University Applications ........

[mummyofteens]

Can someone please explain to me how university place offers are already been given to some young people when the closing date for applications is not until the middle of January. Most of my son's friends haven't even submitted their application yet :/

Have just heard today that DS1 has been invited for an interview at Southampton University.

Not one of his favourites, but at least things are now in motion, so to speak!

Earlier in the thread someone asked what happens if you missed your offer. DS applied for Physics last year and got 5 offers, two for AAA, and chose one of them as his firm.

He got A* (Physics), AB, so although the points were equivalent to his firm, the grades weren't, and after five days messing around they said they couldn't offer him a place. So grades are REALLY important!

He's actually at Sheffield and has settled down really well.

DD sent her application in earlier in the month, with choices based mainly on accommodation and social life!

Yes grades do matter. DS2 had an offer for 3 Bs and got (after a remark) 1 UMS point below a B grade in one subject (i.e. 419/600 instead of 420/600) and was rejected by his first choice.
Silver lining is that he has gone instead somewhere with a more suitable course for him!

Funny how things work out for the best isn't it Lilymaid.

With DD and her Btec I will say that the school didn't actively encourage her to do it. It was in the options block with languages that she didn't want to take. I emailed a 'red brick' uni, the only one that we have looked round so far, and who place a lot of emphasis on GCSE results. they said it was worth the same points as an A/A GCSE so although school insisted her distinction was equivalent to 4 A they treated it as one subject only at A so hardly useless.

As boffin suggested she may be able to explain her choice away in an intelligent way that she was frustrated with the way MFLs were taught in school as after 3 yrs of studying a language she couldn't string a sentence together.

very useful thread. DS1 has just applied and is checking his emails whilst on holiday on an hourly basis to see if any news/acknowledgement/offers. The offers page on the student room also makes very interesting reading.

on extended projects...

FWIW at my uni we really value these and they are often the 'silver lining' that makes a candidate stand out (from all the other AAA students). They also make the PS much easier to write.

and of course they give the students a much better insight into what they might want to study at uni

but...
because not all school/colleges offer then we can't make them a standard requirement or give them too much weight as this would not be fair to other candidates.

I also agree with BM about 'workarounds'

In general in any case where you think the application has been weakened by the action of the school/college then a discussion with admissions staff is useful.

But, unfortunately in the current climate where there is more competition for places and less academic staff time, this kind of flexibility is becoming less common.

I have left DS1 to sort it out. If he wants to go then he needs to push the process. Now he keeps having to explain it to me so I understand his updates.

He has had two offers so far. One from UEA ( his banker) and one from Nottingham. He takes his Oxford test tomorrow and has had an aknowlegment from Brasenose- so at least they haven't just binned it
They are only given 5 choices this year. He has also applied to Warwick and Exeter

But he has chosen the unis, the course. He went to the open days on his own and chose alone. If he is going there for three years he needs to chose it.

I will read this thread regularly so I can arrange my face into the correct expression when he tells me stuff. I didn't go to university. I am officially clueless.

Actually that is wrong. UEA isn't his banker. He loved it and their english course is brill. It was just his 5th choice

pagwatch

you have a very sensible attitude!

I have refused to speak to parents when they contact me on behalf of their kids. At all open days I told the students to contact us themselves and not to rely on their parents to sort things out.

Oh thank god.
Youhave no idea how happy I am muddleduck. Thanks.

I kind of know I am right . But DS1 kept meeting people on train and the parents would say 'oh - where are your parents' in a really judgey way. And he kept being the only one going alone.
But my thing is that it needs to be his choice. And if he kind check a train timetale and get there alone how on earth is he going to cook and shop and save electricity money...

He was a shit though. When asked 'where are your parents' he would say 'oh they don't really like me that much'

and

Sorry - long relief filled post

pmsl at "they don't really like me that much".

I'd say about 90% bring parents to open days and about 50% bring them to interviews.
This has increased hugely over the past 5 years.
There is a strong element of "we are paying for it so we want to see what we are getting." I think this is a very fair point, but at the end of the day we are looking to recruit self-motivated people who will be able to organise their own life/work.

