A levels 2023 - Results day and beyond

[HereWeGo2023]

Hi all. I thought I’d make a new thread as the countdown one is filling up.
Results day is here and I’m sure we will all value each others support, today and for the next stage of their journeys.

Bristol is a GREAT city..UWE is very good- Hope she'll be very happy there :)

@Lowther the message was meant for you- forgot to tag you {Re Bristol}

@tribpot I managed til half ten them left them
To it 😆 we have her a good night though. Managed ti somehow get a free bottle of Prosecco, a tray of five shots and a love dessert with a sparkler for the ivy all for free! Dd was very impressed.
Without sounding dramatic I've not known such a stressful day for along time.
I have to pack for five people, clean the house (ish) and got the airport ro check the bags in at 4pm tomorrow then go to a 50th. The be at the airport for 6am.
After today that willl be a bloody breeze 😆

Sorry so many typos in that hope you get the gist 😆

Well done to everyone and hopefully things will work out for all of them.
My son went to pieces with the pressure leading up to exams and had a huge meltdown (he’s autistic). He struggled with college but tried but didn’t manage to attend most of the exams so he failed everything.
We have put no pressure on him and given him lots of love and support, he would not have coped with uni life. We are so proud of him in many other ways and he will find something. Today has not been as hard as expected.

So pleased to hear that Portsmouth Applied Languages is mentioned on this thread - it is a great course with long-standing results and a good faculty. As a PP mentioned, it is very distinct course and attracts students who are less inclined towards culture or literature (including a good proportion of v high quality students such as the AAA boy mentioned upthread).

If anyone else missed their MFL offers by far and got CCC or below, do also look at: Nott Trent, Sheffield Hallam, Ox Brookes, Essex, Aberystwyth and Bangor. I’ve missed some for sure but these spring to mind. All good for languages IMHO

@aleC4 My son has secured a place through clearing today without having applied at all previously. He decided about a month ago that he wanted to go to Uni.

He had to choose a clearing course (he did this actually a few weeks ago) applied today using a form on their website, waited for an offer, completed his ucas application (this was admin heavy !), paid his UCAS fee, submitted his choice and finally got it firmed ! His student finance is not yet approved but he did apply a couple of weeks ago.

He got BBC so was happy today (a little higher than predicted) and is going to do Business and Management at Aston.

He’s terrible at admin so despite being very happy with BBC he’s done 18 years worth of admin in one day !)

Hey all, a bit late but catching up with messages and wanted to say I agree so much with those saying wow to all the resilience and support on this thread - from students dealing with tough situations to parents who are here for them.

@Lowther lots of DS2's mates are at UWE and really rate it. It's very sporty if that's of interest, and tho it's out of town, I think a lot of students live in the city and commute to uni in 2nd/3rd years so they get to enjoy Bristol.

@SlightlyJaded echoing others who say your dd sounds amazing and I hope she can realise that. Your posts are making me emotional. I really hope she gets something that will be good going forward. FWIW my DD's clearing place four years ago was at Leicester - never on our list for some reason but in many ways perfect (and IME often unfairly overlooked). No it's not RG but hey. DD found the course interesting with lots of modules that she wanted to study, very supportive faculty and department staff and a lovely tutor. The uni has a much more diverse student body than a lot, which I found a real positive. Don;t know about the new halls near the uni but Oadby village is nice, a real range of accom (self catered mostly if not totally) and a nice atmosphere. Bit of a hike into uni but otherwise good.

Well, another poor night's sleep for me, hope others have fared better after the stresses of yesterday. Now the planning begins in earnest.

i am new to mumsnet so apologies in advance if i have interrupted a ongoing discussion

my ds did not get the grades to go to Bath for a economics and politics course. A- econ, B- History ( to be remarked to an A) and C in maths. He did have special circumstances as he got taken ill and in hospital for operation before his exams.

We have managed to get Nottingham through clearing for History and Philosophy, which is not what he really wants to do. Lots of his friends in similar situations. However he is looking into CASS/Bayes business school. Advice on if that is a good university, I havent heard much about it, I would rather he goes Nottingham or resits and applies next year. I will not influence his decision but as a mother want him to make sure he knows all options he has

any advice from parents who have hone through a situation like this.

This is not true. You can apply to uni via clearing without going through UCAS. My ds has just done this after contacting the uni directly (decided to not apply to uni through UCAS back in January, and put all his eggs in the degree apprenticeship basket).
He received a firm offer yesterday.

The information about reviews is here for aqa: https://www.aqa.org.uk/exams-administration/after-results/post-results/review-and-priority-review-of-mark

All of the boards will have a similar page.

