IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cdl/cshedu/qt87p9j2qf.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Eligibility for Admission to the University of California After the SAT/ACT: Toward a Redefinition of Eligibility

Author

Listed:
  • Geiser, Saul

Abstract

Eligibility is a policy construct unique to California. UC and CSU are the only US universities that distinguish between eligibility for admission and admission itself and set separate requirements for each. The eligibility construct derives originally from California’s 1960 Master Plan for Higher Education, which famously mandated that UC admit students from the top 12.5% (and CSU from the top 33.3%) of California public high school graduates. Thus began a long and twisting saga of policy implementation that has become increasingly convoluted over time. UC’s decision to eliminate the SAT/ACT in university admissions presents an opportune moment to rethink the eligibility construct from the ground up. This essay proposes, first, eliminating the now-antiquated “Eligibility Index,” a mechanical algorithm that is increasingly at odds with the thrust of UC admissions policy over the past two decades; second, moving from a 12.5% eligibility target (the percentage of students who qualify for admission) to a 7.5% participation target (the percentage who actually enroll); and third, redefining eligibility from a norm-referenced to a criterion-referenced construct. Using holistic or comprehensive review to select from among applicants who have successfully completed UC subject requirements at a specified level of proficiency, UC would admit that number of applicants needed to yield a 7.5% participation rate among California high school graduates. This is the same average participation rate that the Master Plan has yielded historically, so that the proposal would be revenue-neutral with respect to State funding for UC. At the same time, like the 12.5% eligibility target, a 7.5% participation target would tie UC enrollment growth to growth in California’s college-age population. Conversion from an eligibility to a participation target would not eliminate the eligibility construct but would redefine it. In place of a norm-referenced standard – whether students rank in the “top 12.5%” – eligibility would be redefined as a criterion-referenced standard: Whether students have mastered the foundational knowledge and skills needed to succeed at UC. When we judge students against that standard, two truths become evident. First is that the pool of students who are qualified for and can succeed at UC is far larger than UC can accommodate; the chief advantage of a criterion-referenced standard is the greater scope for UC to select from a broader, more diverse pool of qualified applicants. Second is that expanding eligibility is much less a priority than increasing actual enrollment and participation rates among the pool of those who are already qualified.

