Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science

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Browsing Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science by Author "Botha, H. L."

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    School results and access test results as indicators of first-year performance at university
    (Operations Research Society of South Africa, 2004) Bothma, A.; Botha, H. L.; Le Roux, N. J.
    ENGLISH SUMMARY : The goals set by the National Plan for Higher Education, the fact that many schools are still severely disadvantaged as well as far-reaching changes in the school system demand that South African universities urgently reconsider their admission procedures. Redesigning admission procedures calls for a thorough understanding of the interrelationships between school marks, results in existing access tests and first-year university performance. These interrelationships were statistically investigated in the case of the 1999, 2000 and 2001 intake groups, who were compelled to write access tests before being admitted to Stellenbosch University. The results of this investigation confirm an alarming degree of unpreparedness among many prospective students regarding what is expected of them at university. This is aggravated by school marks creating a totally unrealistic expectation of performance in the first year at university. It is emphasised that schools and authorities dealing with admission of prospective students at universities should be cognisant of the findings reported here. Furthermore, the statistical analyses demonstrate several novel techniques for investigating the interrelationship between school marks, access test results and university performance.
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    Statistical properties of indicators of first-year performance at university
    (Operations Research Society of South Africa, 2004) Le Roux, N. J.; Bothma, A.; Botha, H. L.
    ENGLISH SUMMARY : Appraisal of admission procedures is a matter of urgency for South African universities, as well as for schools producing the prospective students. In this article the focus is on how various statistical procedures can be used to assess admission measures. Properties of the statistical distributions related to school results, access test results and first-year university performance are vital for decision-makers in schools preparing the prospective students and for those who wish to refine university admission procedures. These properties are scrutinised for the 1999, 2000 and 2001 intake groups required to write access tests before being admitted to Stellenbosch University. Using kernel density estimates the univariate distributions of all variables concerned are described in detail. Bagplots are proposed for visual displays of important features like location, spread, correlation, skewness, outliers and tails of bivariate distributions composed of university average performance and a school result or access test variable. Evidence is provided that certain access tests (Mathematics, Science and Numeracy Skills) have statistical distributions similar to that of average first-year university performance, but that average school marks could not be trusted to discriminate between potentially successful and unsuccessful university students.