Students Flow in Private Universities in Nigeria: A Markov Chain Modelling Approach

Abstract

The emergence of Private Universities in Nigeria is expected to help the flow and progression of students. Hence, this paper applies Markov Chain modelling to flows of students. The population of the study includes all students undertaking four-year programmes at a private University. The Faculty of Social and Management Sciences is chosen as a convenience sample. This Faculty has six departments for which secondary data are available for  2004/2005 to 2013/2014 sessions. Available data were analysed using the Matlab software. The results revealed that the probability of a student repeating a grade year influences the expected length of time of stay in the programme. Also, the study found that the average time a student spent at each level of the programme ranged from 1.14 to 1.43 sessions; the expected time it took a student to reach the wastage or graduation absorbing states ranged from a minimum of 1.4714 sessions (in 400 level) to a maximum of  4.7463 sessions (in 100 level). Furthermore, the probability of a student reaching a wastage absorbing state continuously decreased in all Departments and ranged from a maximum of 0.43 (in 100 level) to a minimum of 0.01 (in 400 level). A reverse trend in the probability of reaching a wastage absorbing state was however exhibited for the probability of a student reaching a graduating absorbing state.  Finally, for the students sampled, the wastage ratio varied from 1.49 to 3.87, while the coefficient of efficiency was between 25.84 and 67.32.We concluded that Sociology and Anthropology Department has the highest level of efficiency of students progression in the Faculty.

Keywords: markov processes, absorption states, dropout rates, private universities, transition states.