No personal statement from 2024 (according to the Times)

[lieselotte]

Although you will have to fill in answers to a number of guided questions. And maybe submit a video message (maybe give students a choice so they can use their preferred communication style, I'd hate to have to put a video together).

A video message could soon replace the personal statement, the university admissions body said as it announced it was scrapping the written essay.
Candidates have a blank space on university application forms which they can fill with up to 4,000 characters. Ucas said that from 2024 they will instead respond to questions that will guide them to support their application in the right way.
Social mobility experts have campaigned for change and said personal statements were “barometers of middle-class privilege” because wealthier teenagers had tailored help. Numerous companies offer their services and private school sixth forms have specialists to help pupils.

Ucas is making the changes after a consultation with 1,200 students, 170 teachers and more than 100 universities and colleges. It said this paved the way for further change in future, such as moving from written text to multimedia submissions.
While students want the space to advocate for themselves on the form and demonstrate achievements beyond grades, most said the process of writing the personal statement was stressful and difficult to complete without support.

The questions the admissions service plans to introduce include asking about applicants’ motivation and preparedness for the course, their preparation through other experiences, any extenuating circumstances, how prepared they are to study and their preferred learning style.
Kim Eccleston, head of strategy and reform at Ucas, said in a blog for the Higher Education Policy Institute: “We believe this will create a more supportive framework, which in turn will help guide students through their responses by removing the guesswork, as well as capturing the information universities and colleges have told us they really need to know from applicants when it comes to offer-making.
“We are continually working to improve the admissions service to serve applicants better and broaden participation for all students, whether pursuing a traditional undergraduate degree or an apprenticeship.
“Through these upcoming reforms, we aim to introduce greater personalisation for students making post-secondary choices, give more structure to free text sections of the Ucas application, enhance visibility of the range of grade profiles and deliver new initiatives to support further widening access and participation.”

The change will affect those applying in 2024 to start university in 2025.
Lee Elliot Major, professor of social mobility at Exeter University, has campaigned for change. He said: “This is a significant breakthrough in our efforts to make university admissions fairer and fit for purpose for all students.
“Personal statements have become little more than barometers of middle-class privilege, disadvantaging applicants from poorer homes who do not benefit from the extra help provided by an army of advisers filling in the submissions.
“I’m afraid it is time to say goodbye to the university love letter that has been a key part of university applications for decades.

“No one should underestimate how important this reform will be in helping to level the playing field in university admissions. Statements currently add further advantage to middle-class applicants who are often given help in filling in their submissions.”
On its website, Charterhouse, a private school, says: “We offer guidance on choosing degree courses and universities as well as support on writing personal statements. We have dedicated specialists for Oxbridge, medical and law applications and applications for the USA.”
Cheltenham Ladies’ College, a private boarding school for girls, has a dedicated professional guidance centre which supports girls in their university applications.
Radley College, an independent boys’ boarding school, has a director of university entrance whose team provides “comprehensive guidance through the process of applying to UK universities through Ucas.”

To be honest, I wish the main changes were happening sooner...

'Reflection' rather than just 'list' would be a perfectly reasonable point to make, indeed.

I have just completed the survey which was very quick. I have said about the importance of being able to tailor the responses to the university, why should the admissons office be able to deduce that you have applied to a different course elsewhere. It might even mean that you could have a staggered application, perhaps put in the Oxford/medicine application early and then apply to other places with a different set of answers later on. I know that you can add places later and ask unis to accept different PS now, but this could be so much easier.

God I hope they dont go down the video message route. My bright but shy GCSE stage DS would hate that. he is actually the most fit for university out of all my children but that would cripple him. He is very self-concious about his looks, moderate acne etc. I actually think he would choose not to go to university rather than have to submit a video-based PS. I think a lot of teenagers would feel the same way. I hope they take that into account.

Unfortunately, it's pretty normal these days for job applications, certainly for the larger employers. My son has had to do video presentations for every single job where he's got through the initial application stage, and also online/webcam interviews rather than "in person".

So I can see where they're coming from. It's easier and quicker for the Uni admissions team to watch videos rather than have to read lengthy personal statements.

I think today's youngsters are just going to have to get used to it. "In person" interviews and lengthy/wordy applications are looking to be a thing of the past.

It's easier and quicker for the Uni admissions team to watch videos rather than have to read lengthy personal statements.

If you read the thread and the linked report you will see videos are not being proposed by UCAS. But I would contest that watching videos is quicker - you can scan through a personal statement looking for key words pretty quickly, you can’t do the same with a video.

I agree, as a recruiter or admissions tutor, I couldn't be bothered to look at videos. Reading something is much easier.

lieselotte how much weight do you give the teacher’s reference? That bit seems the least likely to give useful information as some school must write pretty much fictional ones which they think look good. And others might be the opposite and completely undersell a good candidate?

dd3 would literally rather not go to university than have to make a video of herself.

I don't know really - I imagine they are as much of a fiction as personal statements are.

As a teacher you want your students to do well and get on - unless you have real concerns about a student's ability to cope with any course, even with assistance for special needs, you are going to give them a decent reference aren't you. There can't be many students who are completely unsuited to higher education (ie any course at all). I suppose if a student has applied to do a law degree and you think they'd be better off studying art, you might say so?

How does she think she's going to get a graduate job after Uni? A huge proportion of graduate jobs have a fully online application process, and that usually includes a video/webcam presentation and a self-video answering various questions they ask you.

