An Analysis of Certain Factors Which May Affect Completion in Supervised Correspondence Study
A NUMBER of research studies have indicated that pupils who complete correspondence study courses are above average in mental ability. This might indicate that correspondence instruction is a selective process and that in general pupils with above average mental ability who register for work by this method are more likely to continue to com pletion than are registrants of average or below average ability. There is, however, the alternate possibility that selection occurs before registration and that pupils who register for correspondence study are a selected group to begin with. There are serious implications for those in charge of correspondence study programs to con sider in these possibilities. If the correspondence study process tends to eliminate less able students, it would seem to be desirable to examine this pro cess to determine if methods can be devised to help these people to be more successful. If, on the other hand, selection occurs before registra tion, the matter of guidance may be involved. Perhaps correspondence study is not being made equally available to all who could profit from it. This study is an attempt to determine whether cer tain factors which might affect success in corre spondence study are really instrumental in doing so.