Correlation between academic performance and absenteeism in a Production Engineering program

Abstract

The academic performance of students can be impacted by several factors, among them the absenteeism (class absences) is one of the main responsible ones. In this way, this study had as objective to verify if there is any correlation between the final grades of the students and their absences in the classes during the semesters, in the courses of the Production Engineering program of University of Santa Cruz do Sul, Brazil. Based on the objectives, a descriptive research was employed, which used documentary research to perform the data collection. The data used were the absentee totals and the final grades of the students in each semester. A statistical analysis of correlation and linear regression was applied, and the result showed that there is a correlation between absenteeism and the students' academic performance. Although in some cases this correlation is not so significant, it was verified that missing classes decreases students' grades.