Internal migration motivated by access to higher education is a relatively unexplored topic in Colombia, leading to a lack of data on its dimensions, characteristics, and impacts on urban space and the emotional conditions of migrants. For this reason, an academic program of architecture in a public university was selected to comprehend the internal migrations of students, exploring their territorial experiences, living conditions, and social mobility capacity. An exploratory methodology was designed to recognize the phenomenon through a descriptive analysis, utilizing institutional data, surveys, and interviews. The research identifies the primary reasons, barriers, and impacts experienced by the migrant population in Ibague<acute accent>, Colombia. The study concludes with recommendations pertaining to both institutional and urban planning to address these identified challenges. (c) 2024 The Author(s). Publishing services by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of KeAi Communications Co. Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons. org/licenses/by/4.0/).
