Abstract:
This thesis examined the influence of the Georgia HOPE Scholarship Program on student
choice to attend or not attend University System of Georgia (USG) institutions. The study
focused on the factors that influenced Georgia high school graduates’ enrollment
decisions as the value of the Georgia HOPE Scholarship lessened with declining Georgia
Lottery funding. Using a combination of purposeful and snowball methods of data
collection, participants were interviewed for this study. Georgia high school graduates
who used the Georgia HOPE Scholarship to attend a USG institution, those who chose to
forego their Georgia HOPE Scholarship to attend a different institution, and those who
chose not attend an institution of higher education at all were interviewed. Participant
responses were examined through the student choice perspective using Laura Perna’s
(2006) four-layer model incorporating social, economic, and policy context, higher
education context, school and community context, and habitus context.
