Key Findings and Recommendations
Key Finding 1: Enrollment Preferences Vary by Student Characteristics
As students’ ACT Composite scores, parent education levels, and degree aspirations increase, so does their likelihood of attending 4-year colleges (in general), 4-year private colleges (in particular), out-of-state colleges, and colleges located farther from their homes. These findings are consistent with the findings of numerous research studies conducted over the past few decades that highlight the systematic differences among students in the type and location of colleges in which they enroll. College preferences differ by student characteristics in similar ways both at the time of score sending and at the time of enrollment. Information presented in Part 1 and Part 2 of the College Choice Report suggests that self-reported preferences are fairly stable throughout the college choice process and that many students act on their preferences when making their enrollment decisions.
Recommendations:
- Admissions personnel should use self-reported college preferences in tandem with student characteristics to identify prospective students who are more likely to enroll and to track yield rates for students at different stages of the enrollment funnel.
- Admissions personnel should use self-reported college preferences as a means of developing marketing messages that reinforce enrollment preferences fitting the characteristics of the college as well as messages intended to modify students’ college preferences when they don’t match the characteristics of the college.
Key Finding 2: College Choice Behaviors Differ in Predictable Ways by Student Achievement Level
ACT research has consistently found that student academic achievement as measured by ACT Composite score is an important indicator of student behavior during the college choice process. For example, with the exception of students in states that administer the ACT statewide to all 11th graders, students’ chances of first taking the ACT before 12th grade increase with their academic achievement level. Students with higher ACT Composite scores also tend to send their test scores to a greater number of colleges, and they are more likely to send their test scores to at least one college that selected them through EOS.
Recommendations:
- When placing EOS orders, admissions personnel should segment their search names using tighter ACT Composite score ranges (e.g., 3–5 points) to more effectively track yield rates for students at different stages of the enrollment funnel. This tracking will help colleges to better understand the differences in college choice behaviors by academic achievement level that are unique to that institution.
- When placing EOS orders, admissions personnel should use ACT Composite score ranges that exhibit desired testing and enrollment behaviors.
Key Finding 3: Enrollment Preferences and College Choice Behaviors Vary by State
As the ACT participation rate in a state increases, ACT-tested students look and behave more like typical high school graduates in the state. As the ACT participation rate in a state decreases, ACT-tested students tend to be a more select subset of high school graduates in the state. These differences are evident both in the college preferences and college choice behaviors of ACT-tested students across the states. For example, ACT-tested students in states with lower ACT participation rates are more likely than their peers to attend a 4-year college (especially a 4-year private college), an out-of-state college, and a college located farther from their homes. In contrast, relative to ACT-tested students in other states, those in states with higher ACT participation rates are more likely to have taken the ACT before 12th grade, opted into EOS, and sent their ACT scores to at least one college that selected them through EOS. For any market where a college searches for students, the ACT participation rate provides important clues to student enrollment intentions and likely enrollment behaviors.
Recommendations:
- Admissions personnel should take into consideration both the historic trends and future state policy changes that may have an impact on the ACT participation rates in their state and other states in which they recruit ACT-tested students. For example, in the 2013 graduating class, North Carolina’s ACT participation rate will increase to nearly 100% due to a recent policy to administer the ACT Test to all public high school 11th graders.
- When placing EOS orders, admissions personnel should pay close attention to the testing environment in a given market and choose the source of names that is most likely to provide a group of students that match the desired student characteristics and enrollment behaviors of their search pool.
Key Finding 4: Significant Numbers of Students Enroll at Institutions Through Unofficial ACT Scores
Unofficial test scores are scores taken from a high school transcript rather than official score reports received directly from ACT. Enrolling on the basis of unofficial scores is a behavior seen for students at all achievement levels, for all degree objectives, and in all state types, but it is especially pronounced among first-generation students, students who plan to obtain an associate’s degree, students in the highest ACT Composite score range, and students in states with the lowest ACT participation rate. Just over half of all first-generation college students attend a college that did not receive an official ACT score report for that student. More than half of all students who plan to obtain an associate’s degree or undergraduate certificate attend a college that did not receive an official ACT score report for that student. Finally, half of all students in states with the lowest ACT participation rates are attending colleges that did not receive an official ACT score report for that student. For students in states with low ACT participation rates, it may be the case that many of these students are enrolling using official SAT® scores.
Official score reports contain more than 250 data elements compared with the four ACT subscores and ACT Composite score contained in the unofficial scores from the high school transcript. The information from the full score report provides a great deal of information on student interests, needs, preferences, and abilities and is valuable for a variety of preenrollment and post-enrollment uses.
Recommendations:
- All institutions that require or recommend test scores for admission should consider requiring official scores at point of enrollment and, when possible, at the point of admission. This is especially true for institutions in states that do statewide administrations of the ACT.
- Open admission institutions, including community colleges, that admit students regardless of test score should still consider requiring or recommending ACT score reports for students enrolling directly from high school as a way of reducing the number of students required to take course placement tests at point of entry.