The Student Room Group

Percentage of applicants receiving offers

I'm in Year 12 and want to study Economics at a decent Russell Group uni to start in 2017. I began thinking about what universities I wanted to consider almost a year ago, and one of the main factors (alongside grade requirements, rankings etc) was how many applicants receive offers, as it gives me an idea over how competitive each course is. university.which.co.uk gives a percentage of applicants who get an offer under most of its course pages (http://university.which.co.uk/university-of-warwick-w20/economics-3-years-9000-l100-79893 as an example). The five unis I am most likely to apply to are Warwick, Nottingham, Leeds, Sheffield and York, which, according to the site, have offer rates of 60%, 83%, 85%, 90% and 94% respectively. I was pretty happy with those figures, and assuming my AS grades go well (ie.AAAB) and I perfect my personal statement, I didn't think it would be too unrealistic to expect maybe 3 offers from those 5 universities if I get A*AA or AAA at A2 - my personal realistic predictions.

However, having started to attend open days, I have begun to severely doubt these figures. I went to Warwick today and found out that there were 3000 applicants for just 400 places for Economics, which works out at 13% - far below the 60% that university.which quoted. I asked a lady about this and she had no idea where the 60% figure came from. 13% is even below the figures that the website use for Oxford and Cambridge (16% and 15%), and its those figures which effectively made me rule out applying for Oxbridge because I feel as though it would almost be waste of one of my five applications as the chances of me getting an offer is very slim. Similar story for Sheffield as well - I was told by a lady there that the applicants to offers ratio is around 6:1. No disrespect to Sheffield but it is 27th in the country for Economics so I amazed it is that competitive. It's not even like the entry requirements for Sheffield are A*AA - its actually AAB, which lower than the RG rough average of AAA.

Finding out figures like this is really deflating, especially as I reckon I could potentially get A*AA and maybe not get an offer at all if even my last choice uni (Sheffield) of my five choices gives me just a one in six chance of getting in.

Would be grateful if anyone could give me any reassurances/advise about all of this. Sorry if it sounds as though I am very naive - I don't believe I am as I have done a lot of research about what unis I want to apply for, only to see a set back once I have visited the unis themselves (for the record I really liked Warwick today, as I did with Leeds and Sheffield when I visited yesterday and the day before).

Thanks in advance if you can help, would really appreciate any replies.

Scroll to see replies

The two sets of percentages represent entirely different things - the high percentages are applications to offers and the low percentages are applications to admissions.

For example, 60% of applicants to Warwick will receive an offer, and 13% of applicants to Warwick will end up at Warwick.
Reply 2
Original post by joddcfc
.. I went to Warwick today and found out that there were 3000 applicants for just 400 places for Economics, which works out at 13% - far below the 60% that university Which quoted.


I'll try to give a worked example using made up numbers to give you an idea of what is happening:

Let's start with your 3000 applicants
and if there's a 60% offer rate
that's 1,800 offers
of which, guessing, 350 firm Warwick (the other 1,450 people firm other universities, and some will insure Warwick)
of which 250 hit their offer and are accepted

So 400 Warwick places are filled by 250 firm plus 100 insurance plus another 50 from clearing/adjustment.
(edited 7 years ago)
Reply 3
Original post by stevey396
The two sets of percentages represent entirely different things - the high percentages are applications to offers and the low percentages are applications to admissions.

For example, 60% of applicants to Warwick will receive an offer, and 13% of applicants to Warwick will end up at Warwick.


Original post by jneill
I'll try to give a worked example using made up numbers to give you an idea of what is happening:

Let's start with your 3000 applicants
and if there's a 60% offer rate
that's 1,800 offers
of which, guessing, 350 firm Warwick (the other 1,450 people firm other universities, and some will insure Warwick)
of which 250 hit their offer and are accepted

So 400 Warwick places are filled by 250 firm plus 100 insurance plus another 50 from clearing/adjustment.


Thank you both for replies, they were very helpful and reassuring :smile: although, I forgot to mention this initially, but the Warwick lady said they would offer "a few hundred" over the 400 as obviously not everyone will get the conditional grades or they may firm another uni. Wouldn't it need to be more than a few hundred for the 60% mark to be reached?

Apologies if I'm over thinking this, just a little worried I've massively underestimated the competition for these courses
Original post by joddcfc
Thank you both for replies, they were very helpful and reassuring :smile: although, I forgot to mention this initially, but the Warwick lady said they would offer "a few hundred" over the 400 as obviously not everyone will get the conditional grades or they may firm another uni. Wouldn't it need to be more than a few hundred for the 60% mark to be reached?

Apologies if I'm over thinking this, just a little worried I've massively underestimated the competition for these courses


The admissions departments do this every year and know how many offers they need to give in order to meet the required number of firm/insurance acceptances and then final post-result acceptances.
Reply 5
Original post by ageshallnot
The admissions departments do this every year and know how many offers they need to give in order to meet the required number of firm/insurance acceptances and then final post-result acceptances.


