Course Success Rate Data

Scroll down or click the link for each topic to view relevant data. All data displayed is from De Anza's Office of Institutional Research and Planning.

Course Success Rates

Success rates (A, B, C, P grades) have been steadily increasing across all modalities and spiked in 2020-21 during the COVID-19 pandemic. When looking at course success rates by modality, prior to 2020-21, the gap between online and face to face success has been narrowing to nearly similar rates. When looking at overall course success rates, over the past nine years, success rates are lowest for African American/Black, Pacific Islander, Native American, Latinx students, Foster Youth and LGBTQ+ students. While overall course success rates have improved, with an 80% success rate, 20% of our students are not completing the course in which they enroll, and this is most pronounced for our disproportionatly impacted student groups. 

As displayed above, course success rates between face-to-face and online courses in 2019-20 were nearly the same with improvements in success in online courses over the past 5 years. 

Course non-success (D, F, NP, I, FW grades) rates were on a downward trend prior to the COVID-19 pandemic for all modalities and were highest for online courses ranging from 14% to 10%.

Course withdraw rates (W, EW, MW grades) were also decreasing prior to the COVID-19 pandemic with online withdraw rates highest of all modalities ranging from 10% to 14%.

Success rates for female and male students has increased over the last 9 years, though female students consistently exhibit slightly higher success rates than male students by 4 percentage points on average. Students who identify as non-binary exhibit success rates lower than all other groups, on average 13 percentage points lower than female students.

Course success rates between students who identify as LGBTQ+ and those who do not average a 9-percentage point gap with LGBTQ+ students exhibiting lower success rates averaging 70% compared to 79% for non-LGBTQ+ students.

Students enrolled in DSPS and EOPS have success rates above 80% on average while CalWorks students have an average success rate of 70% and foster youth students exhibit the lowest success rate at 58% on average.

Course success rates by have increased from 76% to 80% over the past 9 years, and all ethnic groups have seen in increase in their success rate, however, there remains large gaps between the success of African American/Black, Native American, Latinx and Pacific Islander students and white and Asian students.

Note: Racial/ethnic groups were ordered by assigning students with two or more ethnicities selected with the following ranks: Laotian, Cambodian, Vietnamese, Native American, Pacific Islander, Filipinx, African American/Black, Korean, Asian Indian, Japanese, Chinese, Asian Other, Latinx, White, Decline to State. For example, if a student selected Pacific Islander and Laotian, they were included in the Laotian group.  

The Asian student population was disaggregated into subgroups including Laotian, Cambodian, Vietnamese, Pacific Islander, Filipinx, Korean, Asian Indian, Japanese, Chinese and Asian Other. When looking at success rates across the groups, success rates remain lowest for African American/Black, Pacific Islander, Native American, and Latinx students, lower than those exhibited by Laotian, Cambodian, and Vietnamese students.

Course Success Rate Trends by Ethnicity Including Asian Subgroups

Note: First generation status is defined using the NCES definition as a student whose parent(s) has completed high school or less. Low income is defines as family income including all sources of income for student's whose family income is below $25,000. 

As displayed above, there is a negative 7 % pt gap between first generation and non first generation students, on average over the past 5 years, with a negative 8 % pt gap for low income student's success rates compared to students who do not identify as low income. 

When disagreggating first generation students by ethnicity, we see success patterns by ethnicity perpetuated when adding the additional factor of income. For example, African American/Black students have the highest difference in success rates between first generation and non first genaration students, with first generation African American/Black students exhibiting success rates 7% points lower than their non first generation counterparts. Native American students exhibit a 9 percentage point difference while all other racial/ethnic groups follow similar patterns with first generation students exhbitiing lower success rates than their non first generation counterparts, but average differences remain at or below 5% points for all other racial/ethnic groups. 

Similar to success for first generation students, across all racial/ethnic groups, students who identify as low income exhibit lower success rates than their counterparts who are not low income. The greatest divide is again for African American/Black and Native American students with a 11% point and 12% point difference, respectively. White students who identify as low income exihbit a difference of 6% points on average, while all other racial/ethnic groups are at or below a 5% point difference. 

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