Tag: applicants

As the supply of applicants declines, college admissions gets kinder and gentler

by Jon Marcus, The Hechinger Report
November 18, 2025

PLEASANTVILLE, N.Y. — As she approached her senior year in high school, the thought of moving on to college was “scary and intimidating” to Milianys Santiago — especially since she would be the first in her family to earn a degree.

Once she began working on her applications this fall, however, she was surprised. “It hasn’t been as stressful as I thought it would be,” she said.

It’s not that Santiago’s anxiety was misplaced: The college admissions process has been so notoriously anxiety inducing that students and their parents plan for it for years and — if social media is any indication — seem to consider an acceptance as among the greatest moments of their lives.

It’s that getting into college is in fact becoming easier, with admissions offices trying to lure more applicants from a declining pool of 18-year-olds. They’re creating one-click applications, waiving application fees, offering admission to high school seniors who haven’t even applied and recruiting students after the traditional May 1 cutoff.

The most dramatic change is in the odds of being admitted. Elite universities such as Harvard and CalTech take as few as 1 applicant in 33, but they are the exception. Colleges overall now accept about 6 in 10 students who apply, federal data show. That’s up from about 5 out of 10 a decade ago, the American Enterprise Institute calculates.

“The reality is, the overwhelming majority of universities are struggling to put butts in seats. And they need to do everything that they can to make it easier for students and their families,” said Kevin Krebs, founder of the college admission consulting firm HelloCollege.

This has never been as true as now, when the number of high school graduates entering higher education is about to begin a projected 15-year drop, starting with the class now being recruited. That’s on top of a 13 percent decline over the last 15 years.

Santiago, who lives in Hamilton, New Jersey, was waiting for a tour to start at Pace University as a video on repeat showed exuberant students and drone footage of the leafy, 200-acre grounds about 30 miles north of New York City, where the university also has a campus.

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Pace was one of 130 New York state colleges and universities that during October waived their application fees of from $50 to $90 per student, per school. That’s just one of the ways it’s trying to make admissions easier.

“That was a little eye-opening, when we received that letter,” Sueane Goodreau of Ithaca, New York, said about the free application offer as she waited for a tour of Pace’s campus with her high school senior son, Will. Compared to when her older daughter applied to college just three years ago, said Goodreau, “it does feel a little more receptive.”

There was an even bigger incentive offered by Pace: Prospects such as Santiago and Goodreau who visit are promised an additional $1,000 a year of financial aid if they enroll. Applicants who come to visit a campus are twice as likely to enroll as those who don’t, research has found.

The students’ names awaited them on a welcome sign at the reception desk in the office where tours depart. “You Belong Here,” pronounced another placard, on an easel in the waiting area. There was a QR code they could scan if they wanted to chat one-on-one with an admissions officer — who, in earlier times at many schools, were often unapproachable.

“I feel like I’m already a student here,” Santiago quipped.

The reason the university encourages that feeling? It’s simple, said Andre Cordon, dean of admission, in the distinctive pink Choate House at the center of the campus: “We want more students to apply. We don’t want to put up hurdles.”

So many hurdles previously stood along the route to college admission, it’s become a part of popular culture. “Everyone thinks we’re sadists — that we like saying no,” noted Tina Fey in her role as a Princeton admissions officer in the 2013 movie “Admission.”

Related: The number of 18-year-olds is about to drop sharply, packing a wallop for colleges — and the economy

Perceptions such as those are hard to change. Not only do young Americans aged 18 to 29 believe it isn’t any easier to get into college than it was for people in their parents’ generation, 45 percent of them think it’s harder, a Pew Research Center survey found. More than three-quarters say the admissions process is complex, and more than half that it’s more stressful than anything else they’ve done during their time in elementary, middle or high school, according to a separate survey, by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, or NACAC.

“People have that notion that all campuses are in the same category as MIT, Harvard, Stanford” with their impossibly low acceptance rates, said Cordon. (Pace took 76 percent of its applicants last year, university statistics show.) And “teenagers are still teenagers. There’s anxiety no matter what. They overthink things, and they overthink the admissions process.”

There’s also still a lot of genuine emotion in the process, he said. For many parents, “It’s a pride thing. It’s a status thing. It’s showing off. Or from the student’s side, it’s, ‘I want to make my parents proud.’ ”

In the new world of university admissions, however, that no longer necessarily even requires filling out an application.

“Congratulations! You’ve been admitted,” a new California State University website tells prospective students, before they enter a single piece of information about themselves.

Cal State is the latest system to deploy so-called direct admission: They will automatically accept any student who earns at least a C in a list of required high school courses, starting in January for students in some and expanding the following year to every high school in the state.

Related: To fill seats, more colleges offer credit for life experience

Public universities or systems in Alabama, Arizona, Connecticut, Georgia, Hawai’i, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, New York, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Washington and Wisconsin also now offer various forms of direct admission — some beginning this fall — accepting students automatically if they meet certain high school benchmarks.

Several systems now allow students to apply to several public universities and colleges with a single application, avoiding the time-consuming process of completing different forms, writing essays, collecting letters of recommendation or paying fees.

Through Illinois’s new One Click College Admit, for instance, high school students can have their transcripts provided instantly to 10 of the state’s 12 four-year public universities and all of its community colleges and get back a guaranteed offer of admission to at least one, depending on their grades.

“Especially first-generation students, they don’t have that knowledge of how to apply to college,” said José Garcia, spokesman for the Illinois Board of Higher Education. “That’s among the people we’re trying to reach — those who might be intimidated by the name of an institution or not feel confident in their academic abilities or their grades.”

Several of these programs have been advocated for public institutions by governors and legislatures worried about a continued supply of college-educated workers in their states as the proportion of high school graduates going on to get degrees declines.

