiza la información a través de matrices de contenido, encuestas y entrevistas, así como también el uso de software de análisis cualitativo que dan respuesta a la matriz de categorías y subcategorías planteadas. Posterior a este análisis se emitieron una serie de conclusiones y recomendaciones para ofrecer a la entidad la oportunidad de intervenir su programa y tomar las acciones correspondientes.

El trabajo de investigación se presenta como la evaluación de una política establecida por la Ley 1148 la cual determina que las universidades de carácter público deben posibilitar el acceso a las víctimas del conflicto a sus programas académicos, y se evaluó con una perspectiva centrada en el usuario, con una mirada evaluativa desde el modelo de Robert Stake, teniendo como referencia su matriz de evaluación. El documento se estructuró en cinco capítulos; en el primero se define y plantea el problema a tratar, el segundo aborda los marcos de referencia, el tercero expone cómo se consolidó metodológicamente el ejercicio, y el cuarto reporta los principales hallazgos. Finalmente, las conclusiones se presentan en el quinto capítulo.

Esta investigación describe el impacto de los materiales de enseñanza contextualizados enmarcados en el enfoque CLIL, en la habilidad lectora de los estudiantes, haciendo énfasis en el componente inferencial. Esta investigación se realizó con estudiantes de pregrado de la Universidad Manuela Beltrán, sede Bogotá, bajo un enfoque cualitativo. Los datos se recopilaron y analizaron después de la aplicación de seis talleres contextualizados. El instrumento notas de campo facilitó la recopilación de información durante la etapa de aplicación. Además, se realizó una encuesta de entrada y una de salida para recopilar información sobre el interés de los estudiantes y los comentarios finales sobre el proceso. Los resultados de la investigación establecen la relación entre la creación de material contextualizado y la mejora de los estudiantes en relación con su habilidad lectora. Además, este estudio recomienda continuar explorando el role del docente investigador en el campo de desarrollo de materiales en inglés como lenguaje extranjero.

Esta investigación-acción cualitativa y descriptiva explora los resultados del diseño e implementación de hojas de trabajo diseñadas para la maestra-investigadora, basadas en la narración de historias y en la interacción oral con estudiantes de quinto grado en una institución educativa privada. Este estudio se realizó con un grupo de dieciocho niñas y doce niños de que presentaban algunas dificultades para expresar sus ideas con confianza en forma oral. Los instrumentos utilizados para recopilar los datos fueron los artefactos de los estudiantes con la correspondiente sección de autoevaluación, las notas de campo de la maestra investigadora y las grabaciones de audio. Los hallazgos sugieren que las estudiantes fueron capaces de interactuar oralmente recontando la historia, crear un final nuevo, compartir sus experiencias personales y abordar la diversidad con respeto.

The paper examines the way in which several private firms in Colombia have deployed Corporate Social Responsibility programmes via peacebuilding initiatives, as in a gift-exchange scheme. These initiatives often have taken place in different regions of the country regardless of the geopolitical influence armed groups have on them. Whereas the Colombian government and FARC guerrillas have started peace-talks since 2012, many areas are still vulnerable to the reproduction of violence. The national –however non-state– campaign ""Soy Capaz"" led by 120 big companies, reveal a deep interest from within the private sector to engage in peacebuilding as part of its corporate strategy. The objective of this paper is to describe how peace initiatives by the private sector could be interpreted as a gift-giving relationship between corporate firms and government officials, institutions, and the Colombian society as a whole. Higher corporate expansion and regional consolidation, national and international positive reputation, increased leverage in government decision-making and policy-making, and a greater consumption of goods and services, are possible outcomes among other benefits that could be expected in exchange for these peace initiatives led from and by the private sector. However, the question Mauss already posited in his search for “a rule of legality and self-interest”, a “power residing in the object” (2002, p. 4), suggests a possible underlying and even deeper interest behind these initiatives. The very nature of this gift –its embedded asymmetry for reciprocation, its morality and its spirituality– creates affect within a population desirous of peace and reconciliation. However, the seriousness and scope of such venture coming from the Colombian private sector are still an issue to be clarified.

The main idea of this project is to identify possible indicators to evaluate civil engineering works that involves geotechnical techniques. Furthermore, the idea to encourage the developing of new technologies using as base, properly process that are available at the moment, might be attempt. However, to find these indicators of sustainable geotechnical engineering is the principal objectives of the project. In general words, the objectives of this thesis are: In base of sustainable indicators from different areas such as economics, water management, environment regulations, productivity in the industrial field among others, adapted and developed indicators for geotechnical engineering field. According with the sustainable geotechnical requirements, proposed new indicators relevant for this field. Validate and prove the use of the mentioned indicators with a case study and apply them to analyze their results. Develop an evaluation model to summaries and illustrated the indicators performance. Show the viability of new technologies confronting to regular procedures. This dissertation has found an important and fundamental tool for geotechnical engineers that want to go further that the actual design parameters. Moreover, the necessities to supply the present requirements are covering with the use of sustainability geotechnical evaluation model (S.G.E.M) that is the final result of this dissertation.

