help please - uni backing out of unconditonal offer at last minute and not meeting conditional offer

[Suziah]

It's a been a long day and I could do with some advice.

DS applied for uni this year and got a mix of conditional and unconditional offers. I was surprised by unconditionals since he hadn't taken his A2s but googled and saw they are now being offered so thought no more - stupid!! He accepted an unconditional offer in April.

Exams were a nightmare as his grandfather died mid exams and he was not fully functioning but at least he didn't have to worry about uni as he had an unconditional offer - or so I thought. He got confirmed accommodation and I'd paid the deposit. He was invited to pre season trials for his sport. All looking good.

3 weeks ago (20 Jul) the uni got in touch and said there was an error on his application form. Somehow his AS results had been entered on form as A2 (by him), school had not picked up during checking and uni hadn't noticed either.

Uni didn't notice because they don't read personal statements or references - they just look at exams on UCAS form. They pointed me to a small paragraph on their rather large website I would never have found which actually said this (so why do we waste so much time on them? But that's another thread) and said he had to accept a conditional offer or else they would withdraw offer completely. Offer was "aspirational" (not sure what you can aspire to once exams are done apart from blind and generous marker). UCAS agreed (apparently unis aren't required to read the total application even though for us it's mandatory!)

I went back and said surely they couldn't do this as exams had been and gone and anyway he would have accepted other offers if they hadn't offered unconditonal. The said rules are rules and pointed out even more obscure clauses on truly vast website. And that was that.

And guess what - today he missed the offer by 2 UMS (whatever these are). So uni declined and because he had previously had to reject every other offer he had to accept the unconditonal he had no insurance. Now no uni at all this year.

Urgent remark of one module requested to try and find these 2 points but I'm not hopeful. School on the case but based on my previous experience with uni admissions I'm not holding my breath. Still can't believe uni could back out at such a late stage - too late to apply to any other unis. His course not normally offered through clearing.

DS devastated of course - at end of school he had guaranteed place, now absolutely nothing and all his friends got places (congrats all).

So what do I do?

Do I appeal to uni based on (1) he's disadvantaged as had to reject insurance offers who would have taken him with these grades when their offer was accepted in good faith (2) it's 2 marks and (3) grandfather's death is extenuating circumstances. As expected course not coming up through clearing and I don't want him to take just anything - seen too many friend's DCs do this and leave within a year but still have to pay back fees.

Or do we just say sod it and plan a gap year (and a retake for these bloody 2 UMS)

DS says its just not fair and for once I agree with him ????

Any other similar experiences?

Hi,

I would say that he made a mistake and so the uni is perfectly within their rights (ethically as well) to convert the unconditional to conditional.
However you should let them know about the remark and the death and ask them to reconsider and at least wait the outcome.

A woman I know had a terrible year, as her father was dying. Her marks were very much lower than forecast (think Cs instead of pre-A* As).

The head of the school rang the university on her behalf, and she was accepted on the course immediately. She is in her mid 20s, so this is not current, but was less than 10 years ago.

Have you spoken to the school, at all?

Agree, the uni did the right thing by changing his offer. He made a mistake on his UCAS form and that sucks, but they can't give an unconditional offer to him (based on AS alone) and not give the same to everyone else who applied.

So, what to do. I'd call the programme director or admissions tutor for the subject he applied for. This info should be readily accessibly on the uni website. Much better than going through the central admissions people (who essentially have no direct relationship with the programme or department he's applying to). State the case, explain the death in the family, etc. They might be willing to accommodate you. You could get the school to do this on your behalf too.

What was the conditional offer and what did he actually get? If he only missed it by a little bit there's a greater chance of them being able to let him in.

No advice but how awful for you and ds :( poor lad

Extenuating circumstances should be submitted asap along with the exam ideally. Not sure you can always back date them I'm afraid.

Can he not go through clearing?

Try clearing, or take a gap year, do a job and improve grades.

Count your blessings, it might not have been deliberate, however he could in fact have been prosecuted for fraud. I've known this to happen, when students write down exam grades on their UCAS form that they don't actually have, which is what he did.

That UCAS form is a bugger to complete, though, which is why it should be checked by his personal tutor and also by someone in the school/college office.

