Never Give up on the Good Times: Student Attrition in the UK

The determinants of students' propensity to drop out of university are analysed using individual records of all students passing through the central applications process in 1993. The data set comprises about 100,000 individuals and allows a much more thorough analysis of student wastage than has been possible in the past. The main reasons for attrition, academic failure ('involuntary' attrition) and 'voluntary' dropout, are modelled. The results highlight, "inter alia", the importance of matching and peer group effects, both of which have been found to be important determinants of student outcomes in the US but which have been subject to little empirical scrutiny for the UK. Copyright 2004 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.