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UCAS is the trading name for the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service. If you want to go to university, you apply through this service. You fill in a form which UCAS then sends to the universities of your choice.
Application Process: Deadlines
- August onwards: applicants register online for UCAS.
- October 15: Deadline for Oxbridge, Medicine, Dentistry and Veterinary Science applicants; applications must have reached UCAS
- January 15: Deadline for all other applicants; applications must have reached chosen universities. Candidates can still apply at a later date, but are not guaranteed equal consideration.
- February 26: Applicants can apply through Extra.
(More on the above is at UCAS_Apply)
- March 31: Date recommended to universities for sending out their offers/declinations to candidates applying before January 15. Universities can still reply after this date.
- May 9: Final deadline for universities to reply to candidates applying before January 15.
- June 30: Last date of receipt for applications for immediate consideration. Applications received after this date will be held for Clearing.
- February 26 - June 30: Applicants who have had no offers at all may be eligible to apply to another university through UCAS Extra.
- August: Clearing starts.
Contact UCAS
A quick guide to contacting UCAS is here.
Notes on the Application Process
- You may apply either as an individual applicant, or through a school. The main difference is that if you apply as an individual applicant, you will have to input a reference into your form yourself, vis-a-vis a pescribed referee doing it for you should you apply through a school.
- On UCAS Apply, you will be able to create an account and save your form as many times as desired until you believe it's ready for submission (either to UCAS directly, or to your referee).
- You will be able to make 5 choices in your application form for most courses, unless you apply for Medicine, Dentistry or Vet. Science in which case you can only apply for 4 courses (and the remaining course can be anything, but usually somethng related like Biology or NatSci).
- After you have submitted your application you will be given offers. These offers are usually conditional on you achieving certain grades in your upcoming A2 exams, and you will be told the grades you are expected to get when you get the offer.
- You must decide on which of the universities that has given you offers you want to go to after you have recieved your offers but before you have your exam results (see Important_UCAS_Dates_(For_2008_Entry)). When you decide which of your offers you want to go to, you usually pick one firm choice, which you will go to if you get the required grades, and one insurance choice, which you will got to if you do not get the grades required by your firm choice (but you must still meet the grades required by your insurance choice). See more information on firm and insurance choices.
- Oxbridge: Another caveat to the application system is that you can either apply to Oxford or Cambridge, not both (unless you are applying for an Organ Scholarship). This is an internal agreement between the two universities which is enforced by UCAS. For most universities, you can apply for as many courses as you desire (although it is recommended you only apply for a maximum of 2-3 courses at any one university), except for Oxbridge where you may only apply for a single course. If you're applying to Oxbridge, your entire UCAS application has to be submitted to UCAS by 15 October (this includes both UK/EU and international applicants).
- For the rest of UK/EU applicants, the deadline is 15 January of the following year. Applications submitted before this deadline will be considered as "on time", and hence given equal consideration by all universities. You can still apply after this deadline, but universities do not have to consider your application. International applicants have no prescribed deadline, although UCAS encourages all applicants to apply as soon as possible. You should also note that universities may begin to make offers as early as late October, so it is a wise idea to submit your application as soon as you can.
- If you're applying to certain art courses and have a strong portfolio of work, you may need to apply through "Route B". The deadline dates and number of choices you're allowed are different. This flowchart describes Route B in more detail.
Getting A Copy Of Your Form (including reference)
http://www.ucas.com/getting/how/data.html
Data protection
When you agree to the declaration on your application, you agree that we and the colleges and universities can process your information and keep a copy of your application to collect statistics and detect and prevent fraud. The Data Protection Act 1998 allows you to ask us for a copy of all the information we have about your application. We charge £10 for this service to cover administrative costs. If you would like a copy of the information, please write to us giving your full name, address and application number, and send us a cheque or postal order for £10, payable to UCAS.
UCAS
Company Secretary
Rosehill
New Barn Lane
Cheltenham
Gloucestershire
GL52 3LZ
A suggested content for the letter (suggested by the Information Commissioner's website and adapted for this specific purpose)
Your address
Your UCAS Number
The date
Dear Sir or Madam
Please send me the information which I am entitled to under the Section 7(1) of the Data Protection 1998.
I have enclosed a cheque for £10 as requested by your website and I believe this letter contains the information needed.
If you do not normally handle these requests for your organisation, please pass this letter to your Data Protection Officer or another appropriate official.
Yours faithfully
Your Full Name
