Have your say: UCAS proposed Post Results Uni Applications for 2016!

Nah, I usually stress about things for a few days then put them out of mind I'm meant to be spending the whole summer (before results day anyhow) away, I wouldn't be able to do that if this new system was in place. There's so much psychology behind it, too many ifs and buts for anyone to be able to say what would happen Wonder if there's a way of trialling the system before doing it?

If they did and it went pair shape it would be pretty unfair on the "guinea pig year".

I think the new proposed system would be much better. The current system has totally taken my mind off of revision for my exams, because i'm so worried about not getting into university after 3 rejections in 3 days. That system would make it so much less stressful, and a lot of people would probably get the grades they are actually capable of.

I'm sorry to hear about your 3 rejections, better luck with your other two choices

While a post result application would certainly reduce that particular stress, the Apply1, Apply2, Apply3 system which is being proposed for use from 2014 (not 2016) entry cycle, is going to throw up a lot of other issues for applicants in the near future.
It is proposed that Applicant can only make TWO choices in the initial round of application (Apply 1 if you have your exam results already, ie gap year students, or Apply2 if you have not yet got your results), if unsuccessful, applicants would then be able to choose up to 3 more choices in Apply3 (effectively clearing).
I think the stress of application would still be there but would be focused on something different, probably on "what will I do in my Gap year if I have to re-apply next cycle?" or "I have to play safe with my course/university choices as I only have 2 choices, but I really want to apply to X, but it's so hard to get into, should I take the risk? ".


Edit, just saw you are a VetMed applicant, good luck with your 4th choice. For Very tough to get into courses, the current system is already putting considerable barriers up against applicants (my son was a Med applicant last year), with relatively low success rates for an individual during each application cycle. I am concerned that (under the new proposals) more and more courses are going to be caught up in that "apply several years in a row" scenario which already seems common for the most academically rigorous courses/universities.

Just as a point of interest, universities generally make more offers than they can accommodate to account for the number of people who will fail their Alevels, so unless I've missed something - surely this will make it far harder to get an offer in the first place.

Very dubious about only being able to apply to two unis. With subjects like Med (cos that's the subject I know most about applying for), even applying to four places only has a 40% success rate of getting 1/4 offers.

I definitely prefer the system now, I'm surprised at the poll results as well!
I think with the current system, students will have offers before they sit their final exams. This way they have confidence knowing they have offers and it's something to motivate them as they know exactly what they need to achieve in order to get into the unis they have applied to. It may be a longer process but it makes more sense in my opinion.

yeah but a point worth remembering is that with this new proposed system. there will be no predicted grades used... which means that a person might be less motivated to achieving a set of grades required for an interview/acceptance.

with the current system, the predicted grades are used which motivates the students.

if anyone understands my point?

If i'm not mistaken, this is the same point, right? I disagree with the idea of students being less motivated. I mean, if a uni says they need a set of grades, students will be motivated regardless of whether or not offers are made before they have sat exams.

I think the concept right now is correct, but there isn't consistency with predicted grades. I think that is what needs to be changed.

yeah but offers are more on a personal level, making you feel a little special

hence why i think the current system is good at keeping someone motivated

I don't think the success rate would be affected. You'd be looking at the same number of applicants and the same number of places, only the number of applications will change.

Based on 2009/10 data, there were 6789 places for Medicine. There were 21389 applicants, meaning that if all of them used all 4 choices then there were 85556 applications.
6789/85556 gives 0.08 places per application, so a 1 in 12 chance of a single application getting a place. If you have four applications, then your chance of getting a place is 1/12 + 1/12 + 1/12 + 1/12 = 0.3 or 30% (Ignore the fact that this doesn't quite match the 40% figure - this is based on pure chance if the unis were picking you out of a hat, whereas in real life a number of those 20k students won't be anywhere near the entry requirements and therefore don't really figure into the competition).
If you only got 2 choices, then there would have been 42778 applications. This gives 0.15 places per application, so a 1 in 6 chance of a single application being successful. With two unis, your chance is 1/6 +1/6 = 1/3, or 30%, exactly the same as with 4 choices.

I realise the statistics don't account for the anomalies in the application procedure such as a 2A* GCSE application going to Birmingham has a 0% chance of success rather than the predicted 1/12 or 1/6, but this means that applicants will have to pick their choices based on their best chance of success in how well they match up to the individual requirements, which they should be doing anyway! Decreasing the number of choices is not going to influence overall success rate of admission.

You make a good point, never realised that! That's reassuring. In that case the only other thing bugging me is how they would manage to get through that many applications in the space of a few months. I'm trying to work out if only being apply to apply to two places would increase applications to individual unis themselves or not. Would it? Or would it decrease?

It would vastly decrease, so in 2009 there were 697,000 applicants who collectively made 2.7million application choices using their 5 possible choices. Under a new system, there would be a maximum of around 1.4 million for the same number of applicants. I suspect that a reduction in the number of applications is a significant motivation behind reducing the number of choices to 2, streamlining the process and therefore allowing it to be compressed into a shorter time period.

You make a good point, never realised that! That's reassuring. In that case the only other thing bugging me is how they would manage to get through that many applications in the space of a few months. I'm trying to work out if only being apply to apply to two places would increase applications to individual unis themselves or not. Would it? Or would it decrease?