I would never discourage a parent from attending an open day, I just don't like them getting over involved in the actual admissions process.

yay, DS1 has had an offer from Southampton. Don't actually know what it is as I gather he had an email saying there was an offer but he hasn't seen it yet. Assume it will be the 'normal' AAA though. Thank god we can relax a bit now and perhaps go to a theme park without taking his sodding blackberry

DH and I haven't been to any Unis (mainly because we are 3,000 away) but even if we were in the UK I don't think we'd go, maybe just drop him off. As Pagwatch says, it is their choice and all we can do is support him.

DS1 has an interview at Southampton. As he's applied with his grades, I'm not sure if this means he's borderline or if it's general practise!

Pag - DS1 insisted on going on his own to the university open days, which I was impressed by.

Good news MOS
I took DD to Open Days and interviews ... I enjoyed having a nice day out. [don't get out much emoticon]
Actually, it did have its uses. She could bounce her ideas and impressions off me; it's always nice to have a second opinion.

Being the parent of 2DC's, one at uni, the other having just applied, I've been following this thread with great interest.

"...I just don't like them getting over involved in the actual admissions process"

...and I completely agree. Like Pagwatch, we've been very much in the shadows for ds's application - his choices, his application. When asked we've checked for him, of course, which leads to me ask - how DO admissions tutors know that the ps is the applicants' own work? Plagarism checks aside, how many parents out there have looked at their dc's ps, paled in horror and then whipped out their double first in journalism to - uh - 'help'? Given the emphasis now placed on the ps (and for some unis, after the academic criteria it's the deciding factor - Southampton A100 for example), is this truly a fair process?

It's not just parents that 'help' with personal statements. I bounced drafts of my Dsis's back and forth along with half her year and, while I didn't write it, there was a lot of red typeface and 'WHAT DO YOU MEAN?' or 'TALK ABOUT THIS MORE' all over it. Several people on here talk about 'helping' friends of their DCs if they have insider knowledge of that career/university/course. I've also been offered money to rewrite people's to bring them up to scratch or, one memorable occasion, write it from scratch in English for a student whose English wasn't good enough to do it themselves. I declined. He probably bought it somewhere off the internet as he got in to a fairly well regarded university on the strength of it without an interview.

frankkinstein.
I think that is great. I try really hard to teach my students that the way to improve their writing is to get lost of rounds of comments from others. Your DSis sounds like just the type of student I like to teach

TBH often we just use the PS as a way of rejecting the students who can't be arsed to write a decent statement. I rejected a AAA student last year because he hadn't updated his PS from the one he'd sent us the year before.

IMO the best PSs are the very personal ones that talk about their motivation for doing the course. Those are hard to fake.

So does seeking help imply being arsed? Cos sone of them were shocking when I saw them first!

I think it's a shame some schools don't give more help on what should go in a PS. Or teach students how to write coherently.

yes. seeking help definitely implies being arsed. Obviously I'm talking about the sort of help you gave your sister not complete rewriting.

sorry have been following the thread and some people are suggesting that gcse grades count towards ucas points. Is this right?

DS1 showed me his personal statement.
I read it. Told him it was great and thatthe only thing was that he hadn't linked his two main points clearly enough. he re-shaped the structure so it read better.

that is my version of seeking helped/being arsed

Actually I couldn't have helped him. he is much better than me at writing. I thought it was bloody brillinat ( slightly biased)

he did his Oxbridge paper this morning. I asked him how it went and he said something that sounded a bit like 'I ploughed it' . I had to ask him if the word he was using meant good or bad.
Doesn't bode well does it

Have been following this thread too and just wanted to ask you Pagwatch was it the TSA your DS did today? Only being nosey cos my DS did it too, albeit with an eye injury sustained on Monday at rugby - massive balck eye and stitches! Am also relieved and refreshed by your attitude to his application. The nearest I got to my DS1s was when I paid by card for his UCAS application. When I ventured to suggest that I would be interested in reading his personal statement he reluctantly agreed! As he said he'd already shown it to a number of teachers 'who know more about it than you, mum'

Oh well!

bump