Transfer

Hi everyone,

I have a problem and I hope I can find a solution to it. I am currently a student in Japan, and I want to transfer to some university in the UK. The UCAS applications are over now and can only apply for 2024 entries. I have emailed some universities and all of them mentioned repeating first year. I personally don't want to repeat first year cause it was a lot of effort and money and I don't want it to go to waste. I have major issues in my uni life at the moment and I even started taking antidepressants to cope. I really hope there is some way to sort it because it is genuinely miserable and I feel completely lost and clueless.

Thanks

You say that all of the universities you've emailed "mentioned repeating first year". Does that suggest that you're trying to switch subject? Or that the way your course is taught in Japan in very different from the way that same course is taught in the UK? It could just as easily be that UK admissions tutors aren't terribly familiar with the way your course is taught in Japan and so have no reasonable way to evaluate whether what you've covered so far is equivalent to what you would have covered at their own university. Did any of them ask for you academic transcripts or details of what modules you'd covered so far?

I just did a quick search to establish whether UK universities typically have processes in place for international transfers. The first relevant hit was this one from University of Gloucestershire, where they say: "We have agreements in place with a number of partners worldwide, which allow students to progress their education on one of our degree programmes. These ‘pathways’ allow entry with advanced standing (coming into the degree programme at an advanced level rather than the beginning) onto specific courses."

This page from the University of Bristol also talks about, "Transferring your studies to the University of Bristol via the Global Transfer Programme provides you with several advantages."

According to this page, transferring to University of East London wouldn't be possible, as they say, "If students have completed a 2 years of a college/university programme or hold an Associate degree in a relevant subject, with a CGPA of 2.0 they may be considered (at the University's discretion) for advanced entry."

The same is true of King's College London, as they say here that "Students completing some overseas degrees will be required to have completed a minimum of two years of study before transferring to King’s College London." (However, note that that say, "some".)

So I think you just need to keep contacting UK universities (and checking the rules on their web sites, as I've done above) to find out if they would consider accepting you as a transfer student.

(By the way, it is not true to say that "UCAS applications are over now and can only apply for 2024 entries". The "equal consideration deadline" was back in January, and today is the last day which universities have to make offer decisions for applications who applied by that date. But there are plenty of course which still have places, and which you can still apply for - to start this September. You just need to filter by "Show courses with vacancies" once you've done your initial UCAS course search, here.)

Applications are still open for the majority of courses for 2023 entry. Especially if you apply for year 2 entry.

Which course and universities are you interested in? Year 2 entry will require a close match between your current course and the course you want to transfer to

Thank you so much for your message - incredibly useful!

To answer your questions, I am not trying to change subjects by an means. I am majoring in Computer Science and I emailed for Computer Science courses. By emailing universities, I was aiming at them giving me specific requirements that I could apply with or respond with. The university of Manchester did answer asking for my grades, educational background and modules. I have responded with the relevant information, but then received a response with the following: "Unfortunately, the Department of Computer Science does not offer any direct second year transfers; if you wish to study with us you would have to apply for first year entry via UCAS. In addition to this, we are no longer considering any new applications for 2023 entry, as we closed all of our courses after the UCAS equal consideration deadline of 25/01/2023. Only those who meet our contextual data criteria may be eligible to apply. If you wish to apply for 2024 entry, applications open in September of this year and we would take your A Levels and current University study into consideration, as well as your personal statement, referee’s comments, and any further academic merits.".

I have also received a response from the University of Edinburgh and they said the following: "Transfer applications must be made through UCAS, and the normal application deadlines still apply. You will normally need to have strong school or college qualifications that meet our published entry requirements.

The equal consideration deadline to apply for 2023 entry has passed – if the programme you are interested in is closed on UCAS we are sorry to advise that we will not be able to consider a transfer application.

As we receive many applications from well-qualified applicants each year, the number of places available to transfer students is extremely limited.

Please also note that transfers beyond Year 2 are not normally possible."

At this point, I am feeling hopeless and I am too afraid I will be stuck in such toxic environment until my graduation from this Japanese university.

Thank you once more - very appreciated

Unfortunately Computer Science degrees in the UK can be very competitive, with many courses (including those at Manchester and Edinburgh) being closed to new applications now. This search in UCAS will show you those Computer Science courses which UCAS believe still have vacancies for year two entry. You will note that there are 520 such courses from 81 different providers:



Like your current degree, these won't all simply be "Computer Science", but might also be "Computer Science (Networking)", "Computer Science and Mathematics" etc.

Are Manchester and Edinburgh the only two universities you contacted? I only ask as your original post said "I have emailed some universities and all of them mentioned repeating first year". Did that really mean, "I have emailed two universities and both of them mentioned repeating first year"? I ask as to say, "I am feeling hopeless" after having two "rejections" seemly like an unusual response. Your situation is unusual; you need to expect most universities you contact to either be closed to new applications (given that we're now five months after the "equal consideration" deadline), or not be happy to accept you onto their course for year two entry due to a mismatch between what you've studied and what their own year one would have covered. Fortunately, you don't need most universities to accept you - you only need one.

Look through the list from the above search, check-out each courses and anything their web site might have to say about international transfers into year two. If it looks interesting and promising, contact them. You may have to contact a lot of them before you find one where both you and they are happy with the transfer. Good luck!

Hello again

Thank you again for your response and help.

I believe I sounded dramatic earlier, but let me explain. Manchester and Edinburgh were 2 of the options and they are the ones I gave as examples since they are the ones who responded to the emails. I have emailed Leeds and received no response. Also, my friend in the UK called some universities and received responses from them similar to the ones in the emails. I have also worked at contacting universities in European countries, Australia and Canada and still haven't received a response yet unfortunately.

I will be looking further, and I will use the links you gave as a reference, so thank you again for that.

I appreciate your time and effort - have a good day.

Rather than wasting time waiting for responses you would be best off prioritising getting a UCAS application put together and submitted ASAP.
Late applications are first come first served and courses listing vacancies now may close at any point.

You have 5 choices on a late UCAS application so you can use 3 or 4 of them on universities showing vacancies to see if you get any offers while reserving one or 2 choices in case a university you've emailed that isn't advertising vacancies reply showing interest with instructions on how to apply.

While waiting for replies makes sense in many cases - right now getting your applications submitted ASAP should be your top priority.