University Offer Withdrawn

[rawlikesushi]

DD missed the grades for her first choice uni but received an email over the weekend offering her a place and saying that more information would follow.

About ten minutes ago, she received another email, from a different person and dept, declining her because she didn't meet the terms of her offer.

She's beside herself. Can they do this? She can try to contact them tomorrow if course but was hoping for comforting words to ward of another sleepless night.

Goodness. Poor you. I have no advice or experience of this but bloody hell I hope you get it sorted today.

Is it Nottingham? They have done this a number of times this year.

It is Nottingham!

No idea what to do.

No reply to emails, phone lines not open, automated chat bot is hopeless.

She had an email from Head of her course confirming the place on Saturday, then last night an email saying application declined.

@rawlikesushi

It is Nottingham!

No idea what to do.

No reply to emails, phone lines not open, automated chat bot is hopeless.

She had an email from Head of her course confirming the place on Saturday, then last night an email saying application declined.

What grounds did they give ? You could try twitter @uniofnottingham

It just seemed like a standard email saying that they won't reconsider her application because she didn't meet the grade requirements.

But the email on Saturday was offering her the place based on her actual grades.

Even if it's an error and can be sorted, they've cancelled her accommodation.

It's been almost two weeks of this misery now, just exhausted with it and feel so sorry for her.

I will try twitter thank you.

What was her second choice? My daughter lost her place at Sheffield and went to Birmingham and had a great time and got a good degree. The world really doesn’t come to an end because you lose your first choice. Will Nottingham give her a deferred place? I hate to say it, but if she’s really determined to go there she might have to go in person and speak to admissions or Head of Course. Have you tried emailing that person? What does her school advise? They are used to dealing with this situation

@rawlikesushi

It just seemed like a standard email saying that they won't reconsider her application because she didn't meet the grade requirements.

But the email on Saturday was offering her the place based on her actual grades.

Even if it's an error and can be sorted, they've cancelled her accommodation.

It's been almost two weeks of this misery now, just exhausted with it and feel so sorry for her.

I will try twitter thank you.

Name and shame on twitter and email your MP.

@mdh2020

What was her second choice? My daughter lost her place at Sheffield and went to Birmingham and had a great time and got a good degree. The world really doesn’t come to an end because you lose your first choice. Will Nottingham give her a deferred place? I hate to say it, but if she’s really determined to go there she might have to go in person and speak to admissions or Head of Course. Have you tried emailing that person? What does her school advise? They are used to dealing with this situation

I don't know whether they'll offer a deferred place because phone lines have a recorded message saying that they are not replying to calls, emails or live chat.

She does have an insurance place, but much prefers Nottingham and it is awful to think you've got a place only to have them seemingly change their mind.

Yes, she has emailed Head of Course.

We live a long way from Nottingham but she would certainly go in person if she thought it would help but our understanding is that everyone is working remotely.

Wait till the phone lines open and call them. Your child should call and explain the 2 emails and can it be looked into.

To me it sounds like some kind of communications chaos within the university. I don’t know enough about the individual circumstances but universities are frantically trying to get student numbers up.

This doesn’t help your daughter right now, because it’s very stressful and unnecessary. My advice would be to see who else has places available and consider going to a university who haven’t bungled the communications.

Which subject is she looking at?

Were both emails from Head of course? If not, I’m sure it’ll be a mix up rather than a retraction. Your daughter could private message them via twitter, explaining the two emails. It’s appalling but if she really wants a place there it’s probably best not to name & shame on Twitter. Private messages work extremely well in my experience (albeit not contacted Notts).

Apologies, you’ve made it clear it’s from differing people. If she’s emailed the Head of Course then I’m sure she’ll receive a reply in the next few days. 🤞🏼

Thank you NotDonna. That's correct, emails from two different people and still no news.

I won't name and shame. It feels like they're doing their best in a difficult situation that is not of their making, but being unable to contact them in any way is very frustrating.

We are hoping that it's an administrative error that will be resolved too, but the wait is excruciating.

At a guess, someone has been told to work through the "people who still didn't make their offer after the goverment u-turn", emailing to confirm rejection. In the meantime, the department has been checking their numbers and has worked out they have space for some of the near misses, and so offered a place.
Hopefully it will all be resolved in the morning...

It’s incredibly frustrating and I have fingers and toes crossed that everything works out for the best!

Someone my daughter knows had this happen to her today... Nottingham again.

I thought I'd update to let you know that she finally received confirmation that it was indeed an admin error and she's got a place on the course.

Unfortunately they released her accommodation and that can't be sorted so who knows where she'll end up, but at least she's in.

Thank you for all of the support on here, really helpful when we were climbing the walls!

Well glad she's in but what a cock up. Your poor dd.

So pleased.

At least she has got in - my daughter loved Nottingham (she is now a London lawyer). Where you live is not that important as in year 2 you move with friends into private rented usually anyway.

Good, though I hope they find her a room in halls and do something by way of a decent apology.

In the past, as an Admissions Tutor, and also as a Head of Department, I've a couple of times made an offer to a student in such a way that was appropriate for my department/discipline, but was not in accord with our centralised Admissions processes. Knuckles rapped, wrist slap for me.

The ability & autonomy of academics to actually act on what we know will work for an applicant & our course is disappearing - the Government imposed surveillance regimes of university admissions policies & public propensity to cry "Unfair!" now make centralised Admissions offices very cautious.

So I'd say it's an internal thing - and I imagine that the academic actually teaching the course will let the centralised Admissions people know that they need to admit this student. I hope your DD gets the right answer for her!

But this is why, sometimes the MN advice "Phone the academic" isn't the best advice.

If only universities were actually all fully autonomous, but our government doesn't want that ...