Another Path to Greatness - Part II

[BigWoollyJumpers]

Here we are.

@NiamCinnOir and @hollypocks congratulations to your DC on their St. A offers. It is indeed an amazing university l.
I’m surprised at Durham’s attitude to being insurance. They can’t withdraw offers can they? If college is allocated already as part of unconditional offer, presumably they can’t take that back either. I guess it will all depend on what their offer conditions are compared to others.

@Jan069

A friend recounts a similar experience elsewhere way back in the late 80's. Students these days would not tolerate what he had to put up with but it was just for one year and no doubt increases resilience for stuff that life throws at you along the way.

Adds to the experiences to be drawn on later in life.

Hi everyone and congratulations on the recent offers over these last few days.

I’ll try and find the stats I saw for BA Geog a whole ago, but I remember thinking it was all a bit odd at the time. The required grades for BA Geog are A*AA too. But of something like 530 applications, they offered to 520 . Some of these will have been contextual offers of course, between AAA or ABB (I think). But then of those who firmed or made it their insurance, maybe 40% didn’t get the grades after exams.

I’m thinking the delay with BA Geog this year might be that a lot more did get the required grades or deferred due to CAGs last summer. So rather than just casting the net wide as usual, they are now having to whittle offer ratios down very significantly. And maybe loads have deferred as well, as they offered financial incentives last summer. I suspect it’s no coincidence that this course is one that over-offers the most, but also seems most delayed in sending offers out. But also, in a normal year, what on earth are they doing, spanning offers out over six months plus, when they must know full well they will practically offer to everyone anyway?

The insurance thing is slightly trickier for Durham than elsewhere, because of its commitment to accommodate all first years in college. Oxford and Cambridge have that same issue but with almost no-one putting them down as insurance. I can see Durham's point - it's a practical thing rather than a primadonna thing.

On the contrary I think most universities would guarantee first year's accommodation if they are put down as their first choice

That's really interesting quest1on, thanks for the info. Still waiting...

Vargas - if you Google “What Do They Know” and then put in Durham BA Geography, you can see the stats for the last few years.

I’m sure there must have been similar FOI requests for other subjects on there too, such as History or English.

@Tenpastseven my DS C college said the same thing. He also didn't want to ask for feedback but I said to do it for me (!). As the email said feedback will be sent to the referee he had to ask his headmaster to request the feedback. I said I would specifically like to know about his pre interview assessment and interview.

However I don't know if Headmaster asked these specific questions (probably not) or if the feedback would be given automatically

Thanks @chopc. Oh I didn’t realise the school had to ask. Have we missed the deadline?

@Tenpastseven that's the thing - I don't KNOW if the school had to ask. But as I wanted to know specific information, I told DS to ask. When he asked his Univ advisor he was told his referee had to ask and his referee was Headmaster.

I recall Pumpkintof saying a while ago there was a deadline but this may be college specific

Like your DS, my DS college said they will send feedback to the referee in due course

Anyone's DC "attending" the virtual Durham offer holder's day tomorrow? My DS wasn't that enthused when I asked him........

Hi @Tenpastseven and @chopc - in the case of the college to which DS applied all requests for feedback had to be submitted by the referee via their upload portal by the 8th of Feb, for feedback to be received by Easter.

There was nowhere on the form to request anything specific, you basically just filled in your name and UCAS details and signed it.

But, that was all made clear in the email he received when he requested feedback and I'm sure as chopc said, different colleges do things differently.

@chopc

Anyone's DC "attending" the virtual Durham offer holder's day tomorrow? My DS wasn't that enthused when I asked him........

Yes DD is virtually attending. She's unsure whether t's a cameras on or a cameras off virtual event. She's intrigued as to who the other offer holders are.

I think Dd intends to check in on Durham offer day. However she is v much enjoying her half term break away from sitting in her room at a screen all day so may not sit there long.

In case it's useful- there is a Facebook group for Durham offer holders detailing group chats for different subjects and colleges if any of your DC are interested.

I think this year especially it's so useful to get to know people if possible before you attend Uni as who knows if they will get a chance to meet at Uni...........