Withdrawal of unconditional is perfectly understandable. It's not just on their website, as he was filling in.the Ucas form it says if you don't put in the right information then the universities have the right to withdraw offers.

So the problem is down to the extenuating exam circumstances which weren't highlighted at the time and need to be explained now - some of the advice above sounds a sensible approach.

I agree with everyone. They can and should withdraw an unconditional offer once they realise the conditions on which that offer was made had not actually been satisfied.

Remark and appeal sounds like an excellent idea. Head of Sixth/Examinations Officer/Head Teacher should be absolutely climbing over themselves to help you as the school has a moral if not legal obligation to make sure your UCAS form is accurate.

It must be absolutely gutting for him not to have the insurance offer to fall back on, but CLEARING will be his friend. Results have dropped again this year so it is likely the case that lots of spaces are open. He is familiar with the courses of what would have been his insurance offer and other places he was offered, so he could ring them first. If he's only missed his top offer by two points he will be comfortable for all the others, and the cap has been lifted so they can (sort of) take whoever they like.

Oh and by the way YOU do nothing. HE does it. He is an adult and their relationship/obligation/agreements etc are with him. Universities do not look kindly on applicants who get their parents to do the ringing, unless for example there are extenuating SEN or medical circumstances.

This is not the end.

I'd suggest a gap year. Not only will it give him the chance to have a break, lick his wounds and mature, it also broadens the horizons and will mean he goes to uni as a more rounded person. Hopefully. Did me no end of good so I did it three times. Might do it again yet....

Thanks for responses. I absolutely agree that he shouldn't be treated any differently to others but it's really just the timing.

DS shouldn't have got the form wrong, the school should have picked it up and and uni should have read his entire application and would have seen the mistake and made an unconditional offer like the other unis did. Or no offer. If this had happened before exams I'd have no issue.
However to change the offer when UCAS was effectively closed so he couldn't go back to the other unis and after he had taken his exams is the challenge. It was pretty much take it or leave it (we'll withdraw the offer completely) and given he had previously had to reject everyone else he didn't have any options. If we'd known before exams he wouldn't have gone to his grandfather's funeral (400 mile round trip in the middle of 4 exams over 3 days was not ideal). I think I'm saying had we known earlier we would have done things differently - hindsight!!
I can't stop wondering whether it's my fault they applied the letter of the law because I challenged them when they changed the offer. Probably unfair but just mother guilt.
It's just hard for him knowing that he would have got in with his current grades to the other offers he had - lesson is not to be seduced by supposedly easy option!

No, it is not your fault, it is entirely HIS responsibility - he is an adult required to complete forms truthfully and accurately, and he didn't. Like I said, I've done students prosecuted for this.

nor is the university required to read the whole application.

*known

That's tricky. The initial mistake, and it was a very significant one, was DS's. Everything that has happened since was a direct consequence of that mistake, so I think its a bit unrealistic to claim that he's been unfairly disadvantaged by timing issues around when the mistake was spotted. He's been disadvantaged by his own mistake.

In fact, had it not been picked up when it was, he would be in a far worse situation. If he had turned up for registration without the grades they thought he had, he would have been asked to leave there and then. No option to go through clearing and horrible to arrive at uni and then effectively get thrown straight out.

You could try the extenuating circumstances route, but I think you are supposed to register that as soon as it happens, not weeks later when the results come out (for obvious reasons).

I think clearing is his best bet, or a year out and retake.

Thanks all for the sanity check. Slowly losing the compulsion for a whole bottle of gin.
@ Charis, Mrs Hathaway, yes it is for him and the school to sort (and they are doing - I'm not even sure the university would talk to me and I certainly don't want to talk to them) but good old mother guilt kicking in as I have put my two penny worth in to discussions. Will keep it zipped now ????
On the plus side could be a lovely year with him at home and no nagging about exams.

Seriously, get him to apply through clearing. There's no reason he can't go to uni this year. 6th formers (and their parents) can get pretty hung up on a particular uni, but unless it was Oxbridge, it won't really matter. He'll get a degree either way, and have a great time.