Do you think it's worth emailing individual unis about this, or would that make me look like a bit of a pest haha?
Original post by joddcfc
Do you think it's worth emailing individual unis about this, or would that make me look like a bit of a pest haha?


You can if you really want to, but I don't think this obsessing over entry statistics is going to help you much. If you get good AS levels with good A2 predictions, you'll get plenty of offers. If this was medicine that you were applying for then I'd say you're more justified but as a relatively strong applicant applying for economics, I think you can afford to apply to ambitious choices. If you're predicted A*AA you could even apply to Oxford for E&M, assuming you were interested in the course - not saying that you've necessarily got a high chance of getting in since it's insanely competitive, but from the information you've given us, I'm not particularly concerned about you ending up with zero offers. Also, don't pay too much attention to entry requirements. They do not necessarily reflect the quality of the course.
(edited 7 years ago)
Reply 7
Original post by joddcfc
Do you think it's worth emailing individual unis about this, or would that make me look like a bit of a pest haha?


Honestly it's not worth worrying about.

If you are on target to achieve the typical offers for courses you like, at universities you also like then apply there.

It's an idea to apply to 1 or 2 above your likely grades, a couple at your predictions and 1 or 2 below.

Leave the stats to the admissions teams. :wink:

Posted from TSR Mobile
Original post by joddcfc
Do you think it's worth emailing individual unis about this, or would that make me look like a bit of a pest haha?


As above.
Reply 9
Original post by Plagioclase
You can if you really want to, but I don't think this obsessing over entry statistics is going to help you much. If you get good AS levels with good A2 predictions, you'll get plenty of offers. If this was medicine that you were applying for then I'd say you're more justified but as a relatively strong applicant applying for economics, I think you can afford to apply to ambitious choices. If you're predicted A*AA you could even apply to Oxford for E&M, assuming you were interested in the course - not saying that you've necessarily got a high chance of getting in since it's insanely competitive, but from the information you've given us, I'm not particularly concerned about you ending up with zero offers. Also, don't pay too much attention to entry requirements. They do not necessarily reflect the quality of the course.


Original post by jneill
Honestly it's not worth worrying about.

If you are on target to achieve the typical offers for courses you like, at universities you also like then apply there.

It's an idea to apply to 1 or 2 above your likely grades, a couple at your predictions and 1 or 2 below.

Leave the stats to the admissions teams. :wink:

Posted from TSR Mobile


Original post by ageshallnot
As above.


Thank you for your replies - much appreciated :smile:
Reply 10
Original post by JohnGreek
If you're really into this, you could try Which?Uni's website to look for the various universities you're interested in. The page for each course specifies the offer ratio as a percentage. You can then compare that ratio to the statistics on a university's website that give you the final ratio of applicants: actual students.

Spoiler

I hope that this helped :smile:


Except that's what confused the OP in the first place :wink:
Don't make the same mistakes I did, I over thought all of these and emailed Warwick numerous times regarding admissions statistics etc. because I thought I'd never get an offer from economics or PPE from them, in the end I applied for accounting and finance and got an offer from them and all 5 of my choices including LSE but I have a feeling I could have done better if I risked it. My friend has the same stats as you and was predicted A*(spanish) A A, and has an offer from Warwick foe economics. Although I'm not saying you will get in, you have to remember that some of the people who apply don't even have the predicted grades and just inflate the number of applicants, although then again there are many credible applicants who may be even better qualified, but it comes down to so much more and I wish I remembered to take that into account when applying.. You have an alright chance, for Warwick and a really good chance for the rest. (Don't forget you need a great personal statement too)
Reply 12
Original post by JohnGreek
If you're really into this, you could try Which?Uni's website to look for the various universities you're interested in. The page for each course specifies the offer ratio as a percentage. You can then compare that ratio to the statistics on a university's website that give you the final ratio of applicants: actual students.

Spoiler

I hope that this helped :smile:


Thats's quite a good idea actually, will see if I can find figures from the unis themselves later. I understand your example anyway, thanks :smile:

Original post by jneill
Except that's what confused the OP in the first place :wink:


Kind of haha, although like I said, it may be worth looking at figures on uni websites.

