Against the backdrop of global transformations in university admission systems, the quest for an enrolment paradigm that efficiently identifies and selects high-quality students has gained paramount significance. With the help of propensity score matching (PSM), this study controlled students' backgrounds and compared the performance of students…

Prospective graduate students' noncognitive attributes are commonly evaluated as a part of a holistic review of their admission applications. Yet it is difficult to determine which noncognitive attributes are considered by those who evaluate graduate admissions applications and what approaches they take to measure applicants' noncognitive…

This dissertation consists of three chapters covering applications within Matching Theory. In the first chapter, we study the decentralized college admissions in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), where students submit their applications to each college separately, and colleges use a ranking based on weighted centralized test scores. Unlike the…

This longitudinal study investigated the challenges and sources of community cultural wealth that underrepresented communication sciences and disorders (CSD) students leverage in navigating each application stage to master's level speech-language pathology (SLP) programs. Four surveys were distributed over 11 months via Qualtrics to CSD…

Stratification in selective college admissions persists even as colleges' criteria for evaluating merit have multiplied in efforts to increase socioeconomic and racial diversity. Middle-class and affluent families increasingly turn to privatized services, such as private college consulting, to navigate what they perceive to be a complicated and…

Higher Education Institutions in England are an integral part of the government's social mobility strategy. Contextualisation of undergraduate admissions decisions has emerged as a key tool towards progressing social mobility objectives. The present paper builds on our previous 2013 research by describing findings from 15 qualitative interviews…

The literature is replete with references to a disproportionate reliance on admission test scores (e.g., the ACT or SAT) in the college admissions process. School-reported reliance on test scores and grades has been used to study this question, generally indicating relatively equal reliance on the two, with a slightly higher endorsement of grades.…

An increasing number of postsecondary institutions in the United States have introduced test-optional admissions policies primarily due to criticism of standardized admissions tests as potentially biased predictors of student success. However, the impact of the test-optional movement is largely unknown and continues to evolve amid the COVID-19…

Nursing programs across North America are typically significantly oversubscribed, resulting in inflated admitting averages thus making it an unattainable profession for many qualified students. This article proposes a lottery-based admissions process, whereby students who meet established selected criteria for entry would be selected at random…

The phenomenon of first impression is well researched in social psychology, but less so in the study of OSCEs and the multiple mini interview (MMI). To explore its bearing on the MMI method we included a rating of first impression in the MMI for student selection executed 2012 at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Germany (196…

I study the efficacy of test-based meritocracy in college admissions by evaluating the impact of a grade-based "top percent'' policy implemented by the University of California. Eligibility in the Local Context (ELC) provided large admission advantages to the top four percent of 2001-2011 graduates from each California high school. I…

There is debate over whether Asian American students are admitted to selective colleges and universities at lower rates than white students with similar academic qualifications. However, there have been few empirical investigations of this issue, in large part due to a dearth of data. Here we present the results from analyzing 685,709 applications…

In this paper, we address whether the provision of contextual information about where students live and learn has the potential to expand postsecondary opportunities to students from disadvantaged neighborhoods and high schools. To examine this question, we describe the results of field experiments with admissions officers working in eight…

This study investigated the underexplored topic of teacher preparation program admissions processes by interviewing faculty and analyzing program documents. We investigated how 31 K-12 mathematics and science teacher preparation programs (MSTPPs) and faculty attend to diversity, equity, inclusion, and social and racial justice (DEIJ). Specific…

Artificial Intelligence (AI) strives to create intelligent machines with human-like abilities. However, like humans, AI can be prone to implicit biases due to flaws in data or algorithms. These biases may cause discriminatory outcomes and decrease trust in AI. Bias in higher education admission may limit access to opportunities and further social…