Role of Prior Experience on Student Performance in the Introductory Undergraduate CS Course

Abstract

Student success rates in introductory computer science courses at colleges and universities across worldwide are scandalously low - 30% to 50% of students fail a first-semester course. At our university, over the past ten semesters, 40.6% of our students failed our first-semester computer science course. A survey (204 computer science students) was administered at the beginning of Fall 2016 to measure two hypothesized constructs: one on prior engagement in activities (such as summer camp, jobs) related to computer science, and another on prior experience in computer science topics. The prior experience bank consisted of several yes/no questions asking about familiarity with specific topics found in a first-year computer science course (e.g. globals, arrays, conditionals). The survey data was matched with the final course grades. Results revealed that the prior experience variables could be construed as a construct, but this was not the case with the prior engagement variables. We discovered a statistically significant relation between prior experience and course grade, with more experience predicting higher grades. Except ethnicity, other variables such as gender and transfer status were not found to be significant. This study emphasizes the need to consider the prior knowledge of students in building introductory computer science curricula, such as creating multiple tracks with students self-selecting into higher or lower prior-experience cohorts.