Management of the applicants’ educational choice based on social network analysis of data from the Ural State University of Economics’ admission committee

Abstract

The purpose of the study is to identify the direction of study choosing motives by applicants of the Ural State University of Economics. The information base of the study was the anonymized data of entrants’ applications, enrolled in full-time undergraduate and specialty programs in 2022. As well as information from the “Application and admission to the USUE” website. To study the relationships between areas of training, the method of social network analysis was used. The study confirmed the hypotheses about the rational behavior of potential students when choosing an educational program and allowed us to conclude that one of the optimal strategies of the university admissions committee to attract applicants is to expand the range of exams, the results of which are accepted upon admission. For less popular areas, such a set should be as similar as possible to the Unified State Exam set for the most popular areas of study.

Keywords

• social network analysis
• admission campaign
• educational choice of applicants
• social network
• educational behavior