“Basically we need to have a bigger pipeline,” said David Troutman, deputy commissioner for academic affairs at the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. “We have to do everything we can to open that door to all students, not just a few. So we have to make sure we’re making the process as painless as we can.”

Now private colleges are jumping aboard the direct-admission bandwagon. More than 210 have arranged through the Common App — an online application used by about 1,100 institutions nationwide — to extend offers of direct admission for the coming academic year to students who filed the Common App but have not applied. That’s almost twice as many as signed on last year, when Common App says 119 institutions in 35 states made more than 733,000 unsolicited offers.

It’s still early to definitively know the effect of this on whether students ultimately enroll. In Idaho, which in 2015 became the first state to try direct admission, enrollment of first-time undergraduates at participating public universities rose 11 percent.

Direct admission by itself does not resolve the other reasons students forgo college, however, said James Murphy, director of postsecondary policy at the nonprofit Education Reform Now, which advocates for more access to and diversity in higher education.

“It’s the furthest thing from a panacea,” Murphy said. “How do we know? Because colleges embraced it so quickly. Any reform taken up so quickly by colleges is likely to have more benefit to colleges than to students.”

While direct admission might help colleges get closer to enrollment targets, for example, he said, “it works best when it’s paired with financial aid and other resources that actually make it easier” to pay.

Waiving application fees has driven increases in applications, some research has shown. During the month that fees were waived last fall in New York state, a quarter of a million students applied to the public State University of New York, up 41 percent from the same period the year before, according to the state’s Higher Education Services Corporation, or HESC.

Related: After years of quietly falling, college tuition is on the rise again

While college applications may not seem expensive, at around $50 each, many students “aren’t just paying one application fee. They can be paying multiple fees,” which add up, said Angela Liotta, HESC’s director of communication.

Universities and colleges are trying other ways to ease the process. More than 2,000 continue to make submitting the results of SAT and ACT scores optional, for instance, something many started doing during the pandemic. More have extended their deadlines or recruited after the traditional May 1 cutoff, when incoming classes were previously considered locked in.

Students are noticing. One way is through the massive amount of marketing materials they’re getting, begging them to apply. The median high school student gets more than 100 letters and emails from colleges and universities each month, a survey by the education technology company CollegeVine found — an old-style approach that CollegeVine found turns out for this generation to be generally ineffective.

Will Goodreau, who was visiting Pace, for instance, got “so many emails and texts,” he said, laughing. “I must have given somebody my number for something.”

All of these things appear to be slowly changing students’ perception of admission. In that NACAC survey, fewer of those who had already gone through the process — while they still found it challenging — considered it as challenging as students who hadn’t started yet.

There could be more changes ahead. A lawsuit was filed in August against 32 colleges and universities that practice so-called early decision, under which students who apply before the usual admission period are more likely to get in, but are obligated to enroll. The practice, which the lawsuit seeks to end, helps colleges fill their classes, but prevents students from shopping around for better offers of financial aid.

Whatever happens, students and their parents should know that “they’re actually the ones in control of this process,” said Krebs, of HelloCollege. “The reality is that at a lot of schools, if you have the grades, you’re going to get in.”

Contact writer Jon Marcus at 212-678-7556, [email protected] or jpm.82 on Signal.

This story about applying to college was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for our higher education newsletter. Listen to our higher education podcast.

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November 18, 2025
Underrepresented Applicants Grow, Foreign Applicants Drop

New early-applicant data from the Common App found that applications from Black, low-income, first-generation and rural potential students are all up compared to this point last year. However, international applications dipped, and the most selective institutions are experiencing the smallest application growth compared to other types of institutions. Applicants are also increasingly choosing to submit standardized test scores.

The Common App report, released Thursday, is the first in a series of monthly research briefs on college applicant trends typically released between November and March. The November brief showed that applicants, and applications, rose over all compared to this time last year, with notable growth among particular groups.

For example, applications from those who identified as Black or African American increased 16 percent and multiracial applicants rose 11 percent compared to the same time last application season. The report also found that applicants who identified as first-generation grew by 12 percent, while low-income applicants, who qualified for a Common App fee waiver, increased at more than twice the rate of other applicants. Rural applicants grew by 15 percent compared to last year, while those from metropolitan areas grew only 6 percent.

But the number of international students applying dropped 9 percent compared to this point last year, driven by a 14 percent drop in applicants from India, which has historically been the second-biggest source of international applicants on the Common App platform after China. Applicants from Asia broadly and from Africa also dropped significantly, 9 percent and 18 percent respectively, with a whopping 43 percent decline in applicants from Ghana. These trends suggest the Trump administration’s policies, including international student visa delays and denials, may be deterring students.

At a time when highly selective institutions are under new political pressures, the report found that colleges and universities with admit rates of 25 percent or below had the slowest application growth, at 4 percent. Applications to other types of institutions grew at two or three times that rate.

The return of standardized test requirements at some institutions is also driving more applicants to submit test scores. Notably, applications reporting scores rose 11 percent compared to this time last year. However, students who identify as underrepresented minorities or first-generation or who qualify for a Common App waiver were less likely to share their scores.

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November 14, 2025
Nursing Holds Much Promise for Aspiring Job Applicants
With the dawn of a new year ahead, anyone looking for new opportunities can find one in nursing, with a wealth of job openings currently available.

