College entrance scores have been used as predictors of student success for many years. The purpose of this study was to determine if there was an interconnectedness between Occupational Therapy Assistant program student variables of high school biology grade, college preparatory or non-college preparatory track, and COMPASS college entrance test scores in math, algebra, writing, and reading, and student success in Biology 193 for first-time takers. The study was performed at a large technical college in east Georgia. In all, 400 students were examined with data used on 202 as the remaining 198 were missing variables. A multiple regression analysis revealed one variable, student grade in high school biology, that was statistically significant. A stepwise regression analysis revealed three independent variables that were interrelated and statistically significant that could be used as predictors of student success in college level biology. These were high school biology grade, COMPASS math test score, and COMPASS reading test score. Based on these findings, we can conclude students who show a low interconnectedness of these three model selected variables could be advised to take a lower level biology course prior to taking Biology 193 to help ensure success in it. These variables could be used to help predict OTA student retention levels. For this study, the end-of-course grade in Biology 193, reported on student transcripts in letter form, was converted to a numerical form. These grades were used as the predicted scores. Regression coefficients were calculated and actual student scored in Biology 193 were computed. Findings indicated the predicted and computed scores were statistically similar and reliable. The three model selected independent variables could also be used to compute an approximate grade a student might expect to make in Biology 193 and make faculty advisement of the student more accurate.