Clearing - including contacting some of the places who had originally made offers that he would have accepted if he hadn't accepted the withdrawn one.

Lots of students get great places through clearing.

Yes, definitely contact the other universities that made them offers. In person if they're near by. There was a big mistake with my first choice uni and they gave my place away in error and then were full; I really didn't want to go to my insurance offer. I went down to the clearing office at Manchester and they accepted me on the spot. I'd had an offer from them and had exceeded that offer, and that was it.

Horrible for you both but a GAP year will probably be one of the best in his life and have him arrive at Uni more mature and full of work and travel experiences which are another form of education.

Can he not do clearing?

He needs to get the schools exams officer to send off an application for special consideration to the exam boards ASAP.
www.jcq.org.uk/Download/exams-office/access-arrangements-and-special-consideration/regulations-and-guidance/a-guide-to-the-special-consideration-process-2014-2015

A family death mid exams counts and there would be a percentage increase applied to his exam results, this should be enough to get the extra 2 UMS.

It can be applied for after results because I had a gcse candidate do this last year.

Somehow I’m seeing a lot of holes in this particular post. It gives me absolutely no joy in saying what I’m going to say and believe me, I’d say exactly the same thing to my own DC or my nephew/niece or whoever who asks for my opinion.

Now, first things first:

”Somehow his AS results had been entered on form as A2 (by him)”

In all my years concerning myself with education, university application etc. going back to the days of UCCA, never mind UCAS, I’ve never heard of anyone making this mistake. OP’s son from what I can gather, isn’t exactly an illiterate and the UCAS forms were not exactly printed in Swahili, Punjabi or even Maori. One has months and months to prepare, consult, check, double-check, triple-check and then submit a UCAS form ending only in January (other than Medicine or Oxbridge) and to say that one has made this phenomenal mistake is, to put it mildly, unbelievable! And as Charis1 said upthread, OP’s son should thank his lucky stars that he’s not being pulled in for fraud or even barred from UCAS for the next few years or something.

”They pointed me to a small paragraph on their rather large website . . . and said he had to accept a conditional offer or else they would withdraw offer completely.”

They don’t even have to do that, OP - I think you’re just trying to blame everything on the uni as the bulk of your OP seems to suggest as though the fault lies solely with them whilst the reverse is the truth. Actually the uni has bent over backwards to still offer your son a conditional offer!

”I went back and said surely they couldn't do this as exams had been and gone and anyway he would have accepted other offers if they hadn't offered unconditonal.”

Do you really believe that? What makes you think the other unis that gave him conditional offers on a bona fide basis would still welcome him now that they find his UCAS form which could be deemed to be fraudulent?

”. . . today he missed the offer by 2 UMS (whatever these are). So uni declined and because he had previously had to reject every other offer he had to accept the unconditonal he had no insurance.”

I am sorry, don’t mean to put the boot in like I said it gives me no pleasure in writing this. But for your son to accept an unconditional offer out of the blue last April whilst you yourself have admitted that you were surprised by unconditionals since he hadn't taken his A2s for a course not normally offered through clearing and freely rejecting all other (conditional) offers . . . seems to me at best that you/DS did not hear the alarm bells ringing and at worst, you/DS were massively reckless in rejecting the other offers and totally discounting the insurance.

”. . . grandfather's death is extenuating circumstances”.

It normally is under normal circumstances. But I do not see any evidence here as you yourself didn’t either because you did not tell the school/UCAS/uni when it happened.

Sorry to say you/DS have found yourselves in this situation but I’m more sorry to see one other applicant somewhere had been denied a place that was wrongly offered to your son. On a positive note, I hope this experience serves as a life-long lesson for your DS to be more careful in dealing with important matters in future.

I think predicted grades are entered by the school sixth form/college. Certainly my DD didn't enter any predictions.

The thread title is a bit misleading - they've only withdrawn the offer because of the error your son made in his application. The other universities that made offers may have made them under the same assumption so they may not stand either. I would not advise you to claim that the Uni have disadvantaged him with their offer as they will point out that it was made under false pretences! What does your son want to do now? It must be very stressful for you all.

I assume that he didn't quite match the grades that he put down, then? He has only missed by a narrow margin though!