Beverly Malone, Ph.D., RN, FAAN

President and CEO, National League for Nursing

A persistent shortage of registered nurses (RNs) and licensed practical nurses (LPNs) is at the root of nursing jobs going unfilled, caused by:
- An aging nursing workforce, prompting a wave of retirements accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic
- The increased demand for healthcare by the aging Baby Boomer generation
- Job stress and burnout precipitating workforce exits, particularly by nurses with less than two years of experience
- A shortage of nurse educators, limiting the capacity of nursing programs to admit more qualified applicants
Among the additional effects of too few nurses are higher levels of medication, safety, and other clinical errors, and potential hospital closures in regions with the lowest ratio of nurses to patients. For example, in June 2023, there were nearly 300 rural hospitals at risk of immediate closure. Texas and Kansas led this trend, with 29 of their hospitals facing imminent shutdown.

Both states’ widely dispersed populations meant that the loss of vital healthcare infrastructure would have a devastating ripple effect on local economies, in addition to threatening healthcare access for some of society’s most vulnerable. So, how to address these multiple challenges?

Encouraging more nurse educators

One obvious approach to expand the nursing workforce is to hire more nurse educators to prepare a greater number of nurses for practice. While this goal may sound simple, in reality, it is hard to achieve, given budget constraints and the lack of state, federal, and local funding to support clinical nurses desiring to transition into education.

Still, there are so many rewards that come with a career in nursing or nursing education — or both. Yes, it’s more than possible to combine the daily satisfactions of clinical practice with the long-term fulfillment inherent in teaching, mentoring, and preparing outstanding practice-ready practitioners. That remains true whether you become an instructor in academia exclusively or a clinical nurse educator, supplementing your own nursing practice in an academic medical center.

Nursing itself has become a multi-dimensional field with a number of career pathways, including advanced practice roles. Specialties like nurse-anesthetist or doctor of nursing practice (D.N.P.) often come with welcome higher paychecks and professional status.

Plus, with nurses now providing more of the frontline preventative care and chronic disease management in community clinics and through non-traditional healthcare settings, a variety of job opportunities may provide scheduling flexibility that’s compatible with family responsibilities.

Nursing education offers an incredible opportunity to engage in research that has the potential to transform the educational landscape for generations. Nurse educators, with their scholarly expertise, are also often at the forefront of nursing and community leadership, tapped to consult in the highest circles of government, public policy, nonprofits, and industry.

The sky is the limit. Consider exploring the possibilities of nursing and nursing education, while helping resolve one of today’s most urgent crises: too few healers to provide the healing.
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November 11, 2025
Head or Heart? How do applicants make decisions about higher education?

The blog was kindly authored by Jenny Shaw, Director of Higher Education External Engagement at Unite Students.

Thousands of new undergraduates are taking their first steps into higher education, but what has brought them there? Have they weighed up all the evidence, or have they followed their heart? The answer is, of course, much more complicated.

The Unite Students Applicant Index, in partnership with HEPI, has tracked the experiences of prospective students since 2022, and this year we asked applicants to tell us, in their own words, why they chose their first-choice higher education provider. An initial analysis seemed to hint at the Teaching Excellence Framework’s influence on international students, but a subsequent deep-dive using inductive coding found a more complex and sometimes surprising story that reveals applicants’ desires, concerns and ambitions.

Academic excellence

International applicants tended to use terms such as academic excellence, good quality teaching or that the provider was best or excellent for a specific field of study. Some expressed their admiration of academic staff: expert faculty; very excellent teaching team. A few Chinese students described their chosen provider as zhuānyè, translated as ‘professional’ but which also implies specialist expertise.

While a few UK students talk positively about teaching in general, for example great academics; good education, their comments more often refer to a specific course. Frequent comments such as top rated for my course or it’s good for psychology suggest that subject-level rankings hold more weight than overall teaching quality.

Additionally, about one in four international applicants, though a much smaller proportion of those from the UK, are primarily motivated by overall reputation or prestige. International applicants tend to cite the fame of their chosen university and its place in international or UK rankings. UK applicants tend to be less specific, for example good uni; its reputation and they sometimes use the Russell Group as a signal of high reputation. They also rely on word of mouth or their own perception: I’ve heard good things; It seemed the best.

Another common motivation for provider choice is linked to the course of study, independent of course quality. This theme includes the availability of specific or niche course, the structure or content of a course, or a provider that offers an appealing range of courses. For a few international applicants, the provider has been recommended to them for a specific subject discipline.

Location, location, location

UK applicants have similar motivations, but their choice is more likely to be contingent on location. This could take the form of having to choose the best option that is commutable: It has forensic psychology as a study choice and it isn’t too far from home; or the course being a co-equal motivator alongside the location: I like the course and the city.

Location more broadly is a major motivation for UK applicants both as a primary and a secondary factor. For some, this is driven by the need to find a provider that is within commuting distance. But the theme also includes the choice of a particular location among UK applicants that reflects their own priorities and lifestyle preferences. This is in line with the growing importance of independence as a motivator: elsewhere in the survey almost 3 in 10 cite becoming more independent as a top motivator for going into higher education. While location can be a motivator for international applicants it is much less common and can be linked to personal recommendations or links to family and friends.

A few applicants were motivated by the supportiveness of a provider. This included being diverse which we know from the Living Black at University report can be important to applicants from racially minoritised groups. Having good support for international students was also mentioned. A few spoke about mental health or disability support, or just the perception of the university and its staff being understanding or lovely.

Employability is a surprisingly rare motivator. While other survey questions show the importance of employability generally, it’s surprisingly absent as a reason to choose a specific provider. When cited, it usually relates to the university’s offer or services around employability skills. Only occasionally it relates to the university’s track record of graduate employment.

Vibe check

However, a more common theme is the nebulous ‘vibe’, a theme that covers a range of emotionally-driven motivations. This may be a particular aesthetic on campus, sense of good fit or a lifestyle preference, and is surprisingly popular as a primary factor as well as being a secondary consideration in combination with other motivations. You may recognise it as a factor in your own higher education choices – I certainly do.

