UNIVERSITY ENGAGEMENT AND CAREER DEVELOPMENT: EVIDENCE FROM BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION STUDENTS AND GRADUATES

Abstract

This article aimed to analyze how student engagement with learning impacts career construction and the practice of the Business Administration profession, identifying its psychological dimensions, motivating factors, and experiences in higher education. The study is grounded in the psychological approach to student engagement, considering its behavioral, emotional, cognitive, and agentic dimensions, and their relationship with career development. This is a qualitative study of exploratory and descriptive nature, complemented by quantitative data obtained through a structured questionnaire applied to 190 Business Administration students at the Federal University of Maranhão, as well as semi-structured interviews with five graduates, analyzed through descriptive statistics and thematic analysis, respectively. The results revealed a predominance of the behavioral dimension, associated with compliance with academic requirements, and a lower presence of the agentic dimension. Participation in extracurricular activities and the development of proactive behaviors proved to be determinant for career construction, fostering skill development, professional exploration, and labor market insertion. It is concluded that university engagement constitutes a strategic process in career construction, directly impacting skill development and students' professional insertion.