Official Imperial Applicants Thread (2012 Entry)

Any idea when imperial interviews for physics ? Finished my application, but my reference won't be done till the 11th so I'll have to wait till then to officially apply :/

The dates for Computing are
I guess it'll be similar for Physics

Ok.
I've decided that I am definitely applying to Imperial now! Its still going to be my dream university that I shall have a shot at!
Therefore, I am applying for Chemistry xD and my username is LGrosvenor101
I think I'm sending my application off within the next few days Scary stuff to be honest!
Who has actually sent off their application?

Ahhh, fellow chemist *hifive*

I am. Im post a level, did maths physics, further maths, and AS chemistry. Wbu

Thanks where did you get these dates from ? I want to interview as late as possible so I can read the books I've claimed to :L

Oh dear. Why have half of my posts here been negged? I'm only trying to help. Jeeez.






I think I'll explain the whole process in the form of a little story after results day.
Arianex here would have done a better job at telling stories. See, she tell stories to entertain people, I tell stories objectively and as short as possible. But I guess I'll give it a go. xD

LONG POST ALERT. MAY CONTAIN WAFFLE AND IRRELEVANT INFORMATION

So, 17th Aug, I knew I was really depending on Physics to get me in. I was literally telling everyone I knew I wasn't worried about maths, but really really **** worried about Physics.

See, I resat C3 and C4 in Jan and got my A* (provisional, uncertificated), and I only needed to average 70 (or lower if I swapped modules with normal maths) in FP2 and FP3 to get an A. Heck, I even thought that I had a decent chance of getting an A*. If I got 81+ in either FP2 or FP3, I'd have got an A*.

Thing was, Physics was a different question.

I scraped an A last year in AS, I think I got 82% overall? And I really screwed up my ISA - I got 36/50 (You might think that you get two shots at this, but believe it or not, I got 36 on both tries), I got 90/120 in Jan when I needed 96 for an A. So, I would have to do spectacular in Phys5 to pull my grade up to an A. I think at this point, I figured if my unit 4 resit doesn't go up, I'd need to get 114/120 in Phys5. I find Physics really hard to get high UMS, so I was literally ****ting bricks on results day. I was praying that I scraped that A in Physics.

So anyway, RESULTS DAY. I woke up at 6am, despite being wide awake since 4:30. I logged onto facebook to chat with other people from imperial who hold offers, and everyone was just so nervous. Then arianex here managed to find a link to UCAS track that we can log into to find whether we got our place. (UCAS track is meant to open after 8:30 officially). So one by one, people on the chat group that I was on found that they've made their offers and got in. At this point, I decided I was gonna join them and find whether I got into Imperial.

And then BAM. You stare at that clearing ID after you sign in. Jesus frikking christ. Mum started crying behind me. I was just literally shell shocked. I never felt so lost in my entire life. Because I always knew where I belonged, where I was going to go next. But this rejection from imperial was like being dumped by a girl friend you never had. Everything felt so… empty. You just really don't have the energy to do anything. As if all your internal organs just disappeared all of a sudden. The plans you had set for yourself for the next year just collapsed. And the awesome people you've been chatting to on FB/Skype who were going to go to the same place now are going somewhere completely different, and you'd never get to meet them.

I went into school at 9am, avoiding everyone I knew. Inevitably, 2 of my friends who were going to do the same course as me were waiting for me, and waiting to see my results. I told them what I knew, and they watched me open that white A4 envelope. First thing I saw were the grades. AQA sheet first: BBAB in Chem, Gen Studies, Geog and Physics. Ouch. Then one of my friends pointed out: "OMG YOU'RE ONLY 3 UMS OFF PHYSICS, WHAT DID YOU GET IN MATHS????", so then I pulled out the little slip from Edexcel: A*A* in Maths and FM. That made feel a lot better. "WOAH, YOU GOT A* IN FM? NICE ONE. NOW GO PHONE THEM UP QUICKLY". So for the next 30 mins, I've been trying to phone the admissions secretary about reversing their decision, except it went to answer machine for about 3 times, and when it did go through, they told me they reconsidered and are unable to offer me a place. Damn. I enquired about taking a year out but they said they won't accept resits. The only way they'd let me in is if my Physics was an A. It didn't matter to them I got A* in FM, didn't matter that in terms of UCAS tariff, I averaged their minimum for the offer, and then some because I did 6 A-levels (Okay, 5 'proper' ones). I then phoned up Durham, my insurance, and their reply was basically: no because you didn't firm us. So, what choice do I have? I blew £100 on a priority remark to get into Imperial. I remarked both papers I sat in June. But with Physics, it's all objectively marked like maths. It's very unlikely that my grades will go up by 2 raw marks. (I actually only need 1.5 for 3 ums, but since it's technically out of the question, 2 it is.) When you then consider that I already 100 in Unit 4 in the resit despite literally getting the entire first question wrong and that half of it is marked by a computer because it's multiple choice, it'd be next to impossible for it to go up by 2 raw marks in unit 5. Then there was unit 5, I was just so iffy about, chance of it going up 2 marks really is impossible. But I knew where my heart was, so I was going to do anything for a chance to get in.