When it comes to the vibe, international applicants have a greater tendency to reference culture and perceptions of reputation: It has a long history and some beautiful buildings; Because it suits my style and it one of the best universities; The building is full of cultural atmosphere. They also express less specific sentiments such as: Great atmosphere; Because it is my ideal university.

UK applicants are more likely to say the university feels like a good fit or a comfortable place: It had a very welcoming feel; It looks like somewhere I’d fit in. They also express reasons that are less specific: Quite lowkey; I like the vibe; It’s soooooo cute. This may be a reflection of the importance of belonging in the student experience, and the higher levels of anxiety about belonging found among UK applicants elsewhere in the survey.

However, the last word should go to the applicants, both UK and international, who simply loved their chosen provider.

“This was my first choice because it has always been my goal and dream.”

“I love it!”

For them, this was reason enough.

You can read more from the Applicant Index at this link.

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September 29, 2025
Canada rejects nearly two in three study permit applicants

Government figures obtained by The PIE show 62% of applicants were refused a study permit from January to July this year, with record-high volumes “raising urgent questions about transparency and application readiness,” said ApplyBoard.

Despite a decade of relatively stable approval ratings hovering around 60%, rates have plummeted to 38% so far this year, down from 48% in 2024 following the implementation of Canada’s study permit caps.

“It’s clear that Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) is applying far greater scrutiny to new applications,” Jonathan Sherman, vice president of sales & partnership at BorderPass told The PIE, pointing to a “fundamental shift” in government processing.

Data: IRCC

Indian students – who comprise 40% of Canada’s international student population – have been hardest hit by soaring refusals, with four out of five Indian students receiving rejections in Q2 2025, according to BorderPass.

Stakeholders have pointed to a glimmer of hope in overall approval ratings rising modestly this spring, though without a “dramatic shift,” Canada will only reach one fifth of the government’s international student target for the year, Sherman warned.

With institutions bracing for severe declines, ApplyBoard analysis has found the most common reason for reason for rejection in 2024 was the perception by IRCC officers that students wouldn’t leave Canada after their studies, cited in over 75% of cases.

“While reviewers at IRCC understand that some future students hope to gain work experience in Canada after graduation… the extensive use of this reason last year suggests that many are perceived as having permanent residency as their primary purpose, instead of study,” stated the report.

Financial concerns drove three of the top five refusal reasons, after Canada more than doubled its proof-of-funds requirements from $10,000 in 2023 to $20,635 in 2024.

Specifically, in 53% of cases, IRCC officers said they were unconvinced that applicants would leave Canada based on financial assets, alongside doubts about insufficient resources for tuition and living expenses.

“While new policy caps played a role, our full-year data points to recurring applicant challenges, particularly around financial readiness and immigration intent that are preventable with the right guidance and documentation,” said ApplyBoard.

The report highlighted the continuing decline of unspecified reasons for refusal, following IRCC adding officer decision notes to visa refusal letters last month, which was welcomed as a much-needed step in improving transparency.

Other reasons for refusal include the purpose of visit being inconsistent with a temporary stay and having no significant family ties outside Canada.

The data comes amid a major immigration crackdown in Canada, with temporary resident targets included in the latest Immigration Levels Plan for the first time, which aims to reduce temporary resident volumes to 5% of the population by the end of 2027 – a year later than the previous government’s target.

Many are perceived as having permanent residency as their primary purpose, instead of study

ApplyBoard

Approval rates are also below average for other temporary resident categories, but none so drastically as study permits, with just under half of all visitor visas approved so far this year, compared to a ten-year average of 64%.

After more than 18 months of federal policy turbulence, changing eligibility rules have likely contributed to the rise in study permit rejection rates.

Pressure to reduce IRCC backlogs and reach ambitious government targets could also be playing a role, according to immigration lawyers speaking to the Toronto Star.

As of July 31, over 40% of Canada’s immigration inventory was in backlog, including 56% of visitor visas, 46% of work visas and 23% of study visas, according to official data.

Following a swathe of new IRCC officer hires, Sherman said he expected to see improvements in consistency, though “processing backlogs may get worse before they get better,” he warned.

Amid the challenges, educators and advisers are doubling down on what applicants and institutions can do to ensure the best chance of success, with ApplyBoard warning that any incomplete or ineligible documentation can be grounds for refusal.

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August 29, 2025
New Michigan Law Essay Prompt Asks Applicants to Use AI

The prompt is one of 10 options for a supplemental essay.

Photo illustration by Justin Morrison/Inside Higher Ed | Gazanfer and InspirationGP/iStock/Getty Images

In 2023, the University of Michigan Law School made headlines for its policy banning applicants from using generative AI to write their admissions essays.

Now, two admissions cycles later, the law school is not only allowing AI responses but actually mandating the use of AI—at least for one optional essay.

For those applying this fall, the law school added a supplemental essay prompt that asks students about their AI usage and how they see that changing in law school—and requires them to use AI to develop their response. (Applicants may write up to two supplemental essays, selected from 10 prompt options in total.)

“TO BE ANSWERED USING GENERATIVE AI: How much do you use generative AI tools such as ChatGPT right now? What’s your prediction for how much you will use them by the time you graduate from law school? Why?” the prompt asks.

Sarah Zearfoss, senior assistant dean at the University of Michigan Law School, said she was inspired to include such a question after hearing frequent anecdotes over the past year about law firms using AI to craft emails or short motions.

Indeed, in a survey released by the American Bar Association earlier this year, 30 percent of all law firms reported that they use AI tools; among law firms with over 100 employees, the share is 46 percent.

