Unravelling why students do or do not stay committed to a programme when making a higher education choice

ABSTRACT

Over the past forty years, scholars have been studying students’ choice of higher education programmes to unravel the complexity of the choice process. Recent studies have shown that students may commit to a programme, i.e. they make a choice to enrol in that programme, when they find a programme that attunes well with their interests. Students may nonetheless decide to switch from one programme to another before final enrolment and research has not yet sufficiently explained why they do that. The present study therefore focused on the mechanisms underlying students changing their minds after they had previously committed to a higher education programme. Eighteen semi-structured interviews with Dutch pre-university students in their final year at school were held just before final enrolment: students retraced their higher education programme choice process over time with the help of a timeline and a storyline. Interviews were thematically analysed. We identified two mechanisms whereby students, sometimes quite suddenly, switched in their commitment from one programme to another and two mechanisms that could hold them back from committing to another programme despite having doubts. This paper provides detailed theoretical insight into how students make higher education programme choices over time and concludes with practical recommendations on how to support students.

KEYWORDS:

• Programme choice
• higher education
• interests
• commitment
• timeline
• storyline

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Alex Janse for conducting the summative audit.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

J. P. Vulperhorst

J. P. Vulperhorst is working for the Department of Education at Utrecht University as a PhD-candidate and university teacher. In his research Vulperhorst focuses on how students’ multiple interests develop over time and how students’ make a choice for a higher education programme based on these multiple interests.

R. M. van der Rijst

R. M. van der Rijst is an associate professor at the Leiden University Graduate School of Teaching (ICLON). His academic work focuses specifically on research based teaching and learning and teacher professional development. The majority of his projects are connected to the field of teaching and learning in higher education.

H. T. Holmegaard

H. T. Holmegaard is an associate professor at the Department of Science Education at University of Copenhagen. Her research centres around understanding students’ identity-work in science. She has published on students’ choices of and transition into higher education science, students’ drop out and first year experiences.

S. F. Akkerman

S. F. Akkerman is full professor of Educational Sciences at Utrecht University. In her research she focuses on transitions of students and collaborations between professionals across disciplinary, educational and organisational contexts and the impact of such multi-systemic participation or transition on interest and identity development.