Non Oxbridge early application - good, bad or neutral?

[GnomeDePlume]

DD has asked me to ask this of you wise folk.

DD is applying to Russell Group universities but not Oxford/Cambridge. If her application goes in early is that an advantage or is there a risk that her preferred unis will assume she is applying to Oxford/Cambridge and discount her application?

She is applying for physics/chemistry subjects and is predicted A*AAA.

Any advice please?

But you might just as well have used a more realistic example titchy, which would have given others a better idea of the type of student who could reasonably expect to be regarded as sufficiently highly predicted to be a cert in terms of admissions. Instead you chose hyperbole, so it's fair to point it out.

I could have used a 3 x B example yes, and the principle would, does in fact, still stand, but I chose to use the A star analogy as the post was about high fliers being seen as Oxbridge applicants. Ok with you?

And my post wasn't about how much of a dead cert an applicant is. It was, if you bother to read it, simply saying that the timing and predicted grades of applicants doesn't differ significantly from one year to the next, and no matter how unusual you might think a particular application is, it won't be.

I don't see why you chose a 4A applicant no :) Since obviously a 4A applicant is very extreme, and even if you yourself don't find such an applicant very extreme (albeit not unique), then I would, with the greatest respect, point you towards the stats which confirm that they are.

Hmmm maybe one syllable words are needed....

I'm not really arguing - just trying to point out how easy it is make offers and know pretty accurately how many of those will end up as reject, firm, insurance, and ultimately enrolments.

Yes of course 4 x A stars are unusual. But a given course at a given HEI may well have say 4 applicants with those predictions applying early October, a further 3 in November and 2 more in January. That same course at the same HEI last year in all likelihood also had around 9 applicants with 4 x A star predictions, half applying before the Oxbridge deadline. So you know from last year the proportion of each of those that will convert. Same for your 3 x A applicants, and your ABBs etc. The point is they behave the same year on year which makes offering pretty straightforward, even if they're in a very small group.

Oh and I probably have access to far more data and stats than you do...

The info for Chemical Physics at Bristol does say they may read the PS. They may need to differentiate between applicants of a similar academic profile. Since they require AAA in Maths, Chemistry and Physics one could assume that lots of students would have a similar academic profile. If they simply don't get enough applicants of such a high calibre I guess they could just offer everyone a place and hopefully get the bums on the seats with the minimum of effort.

Hmm. Both mine had 4xA* predictions. Both ended up waiting till the end of the cycle before hearing from the majority of their choices.

I don't normally disagree with Stranger, but it is important to recognise that a minority's of courses are very over subscribed and good applicants can be kept waiting a long time. It is a pretty hellish process. We are talking about 17 year olds. It is far better to expect a long wait and be pleasantly surprised to hear early than spend most of Y13 desperately worried. Titchy is right. Some Universities sit on applications for a long time. But no news means that you are still under consideration.

On a good day I can manage words with several syllables titchy :)

Yes indeed, some students with very high predictions may be left until the eleventh hour without a decision. However, to my absolutely certain knowledge, plenty of students get offers dished out early for top end competitive courses without necessarily having 4A* predictions, as per titchy's guide. You won't get an early offer if you don't put your form in early so bung it in as soon as you can is my advice and that advice has served my own DC well also many, many of their friends as well. The majority of my DCs' offers came ahead of the January deadline or at the very least it was an even split.

However, to my absolutely certain knowledge, plenty of students get offers dished out early for top end competitive courses without necessarily having 4A predictions, as per titchy's guide.*

My 'guide' - what?!!!! I never said anything about 4 A star predictions being the only ones to get early offers at all!!!! Please read what I said ffs.

(My dd had five offers within 48 hours for fairly competitive courses and certainly wasn't a 4 A star applicant)

titchy you said the very top tranche eg 4A* applicants would be those getting the early offers.

Although I'm sure we all get your point about the profile of cohorts barely changing, it might be helpful for you to clarify why you now seem to be saying early offers do go out to students who aren't all at the very top slice of the pile. I think they do, you said they didn't, now you seem to be saying they do.

titchy you said the very top tranche eg 4A applicants would be those getting the early offers.*

Where did I say that?

I see you wrote 'really strong' applicants titchy, in fairness, but the fact that you referenced 4A applicants in the initial paragraph seemed to imply 4A were the category considered 'really strong'.

I see offers coming in early for strong applicants, not just 'really strong', often for very competitive courses. It's the early offers to that middle group which is interesting.

Cross post. I went back to re-read, as directed :)

But your thoughts on early offers to merely 'strong' applicants eg those predicted the standard offer of A*AA would be useful.

But your thoughts on early offers to merely 'strong' applicants eg those predicted the standard offer of AAA would be useful.*

My thoughts are no different. They're no different when you consider CCD applicants to recruiting universities either.

