Relationship between Retention Rate and Graduation Rate in Universities

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ECONOMICS ASSIGNMENT

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Contents
Purpose.......................................................................................................................................3
Background................................................................................................................................3
Methods......................................................................................................................................3
Results........................................................................................................................................3
a) Descriptive analysis of the variable....................................................................................3
b) Scatter diagram...................................................................................................................4
c) Regression Equation...........................................................................................................4
d) Meaning of slope coefficient..............................................................................................5
e) Statistical significance of the relationship..........................................................................5
f) The goodness of fit of the regression..................................................................................6
g) The case of South University.............................................................................................6
h) The case of the University of Phoenix...............................................................................6
Discussion..................................................................................................................................7
Recommendations......................................................................................................................7
Reference....................................................................................................................................8

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Purpose
Student retention and rate of graduation is an important parameter to measure the
performance of the university. The purpose of this paper is to find out how the retention rate
in universities is related to the graduation rate. The answers to this question will enable the
universities to improve the rate of graduation which depends on an independent variable.
Background
The graduation rate is referred to as the percentage of students of the first year successfully
complete the course within the time stipulated to the student. On the other hand, the
Retention rate is the rate at which the first year students of the universities continue their
classes in the next year (Tchamdjeu, Steenkamp and Nel, 2018). To an economist, these to
variables pertaining to the operation of universities are important as it would help in
improving the performance of the universities. If the retention of students can be increased
through improving the quality of education or by reducing the cost, there is a higher chance
of having a huge number of students to become graduate from the university (Cancado,
Reisel and Walker, 2018).
Methods
This paper uses data of retention rate and the graduation rate from 29 universities. The
numerical data has been analyzed through the process of data analysis. Statistical regression
has been done on the data collected where the graduation rate of the universities have been
taken as the dependent variable. On the other hand, the retention rate variable has been
considered as the independent variable. MS Excel has been used as a tool to analyze the data
that has presented an ANOVA table. This table shows how the independent variable retention
rate influences the value of the dependent variable graduation rate.
Results
a) Descriptive analysis of the variable
Retention
Rate
Graduation
Rate
Mean standard Deviation
23.2402318
1 9.865724115
Maximum 100 61
Minimum 4 25