But many have been derailed by the same well-documented hallucinations that have plagued other AI users. Judges have sanctioned numerous lawyers over the past several years because their use of AI resulted in filings riddled with imaginary cases and quotations. That makes it all the more important to evaluate whether prospective students are able to use AI tools responsibly and effectively, the law school believes.

“That is now a skill that … probably not all legal employers, but big law firms, are looking for in their incoming associates,” Zearfoss said in an interview. “So I thought it would be interesting: If we have applicants who have that skill, let’s give them an opportunity to demonstrate it.”

Michigan Law still disallows applicants from using AI writing tools when they compose their personal statements and for all other supplemental essay questions, which Zearfoss hopes will allow her to compare applicants’ writing with AI’s assistance to their writing without it.

Is AI Inevitable for Lawyers?

Frances M. Green, an attorney with Epstein Becker & Green, P.C., who specializes in AI, told Inside Higher Ed that she believes the ability to use and engage with AI will eventually become a required skill for all lawyers. That doesn’t mean just using it to write court filings but also understanding how to manage the use of AI-generated evidence—say, the notes of a physician who uses AI technology to listen to and summarize appointments, rather than old-fashioned, handwritten doctors’ notes.

“I believe lawyers who use AI will replace lawyers who don’t,” she said. “I think that is very, very true. And judges even, in some jurisdictions, are encouraging the use of artificial intelligence tools.”

Even so, Green noted that she doesn’t really like how Michigan’s question is phrased, because applicants may be inclined to over- or understate how much they use AI based on what they think the admissions officer is looking for.

But Melanie Dusseau, an English professor at the University of Findlay in Ohio and a critic of AI, questioned the prompts’ utility in actually evaluating if a student is well-suited for law school.

“A law school application is a showcase of a student’s language abilities, their passion for lively rhetoric, logic, and captivating narrative. Do reviewers want to know how well future lawyers can prompt a bot [to] turn its beige copyslop into something compelling, or how well they can write? And which would be more important in a law school application?” she wrote in an email. “Since LLMs are fawning sycophants, at least tonally, I would imagine that future lawyers would do better to polish their persuasive writing chops without automation.”

Zearfoss is not a prolific AI user herself; once she decided she wanted to include an essay option related to AI, she recruited the help of another Michigan Law professor, Patrick Barry, who teaches a course on lawyering in the age of AI, to help compose the question itself.

She expects the essays will reveal uses of and perspectives on AI that she never would have been exposed to otherwise.

“I’m always excited when an essay teaches me something, but I don’t really expect that—it’s sort of a bonus, right?” she said. “But I think with this particular prompt, I assume a high percentage of the essays will be teaching me something.”

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July 18, 2025
How can open days help applicants?

Like many Wonkhe readers, I’ve been lucky enough this year to support a young person weighing up their post-18 options.

If you are the person in someone’s life that “really understands universities” it does often fall to you to sift through the vagaries of our recruitment and application process. Just what are “predicted grades” and why are they different from what someone got in their mocks? Why can you only apply to five courses on UCAS? Why, for that matter, does it cost money to apply via UCAS? Why are league tables so silly? Is there really a “Discover Uni”?

The new aspect for me this year has been the world of the open day. On a succession of unseasonably rainy weekends I’ve been finding my way around campuses, under strict instructions not to mention who I work for or wear any Wonkhe merch (“so embarrassing!”) and speaking to academics and support staff about undergraduate entry in 2026.

Performativity

I’d love to say it has all brought back memories of my own open day adventures many years ago – in all honesty it has not. I never visited the university I ended up studying at prior to securing a place, my memory of the others is more of the cities and towns than the campuses and corridors.

And that’s kind of the thing. If you are visiting an open day you are asking about third year options and work placements, but the decision that is being made is more along the lines of what it would be like to live and study in a place. The most successful open days I have seen this year have leaned into this – what would a lecture be like? How would you get from where you live to where you study? What else would I be doing outside of my studies? Where might I get a job?

Academic staff – be they course leaders making a presentation or just generally making themselves available to chat, have often seemed terrified to speak to young applicants and their escorts. I’ve heard an awful lot about course revalidations and QAA Subject Benchmark Statements (yes really!), and while this is clearly great for me I can’t really see anyone else getting much out of it. When you sign up to “the talk” on your subject of choice what I would expect to get is a sense of enthusiasm about the subject and an openness to engage with others who have an interest: we can perhaps assume that anyone who wants to will have read about the course structure on the internet (or even, at one university, in an actual honest-to-god paper prospectus).

My go-to approach for speaking to shy academics is to ask about their personal research interests – all the best conversations we’ve had have been around the particular interests of my prospective student and those of the academics. I feel like it would be good to work some of this into the more formal aspects of the day.

The feel

Applicants and their adults have often asked about practical “feel” based stuff – there’s been a lot of questions raised about assessment strategies and exams versus essays and presentations. The interest in post-degree employment is very real – and there is a trend towards listing industry partners (when done best it has offered tangible examples of how students would experience these partnerships).

There’s also the inevitable question of entry requirements. Just about everywhere I’ve been has taken pains to reassure that there may be a place even if the grades aren’t quite there next summer – staff at all kinds of providers are actively promoting clearing entry.

If you are not involving current students in open days you should be (and if you are, be sure to pay them – as you should everyone involved – for what is a very hard day’s work). Speaking to somebody only a few years older than you, who is living the life you are trying on for size, is what really seems to light applicants up. And the more informal the conversation the better it seems – interpolations in course presentations are good, a student-led tour is better, seeing students demonstrate the skills they have learned was excellent, and a sly joke shared in the student accommodation viewing is pretty much the best of all.