Original post by ParisInc.
Don't make the same mistakes I did, I over thought all of these and emailed Warwick numerous times regarding admissions statistics etc. because I thought I'd never get an offer from economics or PPE from them, in the end I applied for accounting and finance and got an offer from them and all 5 of my choices including LSE but I have a feeling I could have done better if I risked it. My friend has the same stats as you and was predicted A*(spanish) A A, and has an offer from Warwick foe economics. Although I'm not saying you will get in, you have to remember that some of the people who apply don't even have the predicted grades and just inflate the number of applicants, although then again there are many credible applicants who may be even better qualified, but it comes down to so much more and I wish I remembered to take that into account when applying.. You have an alright chance, for Warwick and a really good chance for the rest. (Don't forget you need a great personal statement too)


Hi, thanks for reply, well done on getting those offers. That's boosted my confidence quite a lot to see someone in the same boat (ie. maybe overthinking the stats) and then receive good offers. But yeah in terms of the personal statement too I think I should be able to write that well, but obviously still won't assume that I'll get an offer because I appreciate how competitive Warwick in particular is. Cheers again :smile:
Original post by joddcfc
I'm in Year 12 and want to study Economics at a decent Russell Group uni to start in 2017...


Just to add, don't forget that there are several excellent universities which are not in the Russell Group, particularly for economics. I am not a fan of the so-called 'league tables' but if you look at the CUG then Bath, St Andrews, Lancaster, Surrey, Loughborough and Kent are all in their top 20 for economics while several RG unis languish down in the 30s.
Reply 14
Original post by ageshallnot
Just to add, don't forget that there are several excellent universities which are not in the Russell Group, particularly for economics. I am not a fan of the so-called 'league tables' but if you look at the CUG then Bath, St Andrews, Lancaster, Surrey, Loughborough and Kent are all in their top 20 for economics while several RG unis languish down in the 30s.


I've looked at the first four of those, and was particularly interested in Bath, but, as it stands, I've chosen Warwick as my "risky" choice

Edit: looked as in looked at online etc rather than actually visited
Original post by joddcfc
I've looked at the first four of those, and was particularly interested in Bath, but, as it stands, I've chosen Warwick as my "risky" choice

Edit: looked as in looked at online etc rather than actually visited


Why just one 'risky' choice? I doubt that you will need more than one 'insurance' option.
I don't think you should get too worked up over the % recieving offers, what makes you think you are worse than any other candidate? Be an optimist! Just because the chances aren't high doesn't mean you won't get in, I'll be applying for 2017 entry to competitive universities too ( all Scottish probably though ) and I know they're competitive but I'm still going to try. I would be surprised if you didn't get an offer from anywhere with those grades, still work on getting experience, reading books to do with your subject interest which will benefit your personal statement. :smile:
Reply 17
Original post by ageshallnot
Why just one 'risky' choice? I doubt that you will need more than one 'insurance' option.


So out of Warwick, Nottingham, York, Leeds and Sheffield would you suggest perhaps dropping one of Leeds/York (both AAA) for a "better" uni like Bath?
Out of my current five, Warwick is the only one that explicitly asks for A*AA (Nottingham is A*AA/AAA - not sure which tends to be the more common offer), although I am uncertain whether I could get A*AA as it stands - don't think my school will give me predictions until September so it's guesswork on my part really. Anyway thanks for the help :smile:

Original post by Shadow Hunters
I don't think you should get too worked up over the % recieving offers, what makes you think you are worse than any other candidate? Be an optimist! Just because the chances aren't high doesn't mean you won't get in, I'll be applying for 2017 entry to competitive universities too ( all Scottish probably though ) and I know they're competitive but I'm still going to try. I would be surprised if you didn't get an offer from anywhere with those grades, still work on getting experience, reading books to do with your subject interest which will benefit your personal statement. :smile:


Yeah I think the number of people like you in this thread saying not to get worried must mean something! I plan to send summer perhaps getting 2 well respected economics books read which should help me with my application. I admire your optimism, best of luck for the next few months applying anyway
Original post by joddcfc
So out of Warwick, Nottingham, York, Leeds and Sheffield would you suggest perhaps dropping one of Leeds/York (both AAA) for a "better" uni like Bath?
Out of my current five, Warwick is the only one that explicitly asks for A*AA (Nottingham is A*AA/AAA - not sure which tends to be the more common offer), although I am uncertain whether I could get A*AA as it stands - don't think my school will give me predictions until September so it's guesswork on my part really. Anyway thanks for the help :smile:


It's a question of managing risk. Sheffield is AAB and if you are happy to take that or one of the AAA unis as an insurance then that is a rational approach. Note that Sheffield and York have been in clearing for economics for the past three years, so they would probably be a little lenient even if you slipped a grade or so from their offer - assuming, of course, that this pattern continues into 2017.
Reply 19
Original post by ageshallnot
It's a question of managing risk. Sheffield is AAB and if you are happy to take that or one of the AAA unis as an insurance then that is a rational approach. Note that Sheffield and York have been in clearing for economics for the past three years, so they would probably be a little lenient even if you slipped a grade or so from their offer - assuming, of course, that this pattern continues into 2017.


Thanks for the info - how did you find about York and Sheffield being in clearing? I think York have lowered their requirements from A*AA/AAA to just AAA if that affects anything

Quick Reply

Latest