ABSTRACT

This study investigates the impact of institutional factors and student characteristics on student retention and degree completion, with particular attention to how institutional factors moderate the impact of student characteristics. It makes use of a five-year panel data from the College Scorecard database maintained by the US Department of Education. It uses the Feasible Generalized Least Squares model for the estimation to control for panel level heteroscedasticity and panel-specific autocorrelation. The results reveal the importance of student characteristics in affecting retention rate and completion rate. Moreover, their effects are strongly moderated by institutional factors. These findings generate insight on how to increase student retention and degree completion rates and bear implications for university administrators and public policy makers.

摘要

本研究调查了制度因素和学生特征对学生保留和学位完成的影响，特别关注制度因素如何调节学生特征的影响。它利用了美国教育部维护的大学记分卡数据库中的五年面板数据。它使用可行的广义最小二乘模型进行估计，以控制面板级别的异方差性和面板特定的自相关。结果揭示了学生特征在影响保留率和完成率方面的重要性。此外，它们的影响受到制度因素的强烈缓和。