This communication is part of the project "The impact of educational evaluation in the development of competencies at the University. The perspective of the first graduates" (R + D project with reference EDU2012 ‐ 32766) funded by the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, in which seven Spanish universities participated: University of Barcelona (UB), Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC), University Rovira i Virgili (URV), Autonomous University of Catalonia (UAB), University of the Balearic Islands (UIB), University of Granada (UGR) and the Open University of Catalonia (UOC) in four different degrees: Primary Education, Industrial Electronic Engineering, Pharmacy and Computer Engineering. The aim of this research is to analyze the impact of educational assessment in the development of competencies at the University, starting from the perceptions of the first graduates trained in the new European Higher Education Area. Furthermore, by gathering the opinions of the students and their evolution over the first years, the study makes use of qualitative methodologies to explore the best practices carried out, thereby allowing the accreditation of both specific and transversal competencies. In this communication, we will present the results of open questionnaires filled in by “old” diploma holders’, comparing them to the results of first “new” European Higher Education Area graduates in order to identify which kind of competencies they perceive to have acquired and to know what factors or processes students attribute to the development of such competencies. We will focus, in particular, on the use of new technologies to foster learning and improve the competence‐assessment process. The paper provides empirical data regarding the role of competencies in the acquisition of specific and transversal student competencies. Our research provides evidence about the perception of the new promotion of graduate students after the Bologna process implementation and could suggest future improvements in university study plans in order to include ICT tools in competencies development. The results show that despite the change of the paradigm in higher education, the learning and evaluation methods didn’t change fundamentally, and the implementation of new requirements of the European Higher Education Area remains in hands of the teachers and university leaders.