Vibes

Applicants are very good at picking up the overall mood of the day. If people act like the event has arrived suddenly on campus, and nobody is really clear what is going on, you can pick it up a mile off. And this year keeping the positive mood is not easy if you know the scale and direction of staff and funding cuts coming your way: it is very hard to “sell” an applicant on a course if you know it will have less options and less resources than it did this year.

Likewise, basic hygiene factors stand out a mile (and I don’t just mean the halls of residence bathrooms…). If we’re sat having a coffee in the SU – something we always tried to do as a way of getting a sense of what campus life is like – it does rather stand out when there was supposed to be food available but it has all gone, or if all the posters seem to be for events that happened in 2023. I mean, posters are infinitely preferable (if the LGBT+Soc ran Chappell Roan bingo for pride day I am one hundred per cent there for it!) to glossy pictures and sidewinders wheeled out for the day, but maybe check if they are recent?

Likewise, if visitors will be parking on campus some kind of an advanced plan would help – and if you have student services folks sitting at tables make sure there are actual people at the tables to talk to throughout the day.

It’s the little moments. We were surprised to meet a vice chancellor that was clearly and obviously proud of their university, and who had signed up to do a series of rolling introductory talks. The question I got from next to me (“how often would I meet the vice chancellor as a regular student?”) was interesting – all though frankly I was more exercised about the fact that I’d seen the vice chancellor present a golden slide promoting a “TEF Gold in student experience” with the overall silver noted in tiny writing at the bottom.

The awards and the league table placings really come across as noise – I didn’t see any applicant looking remotely impressed, although some were interested in graduate destinations and links to employers.

An open day is an audition. An applicant is trying on the idea of being a student at your university – the best way to respond (and I’ve seen this done really well) is to set out just how great the student experience actually is: the TEF components are perhaps less impressive than what actual students say and the intangible “feel” of the campus. Students spend a lot of time asking “where do I go now?” – applicants have pretty much the same question.

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June 27, 2025
US study visa applicants told to make social media accounts ‘public’ amid vetting crackdown
New social media privacy requirements come just as US government lifts four week-long study visa interview freeze, leading to fears of a backlog.

Concerns of added complications where consular officers responsible for social media vetting do not speak the applicant’s language.

Policy extends even to those who have been issued US visas in the past.
In an update sent to consulates last week, the US government has advised that all those applying for F, M or J nonimmigrant visas are “requested” to make their social media accounts available to view by anybody so that their identity can be verified and they can be thoroughly vetted before entering the country.

Immigration experts have criticised the move because of the huge additional workload it will place on immigration officers, meaning that visa issuance is likely to slow down considerably.

US immigration lawyer James Hollis said he “almost [felt] bad” for consular officers.

“It’s going to grind processing to a halt and will likely result in increased wait times for all nonimmigrant visas, let alone the student and exchange visitor applicants,” the business immigration specialist at the McEntee Law Group warned – noting that there are added complications where applicants were posting on social media in their own local language if officers do not understand what they have written.

It appears that the new policy will be mandatory from June 25 onwards, and all applicants will be vetted in this way even if they have been issued a US visa in the past.

It’s going to grind processing to a halt and will likely result in increased wait times for all nonimmigrant visas, let alone the student and exchange visitor applicants
_{James Hollis, McEntee Law Group}

Consulates are advised that they should consider whether active social media privacy settings “reflect evasiveness or otherwise call into question the applicant’s credibility”.

Officers have been told to reject a visa application in cases where the applicant has:
- expressed “hostile attitudes” toward the US in terms of its citizens, culture, government, institutions, or founding principles;
- advocated for or supported “designated foreign terrorists and other threats to US national security”;
- shown or supported anti-semitism;
- even if they have otherwise proven they are not an immigration risk;
- and are not already ineligible for a visa (ie does not post a risk to US national security).
In these cases, the US can deny entry on national security or foreign policy grounds.

The US has asked visa applicants to provide social media information on their application forms for the past five years – including all social media names or handles of every platform they have used over the past five years. Failing to include this information could lead to an applicant’s visa being denied and being ineligible for future visas.

It comes after a tumultuous few weeks for prospective international students eyeing a place at US institutions. After stretching a study visa interview freeze into its fourth week – despite assurances that the pause would be quick – officials last week resumed interviews with additional social media vetting for applicants.

US stakeholders have repeatedly expressed concerns that the Trump administration’s extreme social media crackdown could inflict untold damage upon the country’s international education sector.
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June 23, 2025
State Department Screening Visa Applicants’ Social Media

Rubio paused visa interviews last month while the State Department created rules for the social media screenings.

John McDonnell/Getty Images

The U.S. State Department is rolling out sweeping new rules for vetting student visa applicants using their social media presence, according to Politico.

The new process will include screening for “any indications of hostility towards the citizens, culture, government, institutions or founding principles of the United States,” according to an internal State Department cable.

Department officials will also look for posts that signal “advocacy for, aid or support for foreign terrorists and other threats to national security” and “support for antisemitic harassment or violence,” specifically citing support for Hamas—a charge commonly levied against student protesters advocating for Palestinian rights—as grounds for rejection. The cable also directs officials to cull applicants who “demonstrate a history of political activism.”

The news comes a few weeks after Secretary of State Marco Rubio paused all student visa interviews in order to implement a new screening policy focusing on students’ online activity. The Associated Press reported that the department rescinded the pause, but applicants who don’t allow the government to review their social media accounts could be rejected.

The cable is the Trump administration’s latest effort to curtail the flow of international students to the U.S., as tens of thousands of foreign students await approval of their visas after months of delays and with only weeks until the start of the fall semester.

State Department spokespeople did not respond to a list of questions from Inside Higher Ed in time for publication.

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June 18, 2025
The secret life of university applicants

In Spring 2023, 150 students from humanities and social sciences at our university stepped up to share something deeply personal -their reasons for pursuing higher education.

