Using Validated Measures of High School Academic Achievement to Predict University Success

Tim Maloney () and Kamakshi Singh ()
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Tim Maloney: School of Economics, Auckland University of Technology

No 2017-10, Working Papers from Auckland University of Technology, Department of Economics

Abstract: Administrative data from a New Zealand university are used to validate the National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) Rank Score used in university admissions and scholarship decisions. We find no statistical evidence to corroborate the specific weighting scheme used in this index. For example, our regression analysis suggests that too much weight is attached to the lowest category of credits in predicting both successful completion outcomes and letter grades. To show the potential importance of this validated measure of high school achievement, we run several simulations on these first-year student outcomes at this university. We show that the use of an alternative, empirically-validated measure of NCEA results to select students would lead to only slight improvements in course completion rates and letter grades. These higher entry standards would lead to declines in the proportions of Pacifica students, but minimal impacts on the proportion of Māori students enrolled at this university.

Keywords: Academic at-risk students; Academic performance; Academic success; Economics of education (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I21 I23 I28 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu
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