Utilidad de la Plataforma “Pruéb@te UNAM Licenciatura” para Ingresar a la Educación Superior

The admission process to higher education in several universities includes standardized high-stakes examinations, that frequently are associated with special preparation courses designed to help applicants to master test-taking strategies, as well as to review and practice the knowledge assessed in the test. The goal of this study was to compare the performance in the college admission exam to the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) in users of the digital platform “Prueb@te UNAM Licenciatura” versus non-users, and to establish the correlation between being selected and platform use. A quantitative observational, comparative and cross-sectional design was used. The study population was integrated by 178.364 applicants for a college career at UNAM, of these 8.063 used the platform. Users had higher scores in the admission exam than non-users (p < 0,001; d = 0,76). Practicing more than 10 hours (p < 0,001; d = 0,89) and completing up to five mock exams (p < 0,001; d = 0,88) were associated with higher results. The use of a platform for training and rehearsal in simulated tests is associated with a higher score on the university admission exam. Test-enhanced learning can be useful to understand and improve applicants' performance in high-stakes summative examinations.