Through brief, heartfelt recorded monologues, they opened a window into what university truly means to them.

We ended up with nearly 160 pages of raw, unfiltered transcripts. Inspired by the power of verbatim theatre, where authentic dialogue bridges the gap between characters and audience, we have curated a collection of student voices.

These firsthand accounts cut through the cliches narratives often associated with university life. Instead, they reveal the real stories, struggles, and aspirations driving students forward in today’s complex world of higher education. This is their voice, their truth, shared directly with you.

Going to university was the scariest and the best thing

From “screaming at the back of the car” and “crying tears of joy” to “relief” and “apprehension”, we got a glimpse into the rollercoaster of emotions students felt when they got their university acceptance letters.

For most, it was the first big decision of their adult lives, and it was not an easy one. One student said:

…going to university was the scariest and the best thing, the best decision, that I’ve made so far in my 19 years of existence.

Another felt the decision to enter higher education was made:

…not with trepidation as a reasonable person [but] with courage and self-assuredness that only ignorance and youth can bestow in such abundance.

Dealing with such conflicting emotions is rarely simple. So, it is not a surprise that some of the surveyed students thought about dropping out, especially in their first year. They found their degrees “boring” or “very difficult” or wondered “was the amount of work something I was prepared for?”

I’d rather pursue a passion… than end up working a job

A recurring thread in many students’ reflections during this study was the dilemma between entering the workforce immediately or pursuing higher education. No doubt pursuing higher education is largely viewed as the “only option towards a better paying career” and a “comfortable job without a lot of physical demands”.

While some of them questioned whether university “is worth all the debt”, most agreed that the skills acquired through higher education are crucial for getting “further in life” and earning “more than the minimum wage”.

But their testimonies revealed other considerations that go beyond material gains and jobs prospects.

In our survey, students made it loud and clear – it is also about the love and passion for what they do. “Studying what I truly love”, “something I’d enjoy studying every single day of my life”, and chasing that “passion and interest to grow as a person” often took priority, leaving material gains or “just getting into a certain job” in the background.

Just working a job for working sake didn’t feel like a good use of my time.

Students, while contemplating their future, felt that:

…university does feel like a good safety net to hop into… [the] perfect avenue to give myself more options to explore different careers.

We also saw several students entering higher education determined to “dig, dig, dig [to find out their] passions”.

More than rankings

For some students, university felt like a “clear, logical” move toward their career goals. For others, it was more than a decision – they felt it was “compulsory” or even a personal “duty”.

There were also students who approached their university pursuits with less conviction.

I didn’t have anything else to do, so I ended up going to university.

I was not ready for the 9 to 5 life.

When else in my life would I be able to just decide to move away [from home] and receive funding from the government to help me?

Some expected higher education to create for them “a pathway towards finding some meaning in my life”. Others choose their university because its name was the same “as my great grandmother’s”.

As we see when it comes to university studies, students bring a whole mix of ambitions to the table. So, it is no surprise that choosing a subject or a university is a deeply personal issue influenced by several factors.

Among these, university rankings often emerged as a decisive factor. Many students associated high rankings with better career prospects, with one stating:

…it is a lot more important where the university stands in ranking over what degree you’re doing.

Another shared:

I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself if I hadn’t at least tried [to enter an Oxbridge institution]

…highlighting the importance for them of the prestige tied to certain universities. This sentiment was echoed by another student who observed:

…people were looked down on if they didn’t apply to Oxford and Cambridge.

However, it is worth noting that some students in our sample cautioned against making decisions based solely on rankings. They acknowledged that prioritising rankings over programme suitability can lead to dissatisfaction.

I realised that I can’t force myself to like a subject or excel in a subject that I don’t enjoy.

…one student reflected, emphasising the importance of choosing a programme aligned with personal interests and strengths. Others recognised that decisions “purely because of rankings,” without considering the nature of the programme, may result in regret, as students risk enrolling in courses they ultimately dislike.

Reading through the transcripts, it became clear that students do not make their choices in a vacuum. Instead, they are influenced by a network of factors, including family, friends, mentors, and the vast array of information available online. These influences collectively shape the way students see their future and guide their decisions.

Family, as expected, is a primary source of influence and will be discussed in detail in a separate section. Friends, however, also play a significant role. As one student shared:

…it feels like you are doing something big with your friends [from which you] didn’t want to be left out.

Mentors were another important factor. One student explained:

…before coming to university, I spoke to people who were in the positions that I wanted to be in,”

…highlighting the impact of role models on their decisions. Additionally, many students turned to platforms like YouTube for guidance. One student described their process, saying:

I watched so many videos… YouTube videos on people’s experiences in different towns from Manchester to London to Liverpool, to Bristol to Birmingham.

This underscores the significant role of online content in shaping their choices.

Surveyed students also highlighted factors such as facilities, location and the associated lifestyle as significant influences on their university decisions. One student remarked that it was more important studying in London than having a good university ranking.

Since all students surveyed for this project were studying at a London institution, their comments frequently referenced the “dynamic lifestyle” of London, described as “the place to be” where “everything is happening”.

For many, being in London was about more than academics. It was about the opportunity to “see new things […] and explore different cultures”, “take part in so many events”, live in a place which is “buzzing 24/7” where they can “randomly, spontaneously […] see Wicked”, reflecting the unique cultural vibrancy that London offers.

Prospective students were looking for everything that matters to them, and this highlights the importance of providing students with proper guidance to navigate wisely the labyrinth of educational choices.

Several students commented on the importance of universities’ open days. Initially perceived as an “excuse to have a day off school”, one student recounted that it was during an open day that university became a “real option” for them.

