Understanding Why IS Students Drop Out: Toward A Process Theory

IT students dropping out is a key problem in academic institutions worldwide. Previous research on student dropout has advanced many factor or variance models explaining or predicting why university student drop out. Although these studies increased our understanding of the reasons students drop out of computer science courses, university studies, and online learning, we find the factor or variance models are an incomplete research paradigm in understanding the phenomenon. We argue that students’ decision to drop out is a complex and dynamic phenomenon, which develops through a number of stages. As a result, this phenomenon is best understood in terms of process theories instead of variance models. Unfortunately, we find no process studies that explore a study trail describing the process that leads to students dropping out of university. As the first step in filling this gap in the research, we interviewed 40 IS (IS) and Software Engineering (SE) students, who dropped out of university at least once. Based on the interviews, we inductively developed a process theory in terms of van de Ven’s (1992) work. Our process theory explains the trajectories that lead university students to decide to drop out. In addition, the process theory explains the dropout decision-making trail after the decision to drop out has been made. Our findings have implications for research and practice. For research, this article opens up new research directions for students who have dropped out. For practice, the findings provide new insights into the reasons students drop out of IS/SE programs, and based on that provides strategies for preventing students from dropping out.