One of the objectives of the High School Evaluation System (SAEM) established by the Santa Catarina Association of Educational Foundations (ACAFE) is to present an alternative proposal to select college students. This article, which synthesizes and analyzes part of a study that resulted in a Masters dissertation, seeks to make this experiment undertaken in Santa Catarina State a contribution to current discussions about access to higher education in Brazil. The paper analyzes the debate in the context of Social Psychology and Professional Guidance. To do so, it places SAEM in context, briefly considering its genesis and its congeners and then considers it as: a source of information; a pre-college entrance exam; a ritual of passage and or a ritualized barrier; a means of professional choice; a strategy of social and school selectivity and a means to democratize education. To conclude, we raise some questions and make some proposals in the context of the theme interventions in education, where college entrance exams in series can be seen as a strategy that disposes public education to better prepare students in order to assist their insertion at all levels of social life.
University access; College applicants; College Entrance Exams in series; evaluation in series; high school evaluation system
