Extracurricular on UCAS - don't include everything?

[Asterisk]

Careers advisor has told DD to take some of her extracurricular activities off her UCAS form. These are not in her personal statement, they are entered separately. She has qualifications in three areas that are eligible for UCAS points. Careers advisor says this detracts from her application as they distract from her academic grades. She is applying to universities who look at grades rather than points. Is this wise advice? Hoping an admission tutor will be able to comment.

That sounds odd - I'm not sure how it would be a distraction. If they count as UCAS points then I would want to keep them on. Even though grade Unis select on grades Unistats still collect info on UCAS points which is used for rankings etc so It makes you wonder if a Uni had a choice of two identical candidate they might prefer the one with the higher points score. I have no idea if that's true though!

I'd be interested in hearing what a admissions person says about it too.

KEEP THEM IN!!!!!! We like as many UCAS points as possible as it helps our league table position. How else do you think Oxford etc entrants have average UCAS points over 600?!

I know nothing about it, but I would keep them in too. DD applying this year to RG unis and has two things that count for UCAS points. I understand that these are on her application, and I know the form has been approved by the teacher in charge.

That sounds like very dodgy advice. My DCs included various things on these extra qualifications as there was no room to mention them in personal statement (and they weren't relevant to the courses being applied for) but they still wanted to show what they had done. "Distracting from academic grades" - what nonsense.

It seems unlikely that people doing admissions are that easily distracted, tbh!

Can I add if this is a schools careers adviser, and the posters above are uni selection people, that you phone to speak to the school about it as the adviser is giving out incorrect information?

If they are entered separately keep them in. I sometimes get students to limit the extra curricular in the main body of the statement especially if it is taking over from the academic, but music awards, dance awards etc leave them in!

Well you can keep them in and we academics can simply ignire them. That's what i do. I doubt it'll do any harm if the grades or predicted grades are good enough. To me, it just looks naive, but I then simply ignore them.

Multishirker - what - including quals with UCAS points looks naive?!!!! How else is your institution going to raise its average tariff score, or keep it high?

From a parent perspective I'll just say that none of my six DC to have gone through the process have ever added those things in and also never put in AS module scores (even with full UMS) as it's true that the form is much punchier/ neater/ more concise without them - and their hit rate has been remarkably high (three rejections out of twenty nine applications).

Molio I think it's a safe bet that your DCs UCAS points were super high without any extras

Some unis give scholarships to the student with the highest UCAS points! Might be very worthwhile to leave them in!

Titchy I really don't think where I teach has to worry too much about UCAS points in that way - we're already in the top 10 in most subjects.

I tend to assume that applicants to the degree I teach in do extra-curricular activities as a matter of course in terms of a well-rounded bringing up.

Tooty you're being too complimentary here - leaving out the AS module marks masked a good number of blips, as well as looking far neater :) The only one who had no slightly dodgy module mark stuck in there somewhere also opted for the 'look at a glance' approach, so I get the point of what this adviser is saying.

Everyone needs to be concerned with their tariff points, even Oxford and Cambrige. I bet your VC isn't happy to sit on their laurels with a top 10 ranking, they'll be wanting top 5, and encouraging your applicants to put everything tariff point they own down is an easy win.

Sigh - it's so hard getting my colleagues to understand this.....

DD was told to input all the extra UCAS qualifications but there was then no need to refer to them again in the personal statement.

Everyone needs to be concerned with their tariff points, even Oxford and Cambrige.

Perhaps.

But there is absolutely no pressure on admissions tutors to use tariff points in making decisions. Like Multishirker I would completely ignore all non-academic qualifications and happily give an offer to a candidate with lower overall UCAS points but better performance/potential in my subject.

In my subject areas universities which select do so only on the basis of academic grades and potential. Most universities actually offer to all students with the right predicted grades, with Oxbridge, Imperial, and a few others being the only ones who select.

On the other hand for a subject such as law which is very over-subscribed offers are made based on very small differences in candidates, so adding extra UCAS points might help.

I don't think adding extra-curricular qualifications which attract UCAS points would ever have a detrimental effect. It does help to group them after then main academic qualifications on the form, though.

I've seen personal statements where the main body of text is why they want to study the subject than the last paragraph is almost bullet point listing of their ECs which attract UCAS points.

This is an interesting one for me, as DD (12) has already taken a number of dance exams that attract UCAS points ... listing them by the time she gets to 17/18 is going to need a LOT of space. Presumably there is an option to say 'Dance exams in 3 genres, total of X UCAS points'??

It's hard to understand why this adviser believes that reputable qualifications in EC activities might be detrimental to a UCAS application.

Only the highest counts teacher - not sure how dance exams work, but for music exams you'd only put down say grade 8 cello. You wouldn't put down grade 7 and grade 6 cello as these wouldn't attract points as there's a higher grade.

I fully recognise that admissions tutors aren't going to base their decision on whether the applicant has grade 7 speech and drama - but admissions tutors are quite capable of ignoring those and just looking at AS levels and the predicted grades - they're quite clever people!

teacher - you don't need to list the progression - just the highest grade achieved. Quite a few university admissions statements say explicitly that they only want to know about exams and school 16+ (ie GCSE onwards).

Thanks, that's really useful, though - I have all these certificates stating UCAS points, and wondered whether they were 'cumulative' or 'final is the only one counted'.

I hope it's not just 16+ - I've just Googled, and the highest level for which UCAS points are awarded (Intermediate) is one that she will do in most genres by the age of 14 at the latest!

Disclaimer: I'm a careers adviser.

I think the moral of this story is for academic RG /Oxbridge type applications, the extra curricular stuff makes almost no difference to your chances of getting a place (unless you can show the skills gained from it are relevant to the course), so add your UCAS points onto the form but make sure your statement is all about the subject and course and not about your Brownie badges or swimming certificates.

FWIW (and there is no right or wrong as we've seen here) I think an academic dc who can also show that they have taken an extra curricular activity to a high level is demonstrating they are a bit of an all rounder who can cope with the demands of a challenging timetable etc. I'd put them in without mentioning in the statement.

Interesting, Betty - I would say that DDs ability to juggle 10-15 hours of dance, a full school timetable to a very high level, a sport to county trials level and an instrument is valuable, more valuable than the qualifications that those EC activities might bring.