Each year, around one in five first-year university students receives a negative binding study advice. Under this system, students must obtain a minimum number of credits in their first year in order to continue in their degree programme. The idea behind BSA is that students who perform less well will transfer sooner to a programme in which they have a greater chance of succeeding. It is also intended to encourage students to apply themselves sufficiently from the outset.
First large-scale study on BSA
Because the effectiveness of binding study advice had hardly been examined, economist Sander de Vries decided to investigate it in more detail. Using microdata from Statistics Netherlands (CBS), he studied the effects of the introduction of BSA across 351 university degree programmes, covering 712,384 bachelor’s students who started university between 1994 and 2014. His analysis considered short-term effects, such as dropout and enrolment, as well as long-term effects such as graduation rates and study duration. This makes it the largest study to date on the effectiveness of BSA.
More dropouts, but not more graduates
De Vries finds that, following the introduction of BSA, more students stop their studies in the first year. Dropout rises by 7.5 percentage points. At the same time, the share of students who eventually complete their original degree programme falls by 3.6 percentage points. De Vries says: "The analysis shows that around half of the additional dropouts would probably have completed their studies without BSA. BSA therefore affects not only students with a limited chance of success, but also students who would most likely have been able to complete their degree successfully."
Nor does BSA lead to greater academic success in the longer term. Its introduction actually reduces the eventual likelihood of obtaining a university degree by around 1.4 percentage points. In addition, the average time to graduate within the original programme remains unchanged. The total time students spend enrolled in higher education also changes very little. BSA therefore does not demonstrably make students more successful or quicker to graduate. "These results contrast with the position of Universities of the Netherlands (UNL), which argues that BSA promotes academic success," De Vries concludes.
Few benefits, but considerable disadvantages
Finally, the economist argues that BSA has several other significant disadvantages. It may increase the workload of programme directors, who must warn and support underperforming students in good time. Legal procedures, in which students challenge a negative advice, may also take up valuable time. For students, BSA means they cannot always continue in their preferred degree programme. There are also concerns about possible negative effects on their mental health. All in all, De Vries suggests that binding study advice appears to offer few benefits for either students or institutions, while carrying considerable disadvantages.
An extensive analysis of BSA has been published in the economists’ journal ESB. This study forms part of Sander de Vries’s PhD research. He will defend his doctoral thesis this coming Wednesday, 1 April. More information can be found here.
