A Study of Admission Officers' Perceptions of and Attitudes Toward Homeschool Students

Journal of College Admission, Fall 2004 by Jones, Paul, Gloeckner, Gene

Additionally, a supplemental analysis was conducted to examine if there were differences between rural, suburban and urban institutions in how they expected the overall first-year success rate, and social coping of homeschooled students to be compared to traditional high school students. To test for differences, a One-way ANOVA was used. secondly, to determine if there were differences between public and private institutions in how they expected the overall first-year success rate and social coping of homeschooled students to be compared to traditional high school students a t test was used.

Findings

A 15-item, three-part questionnaire was emailed to admission personnel at 159 four-year colleges and universities in Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, and Wyoming. A total of 55 responses were electronically received for a 35 percent return rate.

Section I:

Homeschool Admission Survey

In section one of the survey, nearly 57 percent of the institutions responding to the questionnaire were from state-supported colleges or universities. Thirty-five percent of the admission officers reported that they were private institutions and 9 percent were churchaffiliated institutions. Thus, 44 percent were private colleges. These percentages are similar to 51 percent of the selected sample that were private institutions (church and private combined), and the 49 percent that were public institutions (see Table 1).

The three largest Carnegie types that responded to the questionnaire were doctoral/research universities-extensive at 27.3 percent; master's colleges and universities-at 25.5 percent; and baccalaureate colleges-liberal arts at 20 percent. The selected sample represented 36.4 percent doctoral/research intensive and extensive institutions compared to 27.3 percent in the actual sample, 41.1 percent were classified as master's level institutions, and 22.8 percent from baccalaureate level institutions. The remaining 8.8 percent were coded as theological, business, or engineering institutions (see Table 2).

[Carnegie explains these types at http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/Classification/ CIHE2000/defNotes/Definitions.htm:

Doctoral/Research Universities-Extensive: These institutions typically offer a wide range of baccalaureate programs, and they are committed to graduate education through the doctorate. During the period studied, they awarded 50 or more doctoral degrees per year across at least 15 disciplines.

Doctoral/Research Universities-Intensive: These institutions typically offer a wide range of baccalaureate programs, and they are committed to graduate education through the doctorate. During the period studied, they awarded at least ten doctoral degrees per year across three or more disciplines, or at least 20 doctoral degrees per year overall.]

Campus Size

The distribution of questionnaires returned by campus size is shown in Table 3. The most respondents, at 27.3 percent (15), were from institutions with enrollments fewer than 2,000 students. The second largest, at 23.6 percent, came from institutional enrollments between 10,000 and 19,999 students, followed closely by institutional enrollments between 2,000 and 4,999 at 21.8 percent. The lowest number reporting were institutions between the enrollment size of 5,000 and 9,999 at 12.7 percent.