Bo’s Story

Professor Bo van der Rhee is Professor of Operations Management at the Center for Marketing and Supply Chain Management at the Nyenrode Business University. He’s been using Connect for over a decade.

A couple of years ago, he conducted an empirical analysis of three years’ worth of Connect Online Engagement Index (OEI) data in conjunction with students’ final exam results in order to prove or disprove a correlation between practice in Connect and exam success.

Using linear multiple regression and logistic regression analysis, the results showed that age and gender are not statistically significant predictors of exam grades, but that OEI is. The model was 68% accurate in predicting which students would fail and 60% accurate in predicting which students would pass.

While 60-70% accuracy means that the model isn’t a surefire way of predicting success (some students will practice a lot but still fail, while others may not practice at all and still pass), the correlation is highly positive overall. The data showed that with an OEI of 4 points, the probability of passing or failing is around 50%, while with 6 points, a student is twice as likely to pass as to fail, and for students with an OEI of 8 or above the pass rate is around 90%.

“Statistics always talk about averages and trends,” says Professor van der Rhee, “there will always be outliers, but as a professor of large classes I’m looking at what’s going to improve outcomes for the class as a whole and this research shows that OEI – i.e., practice – consistently has an impact on the grade.”

Importantly, both full-time and part-time students showed increased success with practice in Connect. This is significant not so much because of the method of study but because of the typical demographic - with part-time students more likely to be mature students returning to study following a time out in industry.

With an OEI of 4 points, the probability of passing or failing is around 50%, while with 6 points, a student is twice as likely to pass as to fail, and for students with an OEI of 8 or above, the pass rate is around 90%

Relationship between OEI and probability of a pass

• With a one-unit increase in practice, the odds of passing the test increase by 31%
• For every single point of practice there is an increase in the exam grade of 0.27 on a 10pt scale
• Data shows that additional practice in Connect helps part-time students

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