Russell Group unable to fill university places

[creamteas]

The combination of the higher fees and the introduction of the AAB rule has had been a disaster even for the elite. see here

Good news though for those applying this year, offers are likely to be lower than before from the RG downwards

And on our course we had quite a few more not making their offers / predicted grades than usual as well. This is another slightly more detailed article with a few respected institutions going public on it here

We had a big drop of predicted grades as well. The UCAS Report showing the overall drop of applications and fall in AAB+ is interesting too here

So are grades down generally or are the top AAB students going elsewhere, like European countries where tuition fees are minimal, or the US where there are more prestigious universities?

Very selfishly, I hope this bodes well for students applying this year.

I guess it would be too much to hope the government will rethink the stupid fee increases.

sorry folks but the WHOLE PLAN was to reduce the proportion of people taking degrees back down to around 20 - 25%
so the Government must be rubbing their hands that the Universities have played their part so well.

green I don't know about nationally, but where I work, the offers for different degrees range from AAA-BBC and all courses seem to have seen a significant drop of grades.

Talking yes they might have wanted a drop, but I'm not sure they wanted the 'good' unis to loose students!!

so does this mean they will fill up with students who missed out on grades?

out not necessarily. The numbers of non AAB+ students that a uni can take for entry this year is restricted.

Next year it will be ABB+, so there will be more opportunities to make lower offers.

Interestingly BTEC students have benefited this year from the changes. BTEC DDD counts as AAB+ entry, so lots of unis that were a bit snotty before at BTECs have been welcoming them this year :)

And as they get their results first, many were able to get into where they wanted to go before clearing officially opened.

Who restricted the spaces, the Uni or Government?

It is government policy.

They really want to make Uni elite then, current year 10's won't be able to retake GCSE's now.

They can still retake the whole qualification, what they have restricted is resitting individual papers

creamteas
crazy system - i know of students that missed

Ahh, I didn't realise that, the school said no more retakes.

One if my 6th form boys got his place at Cardiff despite missing his grades. I was surprised at the time that his place was confirmed, but not so much now.

Clearing was madness this year. Where they had places, unis were dropping offers like I have never seen before.

I saw institutions that had have standard offers of AAA accepting students on BBC.....

In my own subject area, preliminary data indicates the RG have been the big losers this year.

There has also been an interesting shift to smaller institutions in general. This might be because more students are living at home and the commute to large campus unis can be more difficult. If it is the case, then unis will be losing money on residences as well.

creamteas
the RG have the front to go to the press
if they have dropped 10%, everybody else has dropped 25%
and I'm sorry but I agree with it
under Bliar and Broon a degree became the basic qualification - which was ALWAYS stupid as people like plumbers and chippies and maintenance engineers are far better with an apprenticeship / HND than a made up BA

Talking Well I can't talk for everywhere, but at my non-RG uni, we are not down 25%, and I have not seen any data that would support that assertion. Why would you assume that is the case?

The AAB+ rule benefited non RG unis. They could accept students on any grades as they did not lose many quota (Core) places. The RG unis that mainly recruited at AAB+ lost most of their quota, so could not fill their places on lower grades.

What is emerging is a divided intake. The 'top' unis fighting amongst themselves for a smaller amount of 'top' students. And the 'second' division doing very nicely with the ABB -BBC students that the top unis could not take.

Some RG unis have always presumed that because they were RG it didn't matter if they were half way down the league tables for teaching and student satisfaction. They have had a shock, and quite right too.

i am glad my son did btecs and got a place and how they were ridiculed on mn

There was another thread today where a mother was talking about funding for level 3 vocational courses (such as plumbing and carpentry) being withdrawn. Her 17 year old son who was accepted on an electrician course will have to pay fees of just shy of 4 grand.

So, you're fucked if you can't pay, whether it is academic or vocational courses you are after, seemingly.

:o

Thats awful.

I mean

So what is supposed to happen to the children of parents on low wages? No higher education, no vocational courses, nothing.

Delighted to say absolutely not a disaster in my dept, despite my subject having problems overall.

In my subject area, there have been large drops amongst the Russell Group; and us third second tier institutions have done OK early anecdotal reports suggest. Our subjects have not entered clearing in any major way - we took a few missed grades but no more than a normal year, but some other social science subjects in my university were hammered this year.

I'd like to think this was my extensive efforts in recruitment and our good teaching. I do wonder if the RG just underestimated the amount parents/applicants expected them to make an effort.

Our subject heads have compiled a quick and dirty report and there is evidence the large city RG places have not done as well as smaller, campus based, small town unis.

Ah reads thread I see you already made the same point creamteas

It will be really interesting to see what comes out broken down by subject and institution if anyone is willing to release the data...