Predicting performance in undergraduate agricultural economics

Entry to the Bachelor of Agricultural Economics (BAgrEc) program at the University of Sydney is consistently less competitive than that for the Bachelor of Economics (BEc) and Bachelor of Commerce (BComm) programs. Given that students in the BAgrEc program undertake units in common with students in the BEc and BComm programs, it is of interest to examine the importance of school performance and first year university in the determination of success at university. This paper takes information for nine cohorts of BAgrEc students and tests their performance in first-year core subjects against the university entrance ranking, school English and mathematics marks, gender, and type of school. The paper then uses the same information to predict which student characteristics at entry level are likely to lead to students completing the degree program. The implications of the analysis are explored.