UCAS actual grades obtained by students v entry requirements

[Bufftailed]

Starting to have a look for DC. Not the v competive unis. There seems a gulf - eg BBB entry requirements, but accepted CCC. Or ABB accepted BCC. Any insight into how reliable this is? And doesn’t it make it a bit of a game to get higher predictions??

The lower down the league table they are, the more desperate they will be to get bums on seats! I think most universities, apart from the top 5-10 and or / the most competitive courses will generally consider a slipped grade. Once you get into second tier unis - eg asking for ABB/ BBB but accepting BCC is probably quite normal. Bottom tier and they'll probably take you even if you have a real disaster! A lot of universities now offer a foundation year for those who don't make their offer (because it's another year of fees for them 🤑)

There is a website somewhere which shows the most common grades / points held by those getting a place on any given course. Is it WhatUni or DiscoverUni or something? Someone will have more up to date application knowledge than me, but I know from friends who work in HE how desperate many unis are to sign students up.

The UCAS beta function shows the range of grades accepted and the mode iirc; it’s a but clunky but it does work

You have to take into account contextual offers, and also that some unis my weight entrance test sets for some courses

If You open the specific course on UCAS it will tell you . My dd2 was asked for ABB at a Russel group for her course and got ABC and was accepted. This was 6 years ago . The course now asks for BBB. Undersubscribed courses tend to be more flexible.
The course our youngest has applied for asked for BBB last year when she went visit. It’s now been lowered to BCC this year ( non RG) and that’s whats been offered .

To add, according tu ucas they accepted CCC last year .

Thanks, I think that is the UCAS page I was looking at. Shows entry requirements, most common grades, top and bottom.

Thanks all for replies. This is reassuring as DC could be looking at a lower grade in one subject than those required for the course he has his eye on. Obviously no guarantee.

But in order to get the offer you need the predicted grades in the entry requirements?

His insurance should ideally be a course with a lower entry requirement, if he thinks it's a risk.

There's always clearing, but obviously the really competitive courses rarely get into clearing.

DD had a BBB offer last year, got BBC plus a B in her EPQ and didn’t get in. From what I’ve read since she was pretty unlucky! So it’s definitely not a given that they’ll accept under offer.

Thanks. He would be looking at a course with BBB so if he didn’t get it and needed to go into clearing these wouldn’t be the competitive courses.

Thanks. Do you mind me asking what they did? Clearing?

No she had an insurance place that did accept her.

Any experiences of this with engineering? We are at an early stage so haven’t started looking at specific courses, but DC definitely wouldn’t be at the competitive end of things.

I think it really depends on how much demand for the course and uni there is. One of DS’s friends missed her grades for Manchester uni economics by 1 and they didn’t let her in. Same for his friend who applied for finance at bath.

DS missed his grades for a humanities degree at a RG uni by 1 and they let him in. his friend’s doing the same course at a different RG, dropped 2 grades and still got in. Loads of good unis (eg Lancaster, Leicester) had humanities and social science courses in clearing reduced from ABB to bbc/ccc - it’s all demand driven.

No - predicted grades need to be near the 'standard offer' level, but if they are not quite there then offers can still be made, particularly at lower level unis, and/or courses which are not super competitive. A good personal statment can also make a difference (although lots of unis don't take nay notice of those at all).
These are all questions that can be asked at university open days.
Which course/uni is your DS interested in?

Thanks it’s mid tier (not sure on exact terminology these days but decent non RG!) social science so less competitive

It's really useful info but I doubt it's 100% accurate.

I remember one course where the average grade was supposed to be BBB but the lowest grade was apparently BBC which didn't really make sense.

I also get the feeling that a few people on these threads are forgetting an average is...an average. So you get things like - "your AAB student can't be challenged and "taught to" when all the other students have CCC."

My DD is on a course where the average is CCC (she got BCC) but Discover Uni shows that 44% of the students got BBC or highe and 20% got ABB or better. So there are plenty of higher achievers there for the lecturers to "teach to" .

So as with all info take the useful parts without treating it as a Holy Grail.

not something I am concerned about @HPFA 🤣🤣

not something I am concerned about @HPFA 🤣🤣

To your original question, yes it means that those who manage to get their predictions a bit inflated are in advantage. They will get the offers, slip a grade, and probably get in anyway.
And the school can fill the course capacity by that move, so there might be no clearing places for students with the same BBC who just didn't get the optimistic prediction at the beginning so didn't get the offer.

In a way, predicted grades have bigger influence than the actual grades.

I find this very strange.

I know someone who was asked for AAA. Got BBB and still accepted.
I know someone who was asked for AstarAstarA. Got that, but the uni wouldn't accept them due to the way around the subjects were.

One thing that is really helpful (if you've not actually applied for this year), is to set yourself a phone reminder for the day before A level results day this August, to check whether the courses your DC might be interested in next year are in clearing this year. This will give you an idea of whether it is a course which is likely to fill up or not (if the latter, generosity over a slipped grade is likely).
Also, in our experience, sometimes you receive the standard offer, and then a letter arrives a few weeks later, offering a slightly lower offer as a "reward" for firming this course.

Thank you. DC year 12. Wasn’t sure about uni but now decided wants to go. Current predictions suggesting spikey results likely. Thanks for tip about clearing.

This is the Game. They need to jockey for as high as possible predicted grades i.e pull out all the stops on assignments and course work from the get go in Y12 and appeal for one higher etc if they are borderline (schools have been sanctioned in the past for over inflating so will resist), to get predicted grades that allow them to have a crack at whatever uni tier they want at published entry requirements, or one below at a push, to get the offers they want, to eventually get into one of them with perhaps 1 or 2 dropped grades (which were probably nearer their actual predicted).

Some unis like Durham and Bath are harder to game because they take more account of GCSE results as well (because they are particularly over subscribed). At the end of the day, its all about bums on seats and no course starts with a space, even if they have to go to clearing and take someone miles off published (wrong really, as they will likely struggle with the course).

All a bit silly really, and yet another indication of the state of UK Higher Ed.

He won’t be looking at top tier so I doubt GCSE an issue