University offers for 2018? (Part 1)

[OnlyTeaForMe]

OK, I know I'm a bit early, but let the hand-holding begin...

Come and join us if you (and your DC) are about to start the UCAS process in September - applying for a place in 2018.

I've got DS1, who wants to do Computer Science in 2018. Looking at various Russell Group unis and maybe Oxbridge.

5 days notice isn’t much! Well done to your dd fatbottom!

Thank you . 5 days is rubbish as we are at other end of the country. She really wants oxford but thats not easy as we all know

Oh congratulations Fatbottom’s DD! Well done her! But yes, 5 days seems very short notice.

She's just got offer from Warwick of 38
She's very pleased

I was under the impression that most offers were after Christmas. Is it because the early applicants are usually Oxbridge/medicine and are clearly brighter than other applicants?

DD wants to do medicine so won't get any offers/interviews yet.

LJ, it varies. Courses that will be oversubscribed may use a "gathered field" where they sort applications essentially into three piles. Yes, no and maybe. The yesses and noes will hear early. The maybes may have to wait till after the January deadline or even later. DS ended up waiting till late March from three of his choices, presumably when the University had a better idea of its acceptance rate. Courses which do not expect to be oversubscribed may expect to offer to almost everyone who meets entry requirements so will be equally quick.

The same seems to happen with medicine. Some will hear quickly after their interview (yes or no) whilst others will wait till after all the interviews have happened, or even later.

How soon after applying for medicine do students hear whether they have been granted an interview?

How long is a piece of string. DD was lucky in that she was the first in her year at school to hear she had an interview (Birmingham). She heard just after the autumn half term, though the interview itself was not till March. The others (two interviews, one rejection) drifted in shortly after Christmas. However she had a lowish UKCAT so would not have been top of the heap. Others had interviews/offers before Christmas. One girl at one of DD's March interview had only been invited the week before.

The best thing you can do is read through The Student Room threads for the Universities your DD has applied to from last year. (Perhaps better you do it than your DD. TSR can be a scary/trolling/braggy place.) It will give a sense of the pattern a University uses. Inevitably the people who post most are the ones left hanging on, so if that happens to your DD you will know that often no news is good news.

The same can apply to other oversubscribed subjects. The TSR LSE economics thread is pretty active in February/March. In DS' day it was acceptances on a Thursday and rejections on a Friday. If it got to 4.00pm on a Friday you were safe for another week!

Thank you for the pointers Needmoresleep

DS has interview at Manchester first week November (science subject) - the interview date was given the day after he applied before EA deadline, so now count ourselves lucky we had more that 5 days notice to get train ticket! Well done fatbottom DD!

dd has been invited to an applicants open day at Bath in November. Frustratingly it’s a week day which means a long train journey and time out from college. I hope they aren’t all going to be week days. They aren’t compulsory are they? If they went to open days they don’t need to go to those too?

They aren't compulsory but for Ds we found them more useful than open days. They are less crowded, it is a normal working day for the university so you get a better feel for the place and you have more opportunity to talk to members of staff.
Ds was still very undecided after open days so we went to offer holders' days at his top three which helped to make up his mind.
If you are pretty clear what you want anyway, they probably are less useful.

Sorry - this may appear twice...
Fatbottom
I may be missing something, but your post suggests your daughter is doing both A levels and IB. In the name of all that is holy - WHY?

Kitten I'd be tempted to wait and go on the offer holder's day rather than an applicant's day. Not everyone has gone to open days first.

DPotter No she's just doing the IB - that's more than enough for anyone. Manchester just gave her the A level offer not the IB offer. We have to wait for that to come through. Bit annoying but there is no direct translation from A level score to Ib score it can vary hugely from place to place

Phew! After nailbitingly quiet 10 days since form went in, an offer! ABB for PPE at UEA. BBB if he gets an A for EPQ. Enough with the acronyms!

That’s confusing Knitting, she’s has an offer from them, but was invited to an applicants open day. Will she get invited to an offers open day too?

I looked it up, it’s just different terminology they use :)

That’s ace party! :) well done to your ds.

I'm relieved Fatbottom!

First offer in here from Leeds for English Lit. AAA or AAB with an A in both English Lit and her EPQ. It’s just a relief that her PS works! and Leeds is a favourite too

Will she get invited to an offers open day too?

I'm not sure if many places do applicants day and then a separate offer holders day. Everywhere my DD applied to interviewed for her subject, and that was the only visit (they all included department, campus and accommodation tours). The only exception was Cambridge which did an overnight visit for offer holders but that was college-specific, not the norm there either.

All such visits I've heard of are weekday not weekend.

If its not clear, then your DD should ask them - honestly, uni admissions people are there to help!

I thought it was a lot of days, the places DS has looked at has called them offer holder days and they have been after Christmas.

Congratulations to Lucy, Party and any other DC with offers!
They seem to be coming in quite steadily now. It’s such a relief to just have that confirmation that the application and PS must be ok!

DD has been invited to offer holder days at Bristol and Newcastle. Also both on weekdays Kitten, so she’ll be taking herself on the train again.
She hinted that she might be able to drive herself by then, but I’m not willing to think about that yet!

Last year DD went to an offer holders open day, she says it was very different to the applicants days because they had a sample lecture and various other things that you'd do when you were a student and met more people in the department in more depth. She says it was useful and helped her make up her mind about which offer to accept and which to turn down.

On the Bath website it lists many days, most of which are after Christmas. I guess they try and spread them out so they don’t get too crowded. dad is going to contact them after the weekend. There’s so much happening for her in Nov/Dec and the trains will mean a very early start.

Lucycat, thats great :)