شبكة المعلومات العربية التربوية

This study looks into undergraduate admissions to higher education from an international perspective involving seven countries selected on the basis of their representation of centralized and/or decentralized admissions models and types, on the basis of their diversified higher educational systems, and their representation of four geographical regions, i.e., East Asia, North America, Europe (including West and Central Europe) and Eurasia. The countries selected are: Japan; the United States of America; the United Kingdom; the People’s Republic of China; Austria; France, and the Republic of Georgia. Data and information were obtained from a host of sources including policy papers of Ministries of Education, refereed journal articles, websites of selected higher educational institutions, the International Association of Universities (IAU), UNESCO, and the National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC), and many others. A frame analysis which is most commonly used in journalism was employed in analyzing information derived from websites and building thematic frames for systematic analysis. Rather than reporting one typology for admission composed of type and model as provided by Helms, this study yielded different typologies of admission consisting of: (i) a typology of models and (ii) a typology of types and their patterns in higher educational institutions in the countries selected for the study. The country with the most wide-ranging admission system was the U.S. with 4 different models of admissions though applied differently across higher educational institutions. The type was pervasive in all countries studied. Further, in terms of procedure all variations appeared among the seven countries compared, excepting the U.K. which had a distinct procedure worth emulating. Expansion, massification, and the increasing number of entrants to higher education were discussed. These were further examined in relation to quality in higher education.