Suggested Citation

  • Geiser, Saul, 2022. "Eligibility for Admission to the University of California After the SAT/ACT: Toward a Redefinition of Eligibility," University of California at Berkeley, Center for Studies in Higher Education qt87p9j2qf, Center for Studies in Higher Education, UC Berkeley.
  • Handle: RePEc:cdl:cshedu:qt87p9j2qf
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/87p9j2qf.pdf;origin=repeccitec
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Geiser, Saul & Maria Veronica Santelices, 2007. "Validity Of High-School Grades In Predicting Student Success Beyond The Freshman Year: High-School Record vs. Standardized Tests as Indicators of Four-Year College Outcomes," University of California at Berkeley, Center for Studies in Higher Education qt7306z0zf, Center for Studies in Higher Education, UC Berkeley.
    2. King, C. Judson, 2018. "The University of California: Creating, Nurturing, and Maintaining Academic Quality in a Public University Setting," University of California at Berkeley, Center for Studies in Higher Education qt6rj182v7, Center for Studies in Higher Education, UC Berkeley.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. M. M. Sulphey & Nasser Saad Al-Kahtani & Abdul Malik Syed, 2018. "Relationship between admission grades and academic achievement," Entrepreneurship and Sustainability Issues, VsI Entrepreneurship and Sustainability Center, vol. 5(3), pages 648-658, March.
    2. Geiser, Saul, 2008. "Back to the Basics: In Defense of Achievement (and Achievement Tests) in College Admissions," University of California at Berkeley, Center for Studies in Higher Education qt8kd4q096, Center for Studies in Higher Education, UC Berkeley.
    3. Angela Lee Duckworth & Kelly M. Allred, 2012. "Temperament in the Classroom," Working Papers 2012-003, Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Working Group.
    4. Francesconi, Marco & Slonimczyk, Fabian & Yurko, Anna, 2017. "Moving On Up for High School Graduates in Russia: The Consequences of the Uni ed State Exam Reform," CEPR Discussion Papers 11996, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Lucio Masserini & Matilde Bini & Monica Pratesi, 2017. "Effectiveness of non-selective evaluation test scores for predicting first-year performance in university career: a zero-inflated beta regression approach," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 51(2), pages 693-708, March.
    6. Takao Kato & Chad Sparber, 2013. "Quotas and Quality: The Effect of H-1B Visa Restrictions on the Pool of Prospective Undergraduate Students from Abroad," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 95(1), pages 109-126, March.
    7. Jiang, Meng & Ishdorj, Ariun & Dudensing, Rebekka M., 2018. "How standardized testing affects students’ college readiness in Texas," 2018 Annual Meeting, August 5-7, Washington, D.C. 274492, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    8. James J. Heckman & Chase O. Corbin, 2016. "Capabilities and Skills," Journal of Human Development and Capabilities, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 17(3), pages 342-359, July.
    9. O.C. Mwaba Sidney & T. Kusanthan & J. Anitha Menon, 2015. "Gender Differences in Academic Performance: A Case of Psychology Students at the University of Zambia," Studies in Social Sciences and Humanities, Research Academy of Social Sciences, vol. 3(3), pages 131-138.
    10. Lisa Barrow & Marisa de la Torre & Lauren Sartain, 2016. "The Role of Selective High Schools in Equalizing Educational Outcomes: Heterogeneous Effects by Neighborhood Socioeconomic Status," Working Paper Series WP-2016-17, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    11. Geiser, Saul, 2008. "Not So Fast! A Second Opinion on a University of California Proposal to Endorse the New SAT," University of California at Berkeley, Center for Studies in Higher Education qt0x09n63m, Center for Studies in Higher Education, UC Berkeley.
    12. Rongrong Yu & Kusum Singh, 2018. "Teacher support, instructional practices, student motivation, and mathematics achievement in high school," The Journal of Educational Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 111(1), pages 81-94, January.
    13. M. M. Sulphey & Nasser Saad Al-Kahtani & Abdul Malik Syed, 2018. "Relationship between admission grades and academic achievement," Post-Print hal-01829634, HAL.
    14. Richard C. Atkinson and Saul Geiser, 2009. "Reflections on a Century of College Admissions Tests," University of California at Berkeley, Center for Studies in Higher Education qt49z7127p, Center for Studies in Higher Education, UC Berkeley.
    15. Emilio Gutiérrez & Rodimiro Rodrigo, 2014. "Closing the achievement gap in mathematics: evidence from a remedial program in Mexico City," Latin American Economic Review, Springer;Centro de Investigaciòn y Docencia Económica (CIDE), vol. 23(1), pages 1-30, December.
    16. Kato, Takao & Song, Yang, 2018. "An Advisor like Me: Does Gender Matter?," IZA Discussion Papers 11575, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    17. Jerome Segura III & Jonathan Willner, 2019. "Athleticism in NCAA D-III: It Ain’t Only Football That Matters," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 20(7), pages 929-958, October.
    18. Mohamad Ikhsan & Natanael Waraney Gerald Massie & Ari Kuncoro, 2019. "A Comparison Between Merit-Based and Test-Based Higher Education Admission in Indonesia," LPEM FEBUI Working Papers 201932, LPEM, Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Indonesia.
    19. Kremer, Kristen P. & Huang, Jin & Vaughn, Michael G. & Maynard, Brandy R., 2019. "College expectations of eighth grade students: The role of learning approaches and parent influences," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 1-1.
    20. Holmgren, Mark & McCracken, Vicki A., 2010. "Identifying Student Success at a Land Grant Institution," 2010 Annual Meeting, July 25-27, 2010, Denver, Colorado 61701, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cdl:cshedu:qt87p9j2qf. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Lisa Schiff (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://escholarship.org/uc/cshe/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.