I expect she'll cross that bridge when she comes to it. Most kids grow up a bit over 5 or 6 years, which you may or may not realise.

It

Oops

Slightly off topic but related to admissions. Do UCAS do an audit comparing a particular school's predicted grades and the actual grades? Is this something done so that schools are disincentivised from over-predicting.

A friend's DS was recently predicted A star A A and applied to Oxford. Got an interview and did really well in it by all accounts but I'd have thought he was starting well behind the blocks in that everyone else who was applying would have three or four A stars. His predicted grades were the same as the course's required ones. I wondered why the school didn't just whack on the A stars in order to increase their pupil's chance of being offered a place and then hopefully matching the offer.

Does anyone know if schools are checked for this? Or are they just ethical? (This academy's way of managing out pupils and fudging the admissions is the least ethical in the borough!)

If predictions are below offers by more than a couples of grades in total (ABB instead of AAA), I presume they are filtered out as not likely to meet offer so no point considering. This seems a weak point to me as pupils do exceed expectations/predictions not irregularly so a teachers predictions could scupper chances. However, over-predicting means wasted offers by universities and students with offers they will never achieve. But it seems unnecessary for universities to up their offer for a promising candidate because they are predicted higher grades than the typical offer?

Do offers generally match their advertised grades required? Or are they often higher/lower (excluding contextual/widening access ones)?

Oxford do not just offer on grades though. They set tests. They want as essay from school. They discuss the subject at interview. They assess if an applicant would suit their style of teaching. They look at GCSEs. It’s not just A level predictions. If the DC got an interview, their predictions were good enough. Other factors were probably at play if they did not get an offer.

Universities can and do vary offers. It seems madness to ask for ABB and the world and his wife qualifies for a course and receives an offer. You filter by grades and increase what you ask for to manage numbers. The grades quoted by universities are a guide, not set in stone.

@poetryandwine knows about admissions.

If leading schools can provide help writing the personal statement, why would they not provide help in creating and filming a video equivalent? It seems completely hilarious that UCAS think that videos would be less discriminatory. At a time when you're not supposed to put your age, race or photo on a CV, this proposal would include all that plus a lot more!!

Hard to understand why anybody thought this could be a good idea.

Predicted grades are wrong in over 80% of cases. Usually they are too generous.

It is a real problem for universities makimg offers…..they always over offer because not everyone will achieve their offer and get their place…… Uta they don’t know exactly how many will achieve it.

Because predicted grades aren’t reliable, and actually having a string of Astar at A Level doesn’t necessarily make you super academic, most unis also look at GCSE results and Oxbridge also set their own tests which they feel are a better reflection of potential for some courses. Most unis don’t have the time or resources for this though, so have to rely on A Level grades and the GCSE profile. In most cases, the personal statement makes zero difference.

It’s a market place. There are X places available and the currency student buy with is grades. The whole system is problematic when you bid (apply) with unknown grades and the seller (uni) has to offer to people who might not have what they hope to have come results day.

Those who hope to get offers for highly competitive courses who don’t have the predictions or contextual flags to allow a bit more generosity in offers, can’t expect to get offers. There are already too many people with grades at or above the required level. If grades turn out much better than expected (and it does happen…but it’s far more common for grades to be worse than expected) they can do a post-results application.

The reality in the real world of work and higher education is that video and online presentation is commonly used. So students better get used to it.
But. As a part of the selection process I think it's the wrong tool. Lots have mentioned neurodiverse students being at a disadvantage. I'll bet also that well presented/dressed and good looking candidates will score higher. It really adds another layer of unfairness

Remember the video application will never happen.

If you read through the thread you can see what has been decided (no open ended personal statement, but writing answers to several specific questions) and that a video was purely mentioned as a possibility amongst many others as a throwaway comment. Unfortunately that’s what the BBC made their headline to grab attention.

It would be impractical and unis won’t want to watch them or have the resources to do so, and using them fairly would be impossible. So don’t fret.

Yes, video interviews are common for all kinds of applications now. Yes, it’s something young people are likely to have to do at some point and many of us might have to do sometime too. It’s part of the move on-line which has been speeded up by Covid and makes it easier to see lots of people without meeting in person. However, it won’t be part of UCAS.

Thanks,@TizerorFizz Clearly there are a couple of other experts on this thread also.

I broadly support the reforms, largely for the reasons you and others cite. @HoneyMobster has pointed out that video statements are nowhere mentioned by UCAS and I agree it is unlikely they will ever be required. I think they would be a much greater burden on admissions tutors than written statements in addition to the other issues that have been cited. In my STEM field I would be much more wary of other ‘multimedia’ submissions - gimmicky tech submissions. Ensuring they were the candidate’s own work, even to a reasonably acceptable degree, in the current environment sounds a nightmare.

If we go down this road I would particularly support the ability to submit different data for applications to different degree programmes. I love the idea of a UCAS audit of PGs vs actual grades of admitted students, published not only by university but by school. As a PP says, the main problem with PGs is over-prediction. Working Admissions one does get cynical about certain schools but it is difficult to think what to do about it: capable students might be wronged. Also, it is well documented that pupils from under-performing schools are often under-predicted - a double whammy.

But mainly, although the reforms are a step in the right direction, the effort-to-outcome ratio is such that I wish we would just move to a post qualifications application process instead.