Page 68 - Secondary school students’ university readiness and their transition to university Els van Rooij

a er completing pre-university education performed better than students who
transferred to university a er one year of professional education. In professional
education, the relationship with prior education was less clear-cut: Two Dutch
studies found that students who entered professional education a er completing pre-university education obtained more EC than students from general secondary
education, and that students from general secondary education obtained more EC
than students from vocational education, but two other Dutch studies found no
relationship. Another Dutch study found no relationship between prior education 3 and persistence, whereas a Flemish study did nd a relationship between level of
prior education and persistence.
Students’ coursework in secondary education consistently predicted GPA,
EC, and persistence in university, with more positive results for students who had taken a science-oriented track (two Dutch and two Flemish studies) and students who had taken more hours of mathematics and classical languages (three Flemish studies).
Personality characteristics
In the two Dutch studies and one Flemish study that investigated the Big Five personality characteristics, conscientiousness was the most consistent predictor of academic success: It was positively related with GPA in a Dutch university sample, with EC in a professional education sample in both a Dutch and a Flemish study, and with persistence in a Dutch professional education sample. Only in a Dutch university sample it was not related to EC. For the personality characteristics agreeableness, extraversion, neuroticism, and openness, mostly non-signi cant relationships were found. Procrastination was negatively related to EC in both a professional education and a university sample in the Netherlands.
Motivational characteristics
Self-e cacy theories. From the perspective of students’ expectancies regarding their own competence, we found in two Dutch and two Flemish studies that self- e cacy was consistently related to GPA and EC. Relationships between academic self-concept and all three outcomes were also all positive, as shown by three Flemish university studies. Another construct related to self-e cacy and self- concept that was investigated in more than one study was fear of failure. is was negatively related to GPA and EC in a Dutch university respectively professional education sample.
Systematic review of rst-year success
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