Page 72 - Secondary school students’ university readiness and their transition to university Els van Rooij

demographic characteristics and motivational factors were the most investigated categories. Furthermore, ability (predominantly secondary school GPA) was o en included. Dutch researchers included learning environment characteristics and engagement relatively o en in their studies, whereas Flemish authors relatively more o en focused on demographic characteristics and motivation.
Overall, for several factors we found evidence of a relationship with all
outcomes of student success. is was most notably the case for the relationship
between secondary school GPA and secondary school coursework with university 3 students’ success in both the Netherlands and Flanders: Students who had higher
grades in secondary school and took more science subjects and mathematics
achieved better in university and were more likely to continue to the second
year. e result regarding secondary school GPA was expected, as this is a very
consistent universal predictor of higher education success (e.g., Richardson et al.,
2012). e bene ts of taking up more science (in this case, a science track in Dutch
secondary education, which includes more advanced mathematics, or more hours
of science and mathematics in Flanders) does not appear systematically in the international empirical research, even though it has been found to be important
in other countries. For example, Long, Iatarola, and Conger (2009) point to the
problem that in the United States many students are unprepared for mathematical
courses in higher education due to insu cient mathematics preparation in
secondary school. Many university degree programmes in the sciences and social
sciences have mathematics-related courses, which may explain why a secondary
school background of science and mathematics contributes to higher achievement
in university.
Conscientiousness, intrinsic motivation, academic adjustment, lack of regulation, attendance, and observed learning activities were also related to all outcomes, although these results were based on a smaller number of studies. e clear impact of conscientiousness is in line with Poropat’s (2009) meta-analysis of personality factors that showed that conscientiousness is the most important personality trait when it comes to predicting academic performance. e e ect of intrinsic motivation matches the ndings of many studies into motivation that conclude that intrinsic motivation is linked to achievement (Clark, Middleton, Nguyen, & Zwick, 2014; Gui rida, Lynch, Wall, & Abel, 2013). In contrast, international research ndings regarding extrinsic motivation are equivocal: Sometimes extrinsic motivation was negatively related to achievement, sometimes positively, and sometimes no relationship was found (Clark et al., 2014). In our
Systematic review of rst-year success
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