Abstract
Nowadays, due to rapid developments and changes, there has been diversities in the university
candidates’ university, faculty, department or program preferences as well as in everything else.
The effective factors in the university preferences of students were examined in this study. There
might be effective many factors such as university, faculty, department, program, advertisement,
family, exam scores or the city where the university is located in the candidates' university
preferences. Especially, newly-established universities can have many disadvantages comparing
to long-established üniversities. Within the scope of the study, a scale with 62 variables was
formed to measure the factors that are effective in the preference of candidates and a survey was
applied to all first grade students in Niğde Ömer Halisdemir University in the 2016-2017
Academic Year. According to the results of the survey, it was found out that the most important
factors in the university preferences of the students were the quality of education in the university
and the employment opportunities of the graduates. The least effective factor in the students'
preferences was the presence of students are in the city where the family is located. The suitability
of the economic conditions of the province and the location of the university were also considered
as the effective factors for the students.