Colleges have increasingly turned to predictive analytics to target at-risk students for additional support. Most of the predictive analytic applications in higher education are proprietary, with private companies offering little transparency about their underlying models. We address this lack of transparency by systematically comparing two…

The Portland Timbers won their first Major League Soccer (MLS) Cup Championship in December 2015. However, if it had not been for a kind double goalpost miss during a penalty shootout a few weeks earlier, the Timbers would never have been in the finals. On Oct. 30th, after what has been called "the greatest penalty kick shootout in MLS…

Educational institutions and governing practices are increasingly augmented with digital database technologies that function as new kinds of policy instruments. This article surveys and maps the landscape of digital policy instrumentation in education and provides two detailed case studies of new digital data systems. The Learning Curve is a…

We investigate the link between schooling achievement and creativity scores, controlling for personality traits and other individual characteristics. Our study is based on field data collected in a secondary school situated in a Parisian suburb. Four scores of creativity were measured on 9th graders. Verbal divergent thinking negatively predicts…

As the U.S. population ages and policy changes emerge, such as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, the U.S. will experience a significant shortage of Registered Nurses (RNs). Many colleges and universities are attempting to increase the size of nursing cohorts to respond to this imminent shortage. Notwithstanding a 2.6%…

The Pittsburgh Promise is a scholarship program that provides $5,000 per year toward college tuition for public high school graduates in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania who earned a 2.5 GPA and a 90% attendance record. This study used a difference-in-difference design to assess whether the introduction of the Promise scholarship program directly…

Nineteen percent of 1997-98 North Carolina 3rd graders were observed to drop out of high school. A series of logits predict probabilities of dropping out on determinants such as math and reading test scores, absenteeism, suspension, and retention, at the following grade levels: 3rd, 5th, 8th, and 9th. The same cohort and variables are used to…

Expressions for the expected value, density, and distribution function (DF) of GS (gain from selection) are derived and studied in terms of sample size, number of predictors, and the prior distribution assigned to the population multiple correlation. (Author/RK)

A communicativity index (Index I) is described that measures the potential communication function performed by a given language in a designated communication situation. Significant sociolinguistic contrasts between the language situations of West Malaysia and Singapore are revealed by applying this index. (PMJ)

A procedure for developing a nomogram that depicts expectancy of success on a criterion from performance on two predictors is presented. Data from 574 medical students attending Michigan State University College of Human Medicine's classes of 1979 through 1984 were used to develop a model for predicting the expectancy of success on Part I of the…

A Bayesian prediction strategy is outlined in which antecedent measures are divided into two subgroups. One subgroup is used to discriminate among criterion groups, the second to provide normal linear predictions for each group. Individualized regression constants are subsequently obtained by computing probabilities of group membership from the…

This paper uses ordinary least squares regression to obtain probabilities for the post-graduation choices of high school seniors, and it presents an illustration of the use of these probabilities in calculating future income. Problems raised by the use of the least squares regression are discussed. The benefits of higher education and ways in…

Expectancy theory and decision theory research predicting occupational preference and choice were reviewed to assess the usefulness of such approaches. Each investigation produced substantial support for the use of such models suggesting that both theories can provide practical insights for occupational guidance and counseling. While theoretical,…

Understanding spontaneous speech is a very difficult task for many foreign students. They must be taught to use all the ethnographic cues available to enable them to predict the likely content of a text. They must predict not only the factual content of spoken language but also the interactional structuring. (Author/CFM)