Impact of optimizer on the MLP-based models for student performance classification

Effectively predicting student academic performance is a critical challenge in engineering education, where enhancing the performance and generalization of machine learning models can significantly aid early intervention strategies, which are crucial for engineering students as they help identify an...

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Main Authors: Osman, Fairul Nazmie, Abdul Aziz, Mohd Azri, Mohd Yassin, Ihsan, Taib, Mohd Nasir
Format: Article
Language:en
Published: UiTM Press 2025
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Online Access:https://ir.uitm.edu.my/id/eprint/126331/1/126331.pdf
https://ir.uitm.edu.my/id/eprint/126331/
https://jeesr.uitm.edu.my
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author Osman, Fairul Nazmie
Abdul Aziz, Mohd Azri
Mohd Yassin, Ihsan
Taib, Mohd Nasir
author_facet Osman, Fairul Nazmie
Abdul Aziz, Mohd Azri
Mohd Yassin, Ihsan
Taib, Mohd Nasir
author_sort Osman, Fairul Nazmie
building Tun Abdul Razak Library
collection Institutional Repository
content_provider Universiti Teknologi Mara
content_source UiTM Institutional Repository
continent Asia
country Malaysia
description Effectively predicting student academic performance is a critical challenge in engineering education, where enhancing the performance and generalization of machine learning models can significantly aid early intervention strategies, which are crucial for engineering students as they help identify and support those at risk of falling behind, ensuring better academic outcomes and retention in the challenging field. This study investigates the impact of different optimization algorithms on Multi-Layer Perceptron (MLP) models for student performance forecasting, utilizing a dataset of 99 student samples. Recursive Feature Elimination (RFE) was employed to select the most salient features, thereby reducing model complexity. Five optimizers, AdamW, AdaGrad, AmsGrad, Nadam, and SGD with Momentum were evaluated to assess their influence on convergence speed, stability, and generalization. Performance was gauged by the number of epochs for convergence and key metrics including accuracy, precision, recall, and F1-score. AdamW and Nadam demonstrated superior overall performance, converging rapidly with stable results. AdamW achieved the highest F1-score (86.95%), while both AdamW and Nadam attained the highest testing accuracy (80.0%). Conversely, SGD with Momentum underperformed, exhibiting signs of underfitting with the lowest accuracy (55.0%) and F1-score (47.05%). By combining RFE with a careful selection of adaptive optimizers, this research underscores a robust methodology for developing MLP models capable of effectively analyzing educational data. These findings highlight the balance between learning efficiency and predictive reliability, supporting data-driven decision-making in education. Future research will focus on validating these findings on larger datasets and exploring the impact of optimizer choice on fairness metrics in educational predictions.
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spelling my.uitm.ir-1263312025-11-17T02:18:28Z https://ir.uitm.edu.my/id/eprint/126331/ Impact of optimizer on the MLP-based models for student performance classification jeesr Osman, Fairul Nazmie Abdul Aziz, Mohd Azri Mohd Yassin, Ihsan Taib, Mohd Nasir Performance. Competence. Academic achievement Algorithms Effectively predicting student academic performance is a critical challenge in engineering education, where enhancing the performance and generalization of machine learning models can significantly aid early intervention strategies, which are crucial for engineering students as they help identify and support those at risk of falling behind, ensuring better academic outcomes and retention in the challenging field. This study investigates the impact of different optimization algorithms on Multi-Layer Perceptron (MLP) models for student performance forecasting, utilizing a dataset of 99 student samples. Recursive Feature Elimination (RFE) was employed to select the most salient features, thereby reducing model complexity. Five optimizers, AdamW, AdaGrad, AmsGrad, Nadam, and SGD with Momentum were evaluated to assess their influence on convergence speed, stability, and generalization. Performance was gauged by the number of epochs for convergence and key metrics including accuracy, precision, recall, and F1-score. AdamW and Nadam demonstrated superior overall performance, converging rapidly with stable results. AdamW achieved the highest F1-score (86.95%), while both AdamW and Nadam attained the highest testing accuracy (80.0%). Conversely, SGD with Momentum underperformed, exhibiting signs of underfitting with the lowest accuracy (55.0%) and F1-score (47.05%). By combining RFE with a careful selection of adaptive optimizers, this research underscores a robust methodology for developing MLP models capable of effectively analyzing educational data. These findings highlight the balance between learning efficiency and predictive reliability, supporting data-driven decision-making in education. Future research will focus on validating these findings on larger datasets and exploring the impact of optimizer choice on fairness metrics in educational predictions. UiTM Press 2025-10 Article PeerReviewed text en https://ir.uitm.edu.my/id/eprint/126331/1/126331.pdf Osman, Fairul Nazmie and Abdul Aziz, Mohd Azri and Mohd Yassin, Ihsan and Taib, Mohd Nasir (2025) Impact of optimizer on the MLP-based models for student performance classification. (2025) Journal of Electrical and Electronic Systems Research (JEESR) <https://ir.uitm.edu.my/view/publication/Journal_of_Electrical_and_Electronic_Systems_Research_=28JEESR=29.html>, 27 (1): 12. pp. 102-110. ISSN 1985-5389 https://jeesr.uitm.edu.my 10.24191/jeesr.v27i1.012 10.24191/jeesr.v27i1.012 10.24191/jeesr.v27i1.012
spellingShingle Performance. Competence. Academic achievement
Algorithms
Osman, Fairul Nazmie
Abdul Aziz, Mohd Azri
Mohd Yassin, Ihsan
Taib, Mohd Nasir
Impact of optimizer on the MLP-based models for student performance classification
title Impact of optimizer on the MLP-based models for student performance classification
title_full Impact of optimizer on the MLP-based models for student performance classification
title_fullStr Impact of optimizer on the MLP-based models for student performance classification
title_full_unstemmed Impact of optimizer on the MLP-based models for student performance classification
title_short Impact of optimizer on the MLP-based models for student performance classification
title_sort impact of optimizer on the mlp-based models for student performance classification
topic Performance. Competence. Academic achievement
Algorithms
url https://ir.uitm.edu.my/id/eprint/126331/1/126331.pdf
https://ir.uitm.edu.my/id/eprint/126331/
https://jeesr.uitm.edu.my
url_provider http://ir.uitm.edu.my/