European universities face great challenges dealing with twenty-first century world changes. Deep transformations are required to a wide range of lifelong learning scenarios, which are replacing traditional modes of university study and giving access to students in more flexible ways. To address the transformation in learning, the European Association of Distance Teaching Universities (EADTU) launched the EMPOWER project in 2015 so that the EADTU could share expertise of distance education universities in the field. The EMPOWER project is organised in 12 areas. One is student support, as the central area for students' success. The project's goal is to empower students to become lifelong , self-directed learners in open, online and blended-learning environments. The plan was to increase student retention and enhance academic performance, integration and satisfaction. This article summarises the work that has been done during the past two years to offer different tools and resources, such as webinars and reports. These can help institutions and academics in their understanding of what underlies student engagement and motivation versus student drop-out. We aim to share expertise about how effective, or not, technology has been for developing innovative, advanced and quality student support services to large and small groups of students. It is too early to judge the success of the student support group of the EMPOWER project. This paper looks at what has been achieved so far. In particular it outlines the reasons for focusing on the problem of student drop-out and how student support may help to ameliorate the problem.

A pesar de que la violencia en el noviazgo se inicia con frecuencia durante la adolescencia y que se ha postulado como un factor de riesgo para formas graves de violencia en las parejas adultas, el corpus de investigación sobre esta problemática continúa siendo limitado. En este trabajo se investiga la direccionalidad y expresión conductual de las agresiones (psicológicas y físicas) cometidas y sufridas en las relaciones de noviazgo en una muestra (N = 69) de estudiantes con edades comprendidas entre los 16 y los 27 años. Los resultados hallados mostraron un patrón recíproco muy frecuente en la agresión psicológica pero, a medida que se agrava la expresión conductual de la violencia (e.g., golpes, amenazas o palizas), disminuye su carácter recíproco y se incrementa la unidireccionalidad de las agresiones. La variable género no predijo la direccionalidad de la violencia y no ejerció un efecto significativo sobre las variables de estudio, agresión cometida (perpetración) y agresión sufrida (victimización). Además, la violencia psicológica/verbal fue la modalidad agresiva más empleada por los agresores y más sufrida por las víctimas. El trabajo presenta implicaciones prácticas que pueden contribuir a hacer visible esta problemática y a concienciar y sensibilizar a los poderes públicos para el desarrollo de medidas de prevención de la violencia y de intervención con las víctimas.Palabras clave: violencia; relaciones de noviazgo; abuso en las relaciones; agresión psicológica; agresión física. AbstractAlthough dating violence frequently begins during adolescence and has been postulated as a ACCIÓN PSICOLÓGICA, junio 2012, vol. 9, n. o 1, 61-70. ISSN: 1578

Formative assessment and personalised feedback are commonly recognised as key factors both for improving students' performance and increasing their motivation and engagement (Gibbs and Simpson, 2005). Currently, in large and massive open online courses (MOOCs), technological solutions to give feedback are often limited to quizzes of different kinds. At present, one of our challenges is to provide feedback for open-ended questions through semantic technologies in a sustainable way.To face such a challenge, our academic team decided to use a test based on latent semantic analysis (LSA) and chose an automatic assessment tool named G-Rubric. G-Rubric was developed by researchers at the Developmental and Educational Psychology Department of UNED (Spanish national distance education university). By using G-Rubric, automated formative and iterative feedback was provided to students for different types of open-ended questions (70-800 words). This feedback allowed students to improve their answers and writing skills, thus contributing both to a better grasp of concepts and to the building of knowledge.In this paper, we present the promising results of our first experiences with UNED business degree students along three academic courses (2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-17). These experiences show to what extent assessment software such as G-Rubric is mature enough to be used with students. It offers them enriched and personalised feedback that proved entirely satisfactory. Furthermore, G-Rubric could help to deal with the problems related to manual grading, even though our final goal is not to replace tutors by semantic tools, but to give support to tutors who are grading assignments.

Two of the most significant challenges that higher education institutions are currently addressing are students' failure and drop-out prevention, as well as the promotion of students’ retention and success. The present study aimed at analysing the role that different variables play in the prediction of Academic Engagement and Burnout in first-year university students, under a multivariate perspective. The contribution of relevant psychological strengths in academic environments (Resilience, Personal initiative, and Academic Motivation), Procrastination and different coping strategies facing studies (Persistence, Avoidance and Anxiety) was explored. Also, the perception of academic demands and stress, students' affect (positive and negative) and the academic satisfaction was considered. Finally, an analysis of different engaged and burnt-out profiles of students was carried out. The contribution of the Efficacy subscale of Academic Burnout as an independent personal resource, and the consideration of the so-called Core Burnout, were subject of analysis. A sample of 172 first-year students of face-to-face universities, 68.8% women with a mean age of 22.99 years (SD = 7.62) volunteered to participate online in this study. The results showed, on the one hand, that Academic Engagement consisted mainly on a positive and intrinsic motivational construct, also characterised by academic efficacy, persistence as an active coping strategy, positive affect and satisfaction. On the other hand Core Burnout was mainly characterised by the perception of higher demands (e.g. academic overload), maladaptive learning behaviours and coping strategies such as procrastination and avoidance of difficulties, negative affect and dissatisfaction. Different profiles of engaged and burnt-out students were also analysed showing strong differences regarding personal strengths, coping with learning strategies, well-being and satisfaction with studies.These results could help us to set bases for the development of early support and prevention programs for students’ Burnout, as well as actions aiming at promoting students’ Engagement and well-being during their first academic year.

resumen El propósito de este estudio es explorar la relación existente entre la procrastinación acadé-mica y el Engagement, así como el patrón de funcionamiento de ambas variables en entornos académicos, en relación al uso de estrategias de aprendizaje autorregulado, eficientes y deficientes, y el estado de los estudiantes previo a la realización de los exámenes. Todas las variables han sido medidas a través de cuestionarios de autoinforme, en una población de universitarios en modalidad a distancia/en lí-nea. Asimismo, se postula un posible efecto de amortiguación o buffering del Engagement sobre los efectos nocivos de la procrastinación académica. Este patrón diferencial se analiza con mayor precisión mediante la consideración de tres perfiles de estudiantes, los caracterizados por Engagement puro, los caracterizados por procrastinación académica pura, y un perfil mixto de procrastinadores con niveles de Engagement medio-alto. Los resultados obtenidos corroboran, por un lado, las grandes diferencias existentes en la forma de afrontar los estudios entre los estudiantes engaged y los procrastinadores y, por otro, el claro efecto amortiguador del engagement sobre la procrastinación académica, observándose en el perfil mixto una mejora significativa de carácter positivo, tanto en el tipo de estrategias de aprendizaje autorregulado utilizadas, como en su estado previo a los exámenes.Palabras clave: Procrastinación Académi-ca; Engagement; estrategias de aprendizaje autorregulado. abstractThe purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between academic procrastination and Engagement, as well as the pattern of academic functioning of both variables, regarding the use of self-regulated learning strategies, both efficient and inefficient, as well as students' state previous to the exams. All variables were measured through self-report questionnaires, in a population of distance learning / online university students. Also, a possible buffering effect of Engagement on the harmful effects of academic procrastination is postulat-