El Estado colombiano ha tenido un conflicto armado desde la década del 60 del siglo XX, cuyas raíces se remontan a décadas pasadas a ésta. En éste han participado distintos grupos de izquierda y de derecha que reclutaron de manera indiscriminada niños, niñas y adolescentes. Durante años, se realizaron diferentes esfuerzos para obtener la desmovilización de los grupos armados y alcanzar la paz. Estos esfuerzos se enmarcaron, en mayor o menor medida, en las herramientas de la justicia transicional. En ese marco, las políticas de juzgamiento desarrolladas buscaban en los últimos tiempos sancionar a las personas que cometieron graves crímenes con ocasión de su participación en el grupo armado. Estas políticas, sin embargo, se realizaron a partir de un imaginario fuertemente arraigado según el cual los grupos armados estaban compuestos solo por adultos. Sin embargo, a los adolescentes reclutados ilícitamente y desvinculados de los grupos armados se les aplicó un régimen penal ordinario, distinto al de los adultos, que generó prácticas discriminatorias según la forma de desvinculación del grupo y respecto del grupo que provenían. Pero además, el trato jurídico brindado no fue menos gravoso que el establecido para los adultos que los reclutaron, entre otras cosas, porque las políticas de juzgamiento diseñadas para los desmovilizados no tuvieron perspectiva de infancia.

The following report describes the work done during my internship in AlbaTERN Ltd, a company focused in the design and construction of wave energy devices that capture energy from ocean waves and convert it into sustainable low- carbon electricity. A background of existing research in the area of Wave Energy conversion and its potential around the world is given in the first chapters. The main objective of my thesis has been support the design and construction of a unique wave energy conversion system constructed from multiple SQUID modules in a hexagonal array configuration. The project has been focused to look specifically at improving the hydraulic energy conversion efficiency, the feasibility of auto-setting operational variables according to the sea conditions, and the overall adaptability of the design to suit the specifications of the site and power requirements. Simulations using SimHydraulics have been developed to assess the design an optimal Hydraulic energy conversion system. With the output of the several simulations and hydraulic laboratory tests have been possible the sizing of its different components, and the design of special manifold blocks with self-setting hydraulic control, reducing the quantity and complexity the electronic devices for the general control. The key challenge facing the Wave Energy conversion Industry is lowering the cost of energy generation, where is required research and Development in order to design a device with high efficiency, high availability and low cost for the mass production. So achieving a viable wave energy future depends as much upon developing a technology that can be rapidly and economically scaled to high volume production. This project provides a solid foundation for scaling WaveNET arrays in excess of 10 MW.

Previous studies have shown that residential water consumption in Phoenix, Arizona is significantly related to changes in climate, although that sensitivity varies substantially from one census tract to another. In this investigation, we determine the empirical relationship between water consumption and variations in temperature and precipitation. We find the sensitivity of consumption to either climate variable is positively related to the percent of land covered in mesic irrigated landscaping, mean household income, lot size, and percent of single-family residential lots containing swimming pools.  We use estimated changes in temperature and precipitation for 50 model – scenario combinations presented by the IPCC, and we determined that mean water consumption should increase by an average of over three percent by 2050, but the climate-induced change in consumption varies considerably across the census tracts. 

With the advent of ubiquitous computing, interaction design has broadened its object of inquiry into how smart computational artifacts inconspicuously act in  people’s everyday lives. Although user-centered design approaches remains useful for exploring how people cope with interactive systems, they cannot explain how this new breed of artifact participates in people’s sociality. User-centered design approach assumes that humans control interactive systems, but neglects any possibility of the agency of smart artifacts.Following Actor-network Theory, this research recognizes that artifacts and humans share the capacity of influencing society and meshing with each other, constituting hybrid social actors. From that standpoint, the research offers a triadic structure of networked social interaction as a methodological basis to investigate how smart devices perceive their social setting and adaptively mediate people’s interactions within activities. These triadic units of analysis account for the interactions within and between humannonhuman collectives in the actor-network. The within interactions are those that hold together humans and smart artifacts inside a collective and put forward the collective’s assembled meaning for other actors in the network.The between interactions are those that occur among collectives and characterize the dominant relational model of the actor-network. This triadic approach was modeled and used to analyze the interactions of participants in three empirical studies of social activities with communal goals, each mediated by a smart artifact that enacted – signified – a balanced distribution of obligations and privileges among subjects. Overall, the studies found that actor-networks exhibit a social viscosity that hinders people’s interactions. This is because when people try to collectively accomplish goals, they offer resistance to one another. The studies also show that the intervention of smart artifacts can facilitate the achievement of cooperative and collaborative interaction between actors when the artifacts enact the dominant moral principles which prompt the preservation of social balance, enhance the network’s information integrity, and are located at the focus of activity. The articulation of Actor-Network Theory principles with interaction design methods opens up the traditional user-artifact dyad towards triadic collective enactment by embracing diverse kinds of participants and practices, thus facilitating the design of enhanced sociality. The theoretical conceptual framework, methods and tools developed in this research are relevant to product and interaction designers, ubiquitous computing and Science and technology studies (STS) researchers; as well as practitioners interested in making the interaction between humans and computers smarter, more intuitive and more enjoyable. The outcome of this research is addressed to designers, engineers and urban planners who are responsible for the design of the new generation of computational artifacts that will cohabitate today’s transportation terminals and vehicles, offices, parks, streets, among other social spaces of the constructed world.