A hybrid data analytic approach to predict college graduation status and its determinative factors

Аннотация

The prediction of graduation rates of college students has become increasingly important to colleges and universities across the USA and the world. Graduation rates, also referred to as completion rates, directly impact university rankings and represent a measurement of institutional performance and student success. In recent years, there has been a concerted effort by federal and state governments to increase the transparency and accountability of institutions, making “graduation rates” an important and challenging university goal. In line with this, the main purpose of this paper is to propose a hybrid data analytic approach which can be flexibly implemented not only in the USA but also at various colleges across the world which would help predict the graduation status of undergraduate students due to its generic nature. It is also aimed at providing a means of determining and ranking the critical factors of graduation status.