A study of students' progress through introductory computer science programming courses

Given the growing demand for skilled workers from the Computer Science field, the high attrition rate of entering Computer Science students is a serious problem at most universities. Much research exists on evaluating the reasons of failure with the introductory Computer Science curriculum referred to as the CS1, CS2 and CS3 courses. Current research has proposed methods to predict patterns and characteristics to offer early detection of students likely to fail. The problem is difficult to understand due to the existence of many possible reasons students drop-out from the computer science curriculum. Factors such as student transfers, course diversity, and students repeating failed courses are seldom considered. The goal of this paper is to extend the understanding of the attrition rates for entering Computer Science students by analyzing the progress of student success through 10 years of course data. The impact of transfer students is considered as well as the frequency students repeat the CS1, CS2, and CS3 courses, and their success. Analysis is done by following the students up until graduation. An analysis is also made to determine how courses tend to predict the graduation success rate.