Admission to selective colleges has grown more competitive, yielding student bodies that are unrepresentative of the U.S. population. Admission officers report using sorting (e.g., GPA, standardized tests) and concertedly cultivated (e.g., extracurricular activities) and ascriptive status (e.g., whether an applicant identifies as a member of a…

New York City's elite public specialized high schools have a long history of offering a rigorous college preparatory education to the City's most academically talented students. Though immensely popular and highly selective, their policy of admitting students on the basis of a single entrance exam has been heavily criticized. Many argue, for…

Secondary education in Fiji ends with the Form 7 examination. Predictive validity for academic success of Form 7 scores which form the basis for admission into the Bachelor of Medicine Bachelor of Surgery programme of the Fiji School of Medicine was examined via a cohort of 129 students. Success rates for year 1 in 2008, 2009, and 2010 were 90.7…

Children learn best in a classroom that contains students with varied abilities and levels of intelligence. (CK)

The Council for Basic Education sponsored an all-day symposium on open admissions in 1971. This booklet contains the full text of the addresses given on that occasion, as well as the major part of the discussion among the panelists and answers to questions from the audience. The aim of the symposium was not only to provide information about…

This study investigated the potential impact on enrollment of raising academic admissions requirements for first-semester freshmen at Stephen F. Austin University (Texas). Data collected in spring 1998 included three years of enrollment and admissions data from SFA's admissions office, 1995-96 statewide high school graduate and individual school…

This document discusses the results of a study completed by the Colorado Community College System in 2001-2002, which analyzed community college applicants. The data was collected in order to aid in enrollment management, scheduling, advising, and other policy decision-making. The applicants were kept representative of the available population in…

The professional school is caught between a social need to grant preferred admission to disadvantaged minority applicants--and the risks that go with reverse discrimination. (DM)

A modified admissions process is described that would reduce total costs without any deterioration in effectiveness. The changes are minor but may be considered revolutionary since the dominant role of A-level grades and the generally mechanical function of selectors would be made much more explicit. (LBH)

This history focuses on three main themes to examine the selective function of American college admission policies between 1870 and 1970: (1) admission policies in the context of social and institutional change; (2) the ability of higher education institutions to absorb new constituencies; and (3) the concept of selective admission, or policies…

Two broad messages emerge from the case of The Regents of the University of California vs. Allan Bakke: (1) there is a need for strengthening the "soft" or difficult-to-quantify data used in admissions decisions; and (2) there is a need to implement concepts of educational due process in the admissions procedure. These two exist in some…