Church Population Growth Prediction Using Predictive Analytic (Linear Regression Model) Technique

Abstract

The world today has become highly technological and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has been identified as one of the basic pillars on which the modern society stands. In Nigeria today, competency in basic ICT skills is now regarded as one of the basic requirements for our day-day activities in religion, economic, financial and political. The use of available ICT tools equally enhances the validity of results and assist management in planning and budgeting for growth. The church cannot be an exception in this regard as “spreading the gospel” is the goal of the churches by growing the number of new members using available tools. The issue of church growth transcends many areas of church activities and the application of the ICT infrastructures could be gainfully put into use in some of these areas for greater impact on church development. The difficulties confronting church organisations in respect of church growth are becoming unsurmountable for those that have refused to embrace and deploy Information and Communication Technologies to enhance growth and its resultant complexities. In this paper, a system capable of predicting church growth with the application of Linear Regression Model (LRM) using the historic data of a growing church is presented. The results demonstrated the importance of predicting the population of organisations such as religious centers that often have a growing teeming population of members. Such results of prediction using ICT tools would be an essential guide in the budgeting requirements of such organisations. Keywords: Prediction, growth, tools, ICT, normalize, linear, budgeting DOI: 10.7176/CEIS/12-1-05 Publication date: January 31 st 2021