You can ask for access for access to scripts to see them before asking for a review - but if you need a grade change, you're up against it time wise. You'd need priority access to scripts, someone to look over them, and then a priority review - the deadline for which is next week.

If a uni place depends on it, priority review is the fastest route, but it's not cheap.

Bayes (i.e. the business school of City(London) University) has an excellent reputation and would be a lot closer to your son's original choice.
City are also well known for having close ties to industry/including practical modules for launching their graduates straight into the professional world.

I'm still recovering from yesterday's emotional rollercoaster of a day.
DS decided he wanted to do a degree apprenticeship in a computer science related field. He applied for loads, and decided he didn't want to apply to uni at all, so sure was he of getting an apprenticeship.
Despite many interviews and progressing through various stages - he didn't receive any promising apprenticeship offers. So he decided to try and apply for university anyway, 2 weeks ago! He researched unis with clearing courses and found one he was very excited about. He called them directly (no UCAS) and got a conditional offer there and then. Student finance took less than 24 hours to come through too.

Results day yesterday seemed absolutely catastrophic. He was predicted ABB and got ACD. (And the D was in the subject he was predicted an A for - his school have sent his paper to be remarked) He called the uni and they said there is nothing to be done. After making a shortlist of just two others he might like to apply to, he decided to call his first choice again before writing it off - he didn't think the first person he spoke to understood him properly.
He called again, and after being on hold for an hour and speaking to various people, they gave him an unconditional offer! He would have been prepared to do a foundation year, but it wasn't necessary.

The grade boundaries for his subjects have definitely been adjusted harshly, higher thresholds than 2019, and his school is shocked at the D for a predicted A subject. Something obviously went badly wrong there - it's a subject that is DS's passion!

I honestly never appreciated how stressful yesterday would be!

Bloody hell @Whiskeyinthejaroh thats terrifying, imagine if he hadn’t called them twice!! Congratulations to him- great news in the end.

It’s so wierd how The UCAS Process takes up hours and days in 6th form, no end of parents evenings, webinars, open days, agonising over the form, looking at previous years data…. And then for a vast amount of this year’s intake it boils down to some phone calls on results day. A lot more random than it should be really.

@S2109 CASS is an excellent choice for business/econ. It is in the heart of London and will give lots of internship and work opportunities. A good stepping stone to a city career, if that is what he is interested in. Very different to History and Philosophy at Nottm.

S2, my daughter went to Nottingham University (she is now a lawyer in London) and she loved it. I think it may be closer to your child's original plan than the business course at Cass etc.

And then for a vast amount of this year’s intake it boils down to some phone calls on results day. A lot more random than it should be really.

I believe it was reported more than 75% had places automatically confirmed at either firm or insurance unis, and that is demonstrated by the early posts on this thread. It is not ideal but those calling yesterday were a mix of those who overachieved and underachieved on their offers or had simply decided to pursue different plans to previously. Don't think this is much different to previous years. There has certainly been some tolerance of missed grades, but that will vary according to demand for each course and uni. Worth another look at clearing this morning as the dust settles and candidates have time to reflect.

The admin gods need to be with ds today. His firm is still not able to see his results and he's in danger of missing out on his place. It's an unbelievably crap system. Especially when he has clearing offers based on what he is telling other universities.

Poor lad got up at 4 to travel to a uni that's offered him a place in clearing when the firm should still be ok. He will have to get off the train and ring his firm as soon as their lines are open in the hope that they can now see his grades and confirm his place. He's very resilient and was ok through it all yesterday but I've just spoken to him and he's seriously demoralised. Fingers crossed for today to resolve it.

It’s disgusting that his firm cannot see his results on the system. Surely school/college can intervene and tell the university his confirmed A Level
results? I don’t understand it at all. Your poor son. This is so unfair.

Ds got in at 3 this morning, don't know what state he was in but he didn't make too much noise!
He won't be early and I have to go to work so I can only hope that as soon as he surfaces he starts looking at his options again.
Assuming that today will bring the No from the degree apprenticeship I think he'll be going through clearing again to identify something he fancies.

Similar here.
A* prediction throughout.
Got DDCC.
Didn't get insurance.

DD is broken. Hasn't come out of her room since yesterday morning.

@Disconcerto I think this is part of the problem. He's an external candidate so he has no school or college. He was very ill during school years and so has been doing gcse and a levels over the last few years. He is a good communicator too and used to advocating for himself. But it's been so unnecessarily hard.

His is the last place on that course, he had 4 phone calls to the uni yesterday and only on the 3rd did he manage to see what the problem was. On the 4th call he spoke to someone who seemed to understand but the relevant faculty staff had gone home. Meanwhile his clearing offers are expiring and places are filling up.

So sorry.
Hope he ends up loving it there.