Page 56 - Secondary school students’ university readiness and their transition to university Els van Rooij

obligatory, again with in some cases additional requirements. e secondary
education system in Flanders also consists of di erent tracks, but in contrast to the
Dutch postsecondary education system, the Flemish system can be quali ed as an
open access system: Successful completion of any type of secondary education
allows any student to enter any higher education programme without having to
pass an entrance test (except in engineering, medicine, and dentistry). is may
cause the rst-year student population in Flanders to be more diverse than that
in the Netherlands, and may imply that student factors such as ability and prior 3 education are more in uential in Flanders than in the Netherlands.
3.1.2 Di erent outcomes measures
A drawback of many studies into student success is that only one or two outcome variables are being used, while for the Dutch and Flemish context there are three outcome variables that matter with regard to rst-year student success: GPA, number of attained credits (EC), and persistence (i.e., continuing to the second year of the degree programme that the student has started). e choice for a speci c outcome measure may have large consequences for the results. is can be explained by the notion that outcome measures in themselves di er substantially from each other. A student’s GPA is an indicator of his or her achievement level, whereas the number of EC is an indicator of study progress. Some students may mainly care about passing examinations, but not so much about how high their grades are, and consequently only put in the minimum e ort required to pass. Persistence is yet again a distinct measure of success: Students with a high GPA who have attained all credits may deliberately choose to quit their studies, for several possible reasons, whereas students with a lower GPA and/or number of EC in the rst year may choose to persist if they still meet the minimum requirements to continue. us, di erent processes play a role in explaining how high someone’s GPA is, how many credits he or she obtains, and whether he or she drops out. For example, fear of failure or a low level of motivation may cause someone to obtain low grades, but not to a level that he or she does not pass an examination or quits his or her studies. Not being satis ed with the degree programme, on the other hand, may determine a student’s decision to quit the programme, but may not have a negative e ect on his or her achievement level before he or she quits. Due to these di erences in measures of success, it is important to include all three of them and investigate whether cognitive and non-cognitive predictors a ect them di erently. is will contribute to more ne-grained knowledge about student success predictors.
Systematic review of rst-year success
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