See at this point, normal people would just break down and cry. Cry and then let go and accept it… never to speak of it again and forget it. And believe me if I could cry I would have. I just couldn't. No matter how hard I tried. No matter how hard I tried to accept my fate, I couldn't. (arianex here said maybe it was because it wasn't my time to cry. So true now I look back ) I started phoning other universities up in clearing to try and secure a place (Well, maybe just one - Sheffield) to see if I could let myself go. I tried to get on with life and try to forget about it, but the thing is, the emptiness is still there. When I was working at my job, the team leaders wouldn't get me to do anything important because I would do it so badly like forget a customer's order, and half pack it and take twice as long as I'd normally do.

It really didn't help that on the official freshers group and on the TSR thread there were stories of people from other courses being reoffered places on EEE. I was quite peed off how they can do that, but not let me in because this was where I wanted to go, what I wanted to do, so surely it proves my dedication to the subject? So I contacted one of the dudes on TSR and asked what he got. Turns out he pretty much got all A*s apart from in maths, which is what he needed to secure the place. Made my grades look very bad indeed. I left the official freshers and started asking on the EEE freshers page what I should do. Turns out, one of the IB people who got their results early also missed his offer by a grade, but told me he managed to secure a place by writing a letter of appeal. This got me thinking, and writing. So I did my first draft on Friday, and put down everything I felt about the situation down on paper. Things like trying hard, and get so close… holding down a part time job to finance myself (because my mother said she isn't paying for me and doesn't want me to go to London. She actually wanted me to firm Durham)… and be 2 UMS off. I sent to original draft here to arianex, and posted it on the facebook chat group. (arianex told me she was close to tears when she read it. ) So people started commenting on how I should make changes, grammatical errors that I should change. Arianex here got her mother to read it who apparently specialises in this kind of thing, and another dude even got his mother who lectures in physics to completely rewrite it over the weekend. In the end, I rewrote a draft that encompassed their ideas of what they think my letter should contain, and emailed it to literally everyone in the EEE department on Monday morning. Namely the admissions tutor, head of department, admissions secretary. I was going to post a paper copy too the next day because I had work.

Some hours later, during the quiet hours at work, I checked the email on my phone. There was a reply. Or quite a few in fact. The head of the department emailed back to say he's going to forward this again to the admissions team, and another one from the admissions team to say they have reconsidered. YIPEEEE. I was literally so happy. I was bouncing everywhere. I was bouncing in the restaurant. People were saying congratulations. Oh my god it was the happiest day of my life. I decided to post it on the chat group first because they helped me loads, IMed arianex at work, and called my mum and Nikita from the chat group (and on this thread nikita_atkin) to tell everyone what had happened (the calling kind of failed though, I could only call when it's quiet, then her dad came home and it all fell apart ).

So next day, I phoned up sheffield to tell them to release me from clearing, so I can reaccept imperial, and the registry people from imperial told me they were going to go into clearing to take me back in. (Oh wow, all that hassle just for me. I feel so loved ) You'd think this was happily ever after? Not quite, but almost! xD Admissions Tutor got back to me to say that unless I get A in Physics, there is no way I'll get a place. So I emailed/called the admissions team back, and it turns out that the offer they are making me in clearing are not on the basis of Physics, but rather, it was my Maths, FM and Geog grades, which somehow meets their minimum intake requirement of AAA The admissions tutor was out of the loop in the whole reconsidering my place thing. Well, minor scare over, I'm not complaining. The Physics remark results came back, and as expected, didn't go up. But oh well, not like I need it now. So now, happily ever after. (Hopefully. If I don’t die from the EEE workload.)

Moral of the story is kids?

1. Work hard so you don't end up where I am.

I ended up giving up on Chem and neglecting Physics because I had to resit maths to get from a B to A*. Luckily, if I get 90+ in C3 C4, I'd have done that. Average 90% in A2 and achieve more than 80% overall, but still had 6 maths exam to sit in January. See if I had actually got the A* first time, I'd not have to resit anything. It just ends up building a backlog of exams.

2. Don't give up on what your heart wants. And make very VERY good friends.
I later read that each uni has a quota from the goverment for home students. If they don't fill the quota, they lose money. If they go over the quota, the pay fine to the gov't. I was very lucky indeed to have a place.

PS - Physics remark didn't go up at all - as expected.

Don't kill me. Extended english writing isn't my forté

congrats mate, i remember lurking the imperial thread some time ago and you seemed really stressed about the whole thing (i'm assuming it was you from what i rememebr). you are a home student right?

Ok.
I've decided that I am definitely applying to Imperial now! Its still going to be my dream university that I shall have a shot at!
Therefore, I am applying for Chemistry xD and my username is LGrosvenor101
I think I'm sending my application off within the next few days Scary stuff to be honest!
Who has actually sent off their application?

Have added you to the list - you are an Official Applicant now!

hey.. post a level, so uve already done ur A levels and have the grades? wah did u get (if u dot mind telling me)

I'm doing the same subjects but A level chem. for some reason i knw the competition is gnna be high but i look at the three of us on this thread applying for aero to console my self. *sigh*

I've given my app to the school and they are just about sending it.

does anyone know the dats for the Aeronautical app interviews? or some other important dates.

I got 3 A* and A, the competition for aero is fierce, look at their entry requirements, they are so high. 2A* maths and physics, and A. prob the highest offer in the country. What grades are you predicted and are you going for Oxbridge too. Ive given my app to my college, and their still updating the references, and stuff.

Rejection for aero received

That was quick...

Have added you to the list - you are an Official Applicant now!