This paper investigates the role played by self-confidence in college applications. Using incentivized experiments, we measure the self-confidence of more than 2,000 students applying to colleges in France. The best female students and students from low socioeconomic status (low-SES) significantly underestimate their rank in the grade distribution…

While the number of individuals in the United States between the ages of 25-44 with a bachelor's degree has been increasing, so too has the number of individuals who have started college and dropped out. Higher education has numerous societal and individual benefits that are not being actualized because there are simply not enough individuals with…

Past work and college-access programs often treat college knowledge as discrete pieces of information and focus on the amount of available college information. I use ethnographic and multiwave interview data to compare college-aspiring working- and middle-class black 9th and 11th graders across almost two years in high school along with their…

The core theme of this article is the emerging tension between the egalitarian discourse that increases the general aspiration of people to become more educated and actual admission constraints. A desire to attend a university and not being allowed to (i.e. non-admittance) is a loss that can potentially result in an anomic condition. Anomie theory…

Too many policies and practices aiming to improve college access and admissions overlook an important group of prospective enrollees: current college students. Substantial policy attention is placed on supporting college applications and decisions for those applying straight from high school. Even though one million students switch into a new…

This study investigates the student mobility choices at different stages in transnational education (TNE) and how their choices are shaped by varying level contexts. Combining survey and interview data collected at a US-China TNE programme, the authors found that majority of students did not intend to be mobile during the programme. Rather, they…

Concerns of equity with respect to the community college model in East Asia persist in educational research. In this study, we described and analysed students' "lived experience" in community colleges in Hong Kong in terms of the "warming up" or "cooling out" of their educational desire. Semistructured interviews with…

The extraordinary expansion of higher education has not been accompanied by more equitable access to universities for various disadvantaged groups. Rural youth is at the heart of this study that draws on secondary data and literature to examine rural-urban disparities in higher education access in two high-participation systems in the Caucasus and…

This qualitative case study examines the college choice decisions of rural students enrolled in engineering majors to understand what conditions and experiences led rural students to pursue engineering at their institution. We found four themes that help illuminate rural engineering students' college choice journeys (1) The Inextricable Nature of…

It is important to consider the cultural and community assets that influence Black girls' intentions to pursue higher education, such as parental messages on degree attainment and college success. The present qualitative study explored how high-achieving Black women perceived and internalized the college preparation socialization they received…

There are numerous scholarly articles that focus on Chinese Students' decisions to go overseas and challenges they face in American High Schools. These research generates a holistic view on the subject., with many of them agreeing each other. Yet, despite many scholarly articles discussing this topic, I find few of these studies originate from…

School infiltration is an important aspect of family parenting research in recent years. This study reexamines the evaluation mechanism of higher education access path to explore the feelings of schooling winners (also Gaokao winners). Different from stratified education's understanding of family authority, this study proposes to deconstruct the…

School to work transition is an important aspect of lifelong learning that has increased in significance as the knowledge-based economy takes off in developed countries. Rapid structural economic changes, the importance of innovation, and a shorter lifecycle of products require education systems to adjust to the needs of economies and individuals.…

This study used latent class analysis to examine the trajectories followed by young people's educational aspirations in England over the age range from 13 to 16 years and their relationship to educational achievement. The results suggested that young people's aspirations followed six trajectories. Four trajectories showed overall patterns of…

Despite high educational aspirations amongst asylum seekers and refugees (ASRs), scholarship on international student migration and mobility commonly lacks insight deriving from forced migration research. Drawing on qualitative research concerned with Syrian ASRs' educational aspirations and lived experiences regarding higher education access in…