Surveyed students express enthusiasm for these events, describing them as the “first actual experience” and an opportunity to “envision my new life”. During these visits, they engaged with current students and staff, feeling “the passion within the department”.

More importantly, they feel heard. As one student remarked:

[I got the opportunity] to talk about things that interested me with someone that was interested in hearing my perspective.

University has given me the space to explore who I am as a person.

To these students, university was the bridge to adulthood. It was for them the place to find “freedom” and “independence” – two words frequently encountered in the transcripts of their recordings.

They leave home with some apprehension, that is true, but they embrace it. And they “love that element of university”, are “really excited for the independence that university promised”, and “do not regret it”. Many viewed university as the opportunity to “learn how to live life without living with your parents”. It is striking to see so many young people eager to learn

…important life skills such as cooking, cleaning, and shopping.

University has given me the space to explore who I am as a person.

Expressions such as “get out of my shell”, “without hiding in the closet”, and “without feeling scrutinised by my parents” frequently appeared in the monologues. Moving away to study at university provided a unique opportunity to embrace independence.

As one student put it, university offered the chance to “do what I wanted to do, how I wanted to do it, exactly when I wanted to do it”. Several of the students in this study deliberately chose universities far from home, often making these decisions “without telling my parents”.

For the young individuals in this study, university is seen as more than just an academic journey. It represents a transformative space for personal growth. It is described as a place to “grow as a person in terms of independence, but also experiences”.

Students also view university as a setting that provides the “freedom and encouragement to be myself, fully and unapologetically, both personally, professionally, and creatively”.

You have to go to university… it’s what we expect you to do

While friends, mentors, and lifestyle factors shape many aspects of students’ choices, family remains a key part of the narrative. From these monologues, we see its role as both inspiring and constraining.

Constraining in that students appear to enter higher education out of guilt or obligation to their families.

One student mentioned pursuing higher education studies due to “the cultural aspect and expectation within my family”, another to make “the family proud and happy despite not sharing the sentiment”, and another simply because it is “what my family wanted me to do anyway, so… I just end up doing it”.

The desire to enter higher education was coerced by a feeling that otherwise they would have “wasted everything that my parents have done for me”, and “disappoint them”, and that “would have been the worst thing”.

Prior academic attainment of family members was also sometimes perceived as limiting students’ choices. In terms of degree choice, students mentioned that families with a background in certain fields “wouldn’t agree with me exploring [other] degrees” and “I feel like my parents just don’t understand that there are opportunities outside of this field”.

Other students whose families had completed higher education claimed that their decision to join university was so that they would not be the “odd one out” or to prove that ”they are not dumb”, and that their intellectual ability reflects “somehow that of my family’s or my post-code’s”.

My mum always wanted me to have a lot more. More choice in my life and so university really allows me that.”

Family can also serve as a source of power and inspiration, fueling students’ academic journeys. Many said their family’s academic achievements and backgrounds inspired them to join university and choose specific subjects.

One student cited the “admiration” for their grandfather’s life and job as “primarily the reason” to choose their subject. Another passionately spoke of wanting to “follow my parents’ first steps”. Another enthusiastically praised their parent’s commitment “to spend whatever they have saved in their lives to afford what they think is important” for their children.

It was been fascinating to see what university meant for students whose family did not attend university. To them university was the opportunity to “take advantage of opportunities many of the members of my family didn’t have”, as “it was just seen as something unattainable for us of this economic class, race and learning difficulties”.

The dialogues shared within families hold immense power. In these intimate moments, life altering decisions often take shape. A student recalled their mother’s wisdom:

…university is not just about getting that qualification […] It’s personal worth. And once you have that education, no one can take it away from you.

Another reflected on the life-story of their mother, her unfinished studies, and the aspirations that span generations:

Oh child, you know when you graduate, it’s going to be like I’m graduating as well […] which I guess is true because the amount of support that I had from my mum and my family has been like insane.

I can go to university so I can get one step closer to my dreams.

For some of the students surveyed, university was more than a path to knowledge – it was a journey for recognition, a way to overcome societal barriers, and to “fulfil [their] dreams in life”.

One student said their studies will help them reach “the standing in society” they think they deserve, and will allow them “to be taken more seriously”. A student with a disability told us it is a means to “overcome low expectations that people in the society have for people like me”.

For this student, it is their “liberation mechanism” to “escape the oppression that I felt I was facing and move my life towards a more success-oriented trajectory”.

In their testimonies, students expressed dreams of becoming Supreme Court judges, CEOs, working in politics or international organisations. They acknowledged that without university education, as one student said,

…I just didn’t have the confidence to dream big

…I do feel proud when I say hey, I’m a [. . . ] student. It’s kind of nice when people are like, wow!

Reading the transcripts felt like tuning into the unfiltered thoughts of students standing at the crossroads of their academic and professional lives. Their stories form a vivid tapestry of dreams, ambitions, and doubts about joining university each one unique, each one unfiltered.

Our aim was not to evaluate their motivations or rank the importance of the influences they shared with us. Instead, we gave space for their voices to be heard. Because listening to these stories matters.

It reveals the beautiful complexity behind their decisions and helps us understand them better. And perhaps, it will inspire us to create a learning environment that truly supports them, one that meets them where they are and helps them get where they are going.

We would like to thank Lyubomir Vasilev for valuable research assistance and helpful comments and discussion. Financial support for this project was provided by the Queen Mary University of London’s Westfield Fund for Enhancing the Student Experience. Authors: Dr. Emmanouil Noikokyris, Reader in Economics and Finance Education, School of Economics and Finance, Queen Mary University of London; Emanuela Nova, Strategic Project Manager, School of Economics and Finance, Queen Mary University of London

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February 14, 2025