Selective mutism and university clearing

[AliMonkey]

It's looking likely that DS will not get the A level grades he needs to get into his first or insurance choices at university and will need to go into clearing. Everything I've read says that the young adult has to ring the universities to discuss clearing places and e.g. emails are ignored for the first few days (after which many places will have gone). DS won't be able to do call - he won't even talk to us on the phone, and in person on a good day to a stranger he would manage yes/no or one word answers, but given the heightened anxiety there is no chance this would work for him. Anyone navigated this and know whether he can provide permission for a parent to talk on his behalf? Or whether anyone offers an option of doing it via live chat? Or any other thoughts on what we could do?

I couldn’t be certain, but I think University of Nottingham, University of Sussex and Newcastle University have online chat functions for clearing as well as phone lines.

If DS suspects he will need clearing and knows the universities he wants to target, it is worth emailing those universities beforehand to ask the question.

I work at a university (Russell Group if it matters), and volunteered on the clearing lines last year. We were allowed to speak to parents as long as the student came on to the line themselves first and gave their permission for us to do so. Hope this helps

Thank you. It's good to hear there may be a way round it - though @Tofeeornottofee getting DS to even say that he's happy for us to talk for him is probably still an issue (given the heightened anxiety there will no doubt be at the time) - but sounds like we might be able to head that off in advance by email if necessary. I will also start researching which unis might have online chat and/or emailing them - this is something DS could do for himself but I don't want to stress him further by talking about clearing whilst he's in the middle of the exams!

Hi! Uni of Glos makes offers via live chat. Best of luck to DS.

Honestly I'd get one dingy friends or cousins to pose as him on phone ( while he is present of course) . This would not be with stress as often it's just getting his name on a list somewhere .

He can nominate someone to speak on his behalf, on his UCAS account