The Changing Selectivity of American Colleges

I f one spends time at certain colleges ’ events, one is likely to hear alumni exclaimthat their college is so selective today that they would not be admitted were theyto reapply. Similarly, one might hear parents worry that their children are forced into excessive resume polishing because American colleges are increasingly selective. These alumni and parents often assume that rising selectivity is a pervasive phenome-non, and they often also assume that it is caused by colleges ’ not having expanded sufficiently to accommodate the ever growing population of U.S. students with post-secondary ambitions. The latter assumption—that the supply of college places has been relatively inelastic despite a growing population of prospective students—would seem to explain rising tuition. Thus, rising selectivity and rising tuition would seem to be part of the same logical phenomenon affecting higher education. It turns out that the above thinking is a consequence of people extrapolating from the experience of a small number of colleges such as members of the Ivy League, Stanford, Duke, and so on. These colleges have experienced rising selec-tivity, but their experience turns out to be the exception rather than the rule. Rising selectivity is by no means a pervasive phenomenon. Only the top 10 percent of colleges are substantially more selective now than they were in 1962. Moreover, at least 50 percent of colleges are substantially less selective now than they were in 1962. Typical college-going students in the United States should be unconcerned about rising selectivity. If anything, they should be concerned about falling selec-tivity, the phenomenon they will actually experience. Although some of the decreasing selectivity of most colleges is due to the number of places growing faster than the number of college-ready students, another explanation is also important. This other explanation, moreover, explain