ALL I have ever done is explain that there is no advantage to applying early, because year after year many people can't understand that applying on 14 January will still yield the same offers, and that offers do not run out as many seem to think they might.

That applies, as I have said repeatedly to all applicants, regardless of predicted grades, course and HEI.

I only mentioned high grades as the example because that's what the OP was about.

Just to add to the mix it is highly likely that DD will get a contextual offer based on school/postcode (POLAR3 level 1). I am hoping that DD will be able to achieve the standard offer but does contextualisation impact at all on timing of offers?

I found tichy's post easy to follow . Applicants who are clearly stronger than the cut off point for offers are the ones who may get an early offer in selecting courses. Those who are closer to the cut off may have to wait until all applications are in. Some courses will operate a fully gathered field - no offers until all applications are in. Recruiting courses may well offer immediately to all the applicants who they believe will meet their admissions standards. Every course and every university is potentially different.

I didn't find it in the least hard to follow chemenger :) My point is that she said in it that 'really strong' applicants may get an early offer whereas experience at my DCs' school over the past decade suggests that you don't need to be 'really strong' to get an early offer. If all those early offers to really strong and averagely strong still leave enough places for everyone else to have proper equal consideration at the January deadline then all well and good. My point is merely that titchy overegged it a bit when stipulating that only 'really strong' applicants get early offers whereas clearly merely 'strong enough' applicants do too. That's what a lot of people want to know. I suspect theory and practice vary, especially in a demographic lull and with increased fees.

The problem is different courses and different universities will do things differently, depending on their specific patterns of applications (which, as titchy says, will be similar year on year, but will differ from university to university and course to course)
Some will make lots of offers on a rolling basis, so that decisions are likely to come out quickly, unless the candidate is genuinely borderline or more information is needed.
Some will make early offers to strong candidates and then hold on to the rest, perhaps because they need or want to make fewer offers.
It is very unwise to try and generalize from the experiences of a small number of young people (comparative to the numbers applying to university every year) to some kind of rule about what universities do.
Theory and practice are not different. Universities do what they say they are going to do - but they do things differently because they are autonomous institutions and are different.

What is universally true, as the admissions specialists on this thread have tried to make clear, is that UCAS' equal consideration rule means that early application does not give you a better chance of an offer. Any university in breach of this rule is in serious contractual breach and should be reported to UCAS, and to allege that universities are routinely breaking this rule is inaccurate and unfair.
There are many good reasons for getting an application in early, as long as the applicant is not rushing things - I am a little concerned about the number of applicants each year who change their mind as to the subject they want to study and have to go through the stress of trying to get new offers from their chosen universities. So if an applicant needs to take a little more time to make the right decision, or if a school is unable, perhaps due to limited resources, to get the applications ready for submission early, it's not a problem from the point of view of their likelihood of getting an offer.

when stipulating that only 'really strong' applicants get early offers

Except, as I have pointed out time and time again, that is NOT what I said.....

Ok then titchy, do you concede that those who merely meet the standard offer for a competitive course at a competitive uni may well get an early offer? Because although I get the point about cohort profiles being similar year on year I don't quite get what you're saying about who bags the early offers and how this interfaces with equal opportunities for those of that sort of merit who apply at the eleventh hour before the January deadline. It's very clear that early offers are actually given out to applicants who aren't 'really strong', on your definition.

Any university in breach of this rule is in serious contractual breach and should be reported to UCAS, and to allege that universities are routinely breaking this rule is inaccurate and unfair.

^ This.

If you have evidence that universities are breaching the rule, report to UCAS.

Gnomedeplume - to answer your question, it depends on how the contexualisation is done. If it is simply a question of identifying a post code etc on a UCAS form, and the applicant doesn't have to supply any separate information or apply separately, it shouldn't make too much difference because it can be flagged up automatically for the decision-maker. If more information or a separate application is needed, it will take longer.
But it will also depend on the system of the individual university (for example, on how centralized the admissions process is) and the state of the backlog on the desk of the person who is making the decision at the time that your DCs application arrives to them. Admissions decision-makers are human and Stuff Happens - don't read anything into the timing of offers. You need to be a bit zen about it, to be honest....

do you concede that those who merely meet the standard offer for a competitive course at a competitive uni may well get an early offer

Yes of course I concede that. If you'd bothered to read my posts of 20.58 yesterday ('I was using that as an example...'), 21.46 yesterday ('I could have used a 3 x B example...'), 22.33 ('Same for your 3 x A applicants, and your ABBs etc. '), and several posts today.

Well Gannet you say it's unwise but the younger siblings in my family have used the experience of their older siblings and it hasn't seemed to compromise them. So on a micro scale it's worked. And at school level it works too. The posters who say that they're tutors on these threads aren't the only tutors either, and not all advice available from various tutors at various institutions is unanimous.