Yes, You Can! Effects of Transparent Admission Standards on High School Track Choice: A Randomized Field Experiment

High school track choice determines college access in many countries. We hypothesize that some qualified students avoid the college-bound track in high school simply because they overestimate admission requirements. To test this hypothesis, we conducted a randomized field experiment that communicated the admission standards of local secondary schools on the academic track to students in Hungary before the application deadline. We targeted the subset of students (“seeds”) who occupied the most central position in the classroom-social networks, aiming to detect both direct effects on the track choice of targeted seeds and spillover effects on their untreated peers. We found neither a direct effect nor a spillover effect on students’ applications or admissions on average. Further analyses, however, revealed theoretically plausible heterogeneity in the direct causal effect of the intervention on the track choice of targeted seeds. Providing information about admission standards increased applications and admissions to secondary schools on the academic track among seeds who had a pre-existing interest in the academic track but were unsure of their chances of admission. This demonstrates that publicizing admissions standards can set students on a more ambitious educational trajectory. We discuss the implications for theory and policy.

An exploratory study of the implementation of admission standards (child:guardian ratios) in Ontario's Class A public pools

Admission standards or specific child:guardian ratios for public pools have been endorsed and promoted by the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long Term Care (MOHLTC) to prevent recreational water injuries and fatalities. However, the voluntary adoption of these admission standards in Ontario has not been evaluated. Therefore, the aim of this study was to explore the implementation of these admission standards in Class A public pools. An online survey was developed and disseminated to Class A public pool operators in Ontario. Frequency distributions were used to describe the results. All respondents have some form of admission standards integrated into their operations, with 68% using child:parent ratios that exceed the minimum MOHLTC's recommendations. The majority of operators (87%) felt that admission standards have a positive impact and there were no known increases in water-related incidents post-implementation. Many owners/operators (78%) would support their enactment into the pool regulations. The findings from this study highlight the promise of utilizing admission standards to prevent or, at the least reduce, the burden of injury related to recreational water use in Ontario. While the results are encouraging, it is recommended that further research be conducted as this was an exploratory study only.

University Competition and Transnational Education: The Choice of Branch Campus

We present a theoretical framework in which an elitist and a non-elitist university in a developed country compete by choosing admission standards and deciding whether or not to open a branch campus in a developing country. Students from a developing country attend university if either a branch campus is opened or, they can afford to move to the developed country. We find that the elitist university is more likely to open a branch campus. This result is reversed if the gain, in terms of prestige, to attend the home campus of the elitist university more than offsets a student’s mobility costs. A rise in the graduate wage increases the incentive for opening a branch campus, although this incentive is stronger for the elitist university.