Speaking of the causal spectrum of dropout we are referring to something not simple but highly complex. In this context, the issue of dropping out of studies is considered critical within the area of higher education due to its impact on the individual, the university and the society as a whole. In this study, an effort was made to investigate students’ tendency to dropout and to identify the sequence of factors that influence it, as well as its configuration per School. For this purpose, hierarchical regression trees were applied for the factors that compose the dropout index, holistically and separately per school, while for each factor the corresponding hierarchical tree with its items has been analyzed further. The responses of 696 students who have not definitely dropped out of their studies at University of Patras were analyzed. The findings indicate that the factors related to students’ academic performance have the greatest impact compared to personal, economical, institutional and social set of factors, on the tendency to dropout. In particular, the perceived level of education, the provision of knowledge as the basis of solving complex real-world problems and student’s academic efficacy emerge as the most crucial issues of the academic factorial category in regards to student’s tendency to dropout.

Dropout in higher education has got important dimensions worldwide. The problem has consequences on an individual, social and economic level and it is thus of significance to investigate students' tendency to dropout before the decision to leave their studies is irreversible. Due to the complexity of the dropout phenomenon and the diversity of the influence exerted by different factors, arises intensively the need for a thorough comprehension of the mechanism and decomposition of the exerted intercorrelations. In regards to the above, this research aimed to analyze the effect of the variables within the academic spectrum on students' tendency to dropout of their studies via hierarchical regression trees indicating both the sequence and intercorrelation. From the present work it emerged that the elements of the academic index exert a significant impact on students' tendency to dropout via the sequence of level of study followed by the subject of study, the provision of knowledge to solve complex real-world problems, the feedback by professors on students' work completed, the students' perception of justice and reward in the evaluation procedures concerning them, the clarity of the educational goals and courses' requirements as well as students' satisfaction with the work of the teaching staff.

Work engagement’s relation with burnout intensively concerns the research community. A plethora of works has tried to interpret the kind of correlation of the above structures with reference to their structural elements and phenomena deriving from their common causal network. Therefore, in this research, the correlation between work engagement and burnout is investigated via their main structural elements and on the basis of job satisfaction’s interpretive role. For this purpose, the responses of 561 employees from various economic sectors in Greece, were analyzed using path analysis after the data had first been approached via item response theory. Job satisfaction’s interpretive role appeared to be of importance in regards to the positive sign of the correlation between work engagement and burnout as emerged in this work. The intrinsic job satisfaction’s positive effect on both constructs that is burnout and work engagement, also arose as a research outcome, while the extrinsic job satisfaction appeared to operate positively to work engagement and negatively to burnout, regulating in this way the overall correlation exerted, therefore giving rise to theoretical and practical implications.

Burnout is a significant challenge in the workplace. Its extent is global and its unfavourable consequences are diverse, affecting the individual, the organization, and society. The aim of the present study was to examine the adaptation and assess the validity of the Greek version of the Burnout Assessment Tool (BAT). The adaptation process included the translation and back-translation of the BAT. Data were collected from 356 Greek employees from diverse sectors. Confirmatory factor analysis and item response theory were utilized to assess the validity of the Greek version of the BAT. According to the findings of the present research, the core symptoms scale and the secondary symptoms scale of BAT-23 and BAT-12 models demonstrated adequate structures for the analysis and measurement of burnout in the Greek context. Finally, the psychometric performance of the BAT-GR-12 compared to the BAT-GR-23 establishes it as a more optimum instrument for the assessment of burnout across Greek working adults.

In this paper, a new flipped classroom model at the university emerged. The innovation of the model lies in the combination of two methods of the students' learning process: students work together in small groups before the class (cooperative learning) and also conduct presentations in groups within the class (group peer tutoring). Indeed, during the semester students alternate in the roles of the tutor and the tutee in the classroom process. The teaching experiment was carried out at the Department of Business Administration of the University of Patras in the context of the Calculus course of the 1st semester. Of the 344 participating students, 179 chose to follow the procedure of the flipped classroom while 165 the traditional lecture. It was revealed that the proposed model of the flipped classroom induces the students’ academic performance of the students. In addition, this level of academic performance is maintained even after the semester in mathematics and in courses in different cognitive subjects. The proposed flipped classroom model that emerged, can offer benefits to the educational process and the students in terms of both traditional and distance learning environments.