Anyone else got DC applying for uni this year - beyond annoyed

[Lionlover11]

DD is 18 and applying for uni this year and the grades are literally insane. Good Russel groups
are asking for grades previously only oxbridge would ask for and former poly universities that previously would have been easier to get into have now shot up to 3 B’s. All because of covid deferrals. I’m absolutely livid on DD’s behalf that predicted of ABB (very good results imo) will not be enough to get her into a Russel group for the course she wants to do. It feels like this year group have suffered so much already because of the pandemic and now because of covid deferrals it’s bitten them on the backside again. I’m half considering telling DD to forget applying for this year, get the best a levels she can and just apply next year when hopefully the grades have eased off. Anyone else in the same boat?

Nine years ago D's got 2x A star and 2x B. That got him into Nottingham for chemistry. Great university of course, but there are better. Which he couldn't get into even ten years ago with what seemed like excellent grades.

Agree with this. History, for example, is very popular so high grades all round - but most unis have very similar courses (Classics, Anthropology, etc) which are way less oversubscribed. You can also usually once you get there do more history modules and switch to straight history if you prefer those modules anyway

(Using history as an example, but same is true for other popular degrees)

@ShaunaTheSheep Totally agree.

My DD is 2nd year at uni and half her flat in 1st year had deferred from 2020. Her year group had a pretty tough year 12/13 which made for a very challenging first term at uni, social wise as they had no opportunities to mature during the various lockdowns.

I work at a Russell Group Uni. Entry requirements setting is complex, but yes covid, more applicants, attracting the best students and subsequently staff, and research grants are all factors.

years ago - a levels were marked very differently.

I knew bright folk who got 1sts from Russel Group, yet had Cs and below at A level, this was a good few years ago.

www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-students/undergraduate/degrees/viking-and-old-norse-studies-ba

As you can see there are still courses at the very top RG institutions that accept ABB @Lionlover11 I’ve picked a very niche one but just wanted to show you that even UCL (a world top 10 uni) is accessible without the very top grades. You just have to choose your subject wisely.

I’ve worked in the HE section for 20 years so feel free to message me for some advice if you like 😊

Back in olden times (first half of the 80s), my BBB A level grades would have got me in pretty much anywhere for the MFL courses I was applying to. Is that the kind of thing OP has in mind? As everyone says, things are very different now. As for the effect of Covid, @ShaunaTheSheep is spot on. We all have our own reasons for believing a specific cohort suffered the most. My DC applied for different kinds of subject both pre- and mid-Covid, and both found there were courses with higher entry requirements than Oxbridge. Neither of them was particularly fixated on Russell Group institutions.

Also entry requirements are used for almost nothing but a hoop for applicants to jump through. You could just as easily do Maths at Warwick with AAA not A*, as evidenced about 10 years ago when it was AAA and students still performed well. Top universities ask for high grades to whittle down applications, and very little more.

Oh it absolutely is quite decent, it is not though enough to get you into many courses in a rg uni.,and hasn’t been for a very long time, well before 2018, that’s what’s being said, it’s not a conversation of the relative grade perceptions but a discussion on what’s required for an rg uni.

I think aiming for a university rather than a course is a bad idea. I got told in 1997 to pick the degree I wanted to do with the highest UCAS points, I was taking a very niche course - I ended up at an ex Poly but on the right course with AAA at A Level. Ended up at a RG for my PGDip, a college for L4 Cert I needed for my 60hrs lecture delivery, an ex poly for my MSc, a random Institute for my L7 and currently being supervised for my doctorate fellowship by an RG supervisor. I can hand on heart say I haven't noticed a difference in quality of delivery at any of them. Might be because I work in a very small field with limited people but it's the content that counted for me. Not the institution.

It does seem max the grades requested generally now. I got into a RG in the 90s with BCC to do English plus French.

I don’t understand posts like this, it makes it about getting to a uni for any course. Which is such the wrong aapproach. People should only go to uni for something they wish to study and for a reason to study it. Not just go to uni for any course they can get on.

@Leafblowertime

depends what you want to gain from your university experience. PwC, KPMG, Rolls Royce, Dyson etc all pay UCL to come on campus and talk to their students about future job opportunities. That just won’t happen at 80% of UK institutions. If your end goal is a high-paying job at a prestigious company, Viking Studies at UCL might just be the way to go 🤷

You can't get into Warwick for maths with A, A, A.

Yeah, nothing to do with Covid. My DS was pre-Covid entry to an RG uni and needed AAA, and others were asked for two AsA
Also to the PP who said 'grade inflation' - this is a myth created by people who have no assessment literacy. Grades go up because more students are better prepared.

all that bold should have been
A star AA and others were asked for two A stars and an A

Like everyone else has said, think you're going on decades old info - former polys? Having your pick of Russell Group with ABB? I'm in my 30s and these things were well before even my time. Since then, grade inflation has continued, and access has opened further.

If your dd is at a rare and underperforming school where ABB makes her an academic superstar, then I see your annoyance but luckily she should have some potential scope for context in offers. However if she has a well-written mum who is involved enough in applications to be in the internet, I'd suspect that's actually not the case, and she's likely a strong but not top performer in her year. And given that, do you think it's necessarily reasonable for someone with these grades, however lovely and hard working, to be assured into top uni places?

Sometimes these threads on MN blow my mind a bit.

Entry requirements have been A, A, A for years to get into the most prestigious universities to do certain courses. Nothing has changed.

A, A, A I meant to post!

OK - the starts aren't typing and now I seem drunk...
A star, A star, A! Those are the requirements for competitive courses at RG universities, and have been for years.

People should only go to uni for something they wish to study and for a reason to study it. Not just go to uni for any course they can get on.

Which is why I don't think schools shold be pushing university as the default option.

There are several posts on other higher education forums which start off with "my DC wants to go to university, but they don't know what they want to study"

My advice would be to take a gap year and have a think about what they really want to do. DD took a gap year for that reason, and she is now taking another gap year after graduating to decide what she wants to do for post graduate. She managed to walk into a job pretty much straight away and thinks she now knows what she wants to do, but at least she isn't juggling the pressure of final year dissertation and exams with deciding on a post grad degree.

@Taillighttoobright I said 10 years ago Warwick accepted AAA.

I don’t understand posts like this, it makes it about getting to a uni for any course. Which is such the wrong aapproach. People should only go to uni for something they wish to study and for a reason to study it. Not just go to uni for any course they can get on.

DD1 had a career in mind - it needs a science degree with some looked on more favorably than others still quite a large range- and likely later a specific masters. She's been thinking chemistry - she enjoys it at A-level and it keeps many options open should she change her mind - but doesn't mean she wouldn't enjoy some other science degrees that would also get her where she currently wants to get.

Well there was grade inflation before covid ever happened:
% of candidates who got A or above:
History 12.5% in 1993 vs 22.6% in 2019
Biology 13% in 1993 vs 34.1% in 2019
French 18.6% in 1993 vs 36.8% in 2019
So ABB now must be similar to BCC 30 years ago when I took A levels. Good grades, but not stellar.

And there’s population growth - there were 54,000 more children born in 2005 than 2002 - so they need an extra 20,000 places just for that.

2021 was the highest year for covid-grades. 2023 is supposed to be back to 2019 levels and unis know this. DD applied for 2020 and DS1 is applying for 2023 and I’m not seeing a lot of difference in the asking grades.

I’d tell her not to bother with uni at all, seriously. There’s so jobs where you can do an apprenticeship nowadays that you can earn whilst you learn. It’s not like it used to be when it was really only the trades it’s practically anything from doctors, AHPs, project managers. So much choice. She should seriously consider it.