Despite their relevance to the evaluation of higher education institutions, students still do not seem to constitute a relevant study subject in the research field of this regulation process. Aware of this gap, the present study intends to, through the analysis of the social representations that students elaborate on this process, examine the features framing their attitudes towards it. It resorts, in this sense, to the methodological framework and to the empirical findings of a broader research, having as subject the analysis of students' social representations on the evaluation of higher education institutions. The analysis of the results allows for the conclusion that students tend to assume positive attitudes towards the notion and the implementation of evaluation, as a result of the legitimacy they recognize to it. This legitimacy emerges, in its turn, essentially connected with instrumental reasons, linked to the increase of the quality of institutions, degrees and teaching and, ultimately, to the future insertion of graduates in the labour market.
Higher education; Evaluation; Students; Students' representations; Portugal
