Clearing - an idiot's guide please.

[MyPelvicFloorTrainsItself]

My friend's DD has a very good offer from a great university of ABB. Her DD has been working really hard but she's not sure if she'll get the A she needs in chemistry to meet the offer.

What happens if she misses it and ends up in clearing? Can someone give us the idiot's guide please as she's the first one out of our DCs to be applying for university.

And when will she know if she's in or not?!

Thanks.

No matter what grades she gets, she contacts the university she's been offered the place with first. Even if she doesn't get the grades she might still get accepted.

If not, she then goes into clearing, which means she can contact other universities with available places and request a place on their course instead.

If they were going to accept her with a missed grade then UCASTrack would have been updated to show this. If it hasn't then there's no point contacting them as they wont change their mind.

She should probably do a bit of groundwork and have a few other courses with slightly lower offers THAT SHE'd BE HAPPY WITH listed somewhere and she can check the clearing lists for those as soon as they're published.

What she absolutely shouldn't do is panic and take just any old place that makes her a clearing offer. She'd be far better taking a year out and reapplying than making the wrong decision in August.

UCAS have a new clearing process this year which I think you have to sign up to beforehand, so check

and agree with titchy there is no rush. DS went into clearing last year, and decided to take a year out and reapply while studying as a "guest" at his old school. His firm last year actually gave him a lower offer this year but having looked around a few other unis he changed his mind and has gone with a different firm this year. He got 5 good offers this year including an unconditional from a uni he could have gone to last september through clearing.

DD has already signed up to the new process.
The best piece of advise a friend gave me last year was make sure you book some time off work! I am taking results day and the Friday off (and off the weekend) and DH has swapped shifts so he is off the first few days of the next week. If they are in clearing you may need to go and look at universities (and possible interviews depending on the subject) and look for accommodation.

Presumably she has accepted an 'insurance' place too. Assuming that the grades for the insurance place are slightly lower than ABB and she meets them, she will take her 2nd choice rather than go into clearing. That was my understanding of the system - ie you only go into clearing if you have not met grades for firm or insurance Unis.

If she gets the grades, she will be in automatically. If she drops a grade or more, then it will depend on the first choice Uni whether they are still happy to take her. Factors will also be what the results are like overall; how popular that course is; how popular that university is. Results are sent to the universities almost a week before the students get their results, so by the Thursday morning she is likely to have had a decision made.

If she isn't accepted by her first choice, then the same applies to the insurance choice. They will also have had time to review her results, and are likely to have made a decision even if the first choice hasn't yet released her.

If neither is willing to take her, then Clearing will have opened. Then it's a matter of preference - if she is very keen to go to a particular university, are there other course choices she would like? If she is more keen on the course than the university, then it would be useful to know the UCAS course codes to search quickly to see which other universities are offering it in Clearing.

The most important thing to know us that there are thousands who don't end up with their first choice - and the vast majority are still delighted with how things turn out for them. So the world doesn't end!!!

Thanks very much, I've just sent her a link to this thread.

Thanks so much, this is uncharted territory at the moment and has me feeling very stressed about August!
Will prepare myself and make sure we have all boxes ticked in advance, once we get through this I just need to deal with the emotional side of my eldest baby leaving home!

Just coming back to this. Hopefully not needed next week but thanks again for the help.