Learning analytics and performance indicators in higher education

Abstract

The availability of large amounts of information associated with the teaching and learning process challenges researchers to explore this information by using learning analytics to obtain indicators that can contribute to improving the teaching and learning process, particularly in terms of learning outcomes and the relationship students have with the educational institutions they attend. Considering that failure and dropping out of school have very negative consequences for a large number of young people, we have sought to obtain indicators associated with these problems through the use of quantitative methodology and documental analysis procedures, by analyzing data from a sample of 1588 students with regard to their frequency of access to the virtual environment of the institution, the number of presences in onsite lessons, the number of course units they passed and the average mark in the course units they passed. From the obtained results, we emphasize that there is a degree of positive association, with moderate correlation, between each pair of the mentioned variables. After organizing the sample in four distinct groups resulting from the division of the data regarding the number of accesses to the institution virtual environment into quartiles, it was found that there are significant differences regarding the number of course units passed between the groups with higher numbers of accesses to the virtual learning environment and the ones with lower numbers of accesses, to the benefit of the groups with the greatest number of accesses.