This brief describes (1) what parents look for when they choose a school and (2) how these preferences affect the sorting of students into schools under different school-choice policies. The findings are based on lists of preferred schools submitted by over 20,000 applicants to a citywide lottery for more than 100 traditional and charter public…

We estimate school-choice preferences revealed by the rank-ordered lists submitted by more than 22,000 applicants to a citywide lottery for more than 200 traditional and charter public schools in Washington, DC. The results confirm previously reported findings that commuting distance, school demographics, and academic indicators play important…

A telephone survey of 500 people admitted to the University of Maryland, College Park (UMCP), but who did not enroll in the fall of 1974, was conducted. Responses were received from 437 (87 percent) no-shows. Results indicated that 82 percent were attending a school outside Maryland and the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, while 34 percent…

Discusses factors which influence the acceptance of particular students at highly competitive colleges. Suggests that admissions officers especially prefer athletes, minority students, and alumni children. Other preferred applicants include school leaders, students with artistic talent or notable personal strengths, and students from wealthy…

The decisions made by admissions committee members of the Medical College of Virginia were studied to determine the criteria used to arrive at value judgments and to analyze variations in predicted ratings based on these criteria. All 983 applicants to the 1980-81 entering class of the medical school who underwent file review evaluations (the…

A study was conducted to examine whether age is one characteristic used by law schools in selecting applicants. Data were obtained on 76,06l registrants for the 1975-76 law school application year. Constraints of the analyses reduced the sample to 43,180. An explanatory model of decision-making in the law school admissions process was formulated…

The extent to which personal and academic factors are important in college admission decisions was studied in 1978, based on data on 25,000 applicants to 9 colleges (Colgate University, Williams College, Ohio Wesleyan University, Kenyon College, Kalamazoo College, Occidental College, Hartwick College, University of Richmond, and Bucknell…