When I hear about people now all being allocated colleges at Durham and attending virtual offer days etc, I can’t help but think DS has no chance there now, even if he did want to go. They’ve had his UCAS since 26th Sept - that’s 5 flaming months! I don’t mean to sound entitled, but what is it they have taken exception to? He has all 9s and also A* predictions. Yes, he’s in an independent school, but no school anywhere is a free pass and he worked bloody hard for those grades. His school reference, I’ve seen, and it’s great. He wrote a separate PS for Durham even, so he could include about his singing and sport stuff as they are apparently interested in this kind of thing (he didn’t include this for LSE and Oxbridge). He’s seen on Discord that they’ve been making ABB contextual offers all last term. Some people sent in their UCAS for this course and heard back with an ABB offer within 48 hours! They all have colleges allocated. To this day, he’s not had even an acknowledgement of his application. They did send that “rank your colleges” email, but it’s hard to feel invested enough to give a damn after 5 months of absolutely nothing. Am I completely missing something here?

quest10n - as per TSR chats he still has every chance of an offer. And college allocations are per quota for the subjects so he should still get one of his top choices. When we looked at College options there were at least 5 or 6 Colleges DS liked - your DS may be the same.

In addition our DC applied early - however the UCAS deadline was less than a month ago ......

However it doesn't take away the frustration, I know

The thing is he doesn’t even want to go to Durham, but they do themselves no favours. Sorry, I’m feeling slightly strung out today.

quest1on still no acknowledgement is very bad.

My hunch is that his application may make him look as though he's a likely offeree for Oxbridge so they may well have put him on the let's-wait-and-see-if-he-firms-Cambridge pile. Especially if he's at a good independent school, they may think Cambridge/ higher than standard offer/ could use us an insurance. He's confirmed he's an Oxbridge applicant by putting in the substitute statement. Clearly his aptitude isn't in doubt. I'd ring again about the acknowledgment though - that would be completely justified.

One of DS4's housemates in a similar situation got an offer on the last possible day that Durham could make it.

Normally I don't get into overly complicated theories but this year is very odd, and Durham has real constraints on space.

Good luck to your DS.

Oh I now see he doesn't want to go.

But it's lovely :)

Thankyou goodbyestranger. I’m sure it is lovely and I do think if the process had gone differently with Durham, he might have felt differently. But 5 months is a long time. He really couldn’t have worked any harder or put more effort into this. Being in lockdown and seeing no friends had made it so much harder. He’s putting a brave face on it, but when they’re on chats and they see people with lowers grades, applying in Jan and getting offers within a week, it’s hard not to take it personally and wonder why you are bottom of the pile.

I have a feeling they will take him to the last day (8th March) and then reject him and it will be through no fault of his own, just that there’s no spaces because of deferrals. Mainly he’s waiting for LSE and this is even worse!

Goodbye - how will Durham know if a candidate would firm up Oxbridge before they actually do it? Universities have no knowledge of where else a candidate has applied let alone what their order of preference is until it's actually done.

Yes they probably do think a person was an Oxbridge candidate who was likely to get an offer - however it doesn't then follow why they would wait to make an offer - unless no offer will be made as the candidate will choose Oxbridge

chopc because when a student firms and insures elsewhere the remaining unis have access to the info. Not that that's the point (about seeing the various choices), the point is that by choosing elsewhere the student whistles themselves out of the pending pile.

Durham doesn't want to be an insurance choice.

Quest1on I really feel for you, it's so tough when your DS is still waiting to hear from his preferred choices. I felt so wretched after the Cambridge decision, it was only him getting the Imperial offer (and being genuinely happy about it) that took the edge off. Really really hope your DS hears from LSE very soon.

@quest1on Durham are notoriously slow at offers, they come out in dribs and drabs. There is still the Durham thread up started on 4th Feb last year with the OP asking how many are still waiting for an offer.

Her DS's UCAS submitted in October (pre-15th as Oxbridge) and he finally got an offer on 23rd March! at his first choice college.

As I knew Durham was on Ds's list I stored that little gem away knowing it could take a while. The way we worked on this was it isn't a no, so it could be a yes.

Warwick specifically said that they would wait for most applications to be in before they made most of their offers so after 29th Jan for a fair process.