Resumen:
This paper shows the results obtained in the research project entitled: “The representations around academic failing presented by the students of the seventh grade of the Agricultural Institution Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria, Turminá, Inzá - Cauca” this research intends to shed light about the fact of academic failure in students. For this, we sought to identify the conceptions of school failure present in students as well as its effects from the sociocultural context and describe the characteristics as to why they fail that are evident in students from the relationship between social representations and pedagogical knowledge. The methodology used was qualitative research from the historical hermeneutical approach and the method of reflective ethnography; the techniques used to collect the information were participative observation, unstructured interview and discussion groups; video recording, field diary, voice recorder, and field notes were used as data collection instruments; The information analysis technique used was the triangulation of information collection based on techniques. The results obtained reflect that the representations around school failure present in seventh grade revolve around the family as a reproductive institution of social practices and the social conditions surrounding the lives of students assigned to rural education. In brief, it was concluded that school failure has become a systematic sociocultural practice that has prevailed and is framed in the social conditions present in the environment: the family, socioeconomic level, interest in training, number of family members, work activities, lack of dialogue in the family, accompaniment of parents in school activities, work as an obligation to survive, failure of school grades, social background, dropout, and finally in the actions of teachers.