Uni Rejections

[Couldn't Be Hyypia]

Quick question for the wannabe students on NSC.

TRHK Jr has applied to five Uni's. One have made an offer and one (Warwick) have rejected him despite him being a good fit and being projected good grades. With three still to be heard from, I was wondering how common rejections are for students who are predicted very good grades.

Course is quite difficult to get on to (Philosophy/Politics) but predictions are good. So generally, do most people expect a few rejections or does this happen very rarely?

Thanks for sharing your experiences.

 

[deletebeepbeepbeep]

Did his grades meet their requirements? Was there an interview? My only guess is, due to competition, they raised there grade requirements as they might have been able to fill the course with people with 5 x A*s or something.

 

[Tricky Dicky]

Supply and demand, I would have thought. If they have cut back places, or are getting lots of people applying, they can afford to be more choosy. Just going by what's in the news, but I would have thought it will be harder and harder to get on the popular courses over the next few years.

 

[Peter Grummit]

PG junior also applying this year with vg AS grades (straight As). He has 2 offers from York and UWE for Economics but is yet to hear from Warwick, Leeds, Birmingham.

Warwick is notoriously competitive so I wouldn't put too much store by a rejection from there. Generally, competition is expected to be heinously difficult this year as no students will take a gap year due to the fees increase if they do, as well as the lack of jobs for A level leavers.

PG

 

[Couldn't Be Hyypia]

Is it common for people to get rejections or is (has) the expectation been that if you have the grades the course requires you'll get offered a place?

In this case he did have projected grades that the course required. As you say - maybe they moved the bar up because of the very high quality of the applicants.

 

[Foolg]

I know people who've had rejections, but the ratio in terms of acceptances/rejections in my experience has been heavily in the balance of accepted, if you see what i'm getting at. I applied to 5, and have got my 5 offers, but then all of those that i applied for (Sheffield, Leeds, Manchester and Leicester as backup) were either matching or below my predicted grades.
If I were your son I wouldnt be worried one bit about being rejected from Warwick, its easily one of the hardest Universities to get into no matter what the course. I enquired about the open day to go to one or two of the talks, but the entire open day had become fully booked weeks in advance, let alone the individual talks. The places per applicants ration there is particuarly low, as its seemingly seen as a back up for those who are rejected by Oxbridge applicants.
Out of interest where else did he apply?

 

[Gwylan]

Warwick is one of the top three places for Philosophy in the country (if not the best of all), I'd imagine that competition is very fierce there so "good grades" wouldn't cut it, you'd need to be looking at outstanding grades. The fact that he's been accepted for another place is a good sign, Id have thought.

 

[sten_super]

When I applied (a few years ago now mind) I didn't hear from Warwick until the last possible day that they could make me an offer, and it required grades higher than their 'standard' offer (which a few friends had got for the same course) and higher than my expected grades. Needless to say I didn't end up going there!

 

[Couldn't Be Hyypia]

Bristol, Warwick, York, Sheffield, Hertfordshire. He's predicted 2A*'s and an A but as you say perhaps Warwick is an exception. Not fretting yet, but as a newbie to all this, the process of selection does seem a bit arcane. None of these Uni's do interviews which I find odd - but when I went to Uni there were far, far fewer people that went, so maybe it was easier to hamanise the process. I feel for people going through this now - wasn't this complex when I was at BHASVIC!

BTW - thank you all for your input - not sure where else I could get this breadth of input. It's appreciated.

 

[Tricky Dicky]

It doesn't help much, but I went to, what is now, Hertfordshire Uni - was then Hatfield Poly. Must be a discerning lot, they threw me out after a year (1982) !

 

[clarkey]

2A*s and an A is hugely impressive. Its not been unheard of for Unis to reject people because they perceive applicants to be almost too strong, presuming they will go somewhere else/better. Perhaps not the case for Warwick since it itself is a strong Uni but I wouldnt worry at all. For what its worth, tell him to go to Bristol!

 

[Foolg]

Bristol, Warwick, York, Sheffield, Hertfordshire. He's predicted 2A*'s and an A but as you say perhaps Warwick is an exception. Not fretting yet, but as a newbie to all this, the process of selection does seem a bit arcane. None of these Uni's do interviews which I find odd - but when I went to Uni there were far, far fewer people that went, so maybe it was easier to hamanise the process. I feel for people going through this now - wasn't this complex when I was at BHASVIC!

BTW - thank you all for your input - not sure where else I could get this breadth of input. It's appreciated.

Good set of Uni's he's picked, am i right in presuming that Hertfordshire would be his fall back option?
I've been lucky that all of mine got back so quickly, thanks to getting my application in early, which having spoken to the admissions office in person at Leeds is seemingly very important too. Another thing that they made a big point about was that many colleges are in fact predicting students far higher grades than they will actually realistically achieve, such as people getting B's at AS level Maths, and being predicted A's at A2 because they have the potential, despite A2 obviously being harder. This seems quite common, although at Newman where I am, its quite the opposite, with one of my mates getting a very high A in AS german, to be predicted a B overall.
What did he get at AS level, in terms of grades, as maybe thats what swung it. If he got below 90% in either of his predicted A* subjects then that would possibly have put the admissions at Warwick off. But as others have said, Warwicks a very, very tough place to get into, especially on that course.

 

[Peter Grummit]

The other thing to be aware of is that there are an increasing number of A2s (A levels) which some ('top') universities do not recognise as valid entry qualifications. These are not just the media studies of this world but things such as Law I was suprised to hear.

The trickiest thing is that this information is not openly available (and there is a lot of fuss about this at present) so students may choose their A2 options without the full information.

PG

 

[KneeOn]

out of interest, how did you find out the predicted grades? Assume you asked the teacher?

Don't put too much by it... i've applied for 5 (B'mouth, Portsmouth, Sussex, Kent and Solent for back up) and had B'mouth, Portsmouth and Solent get back to me. My first choice (B'mouth) want 300 points with at least a B in computing - BBB basically. Uni's print stuff in their prospectus but it changes. B'mouths prospectus was actually ABB minimum, Portsmouth was BBB and they want a BBC or a BCC (i forget which). On the otherhand Solent wanted 120 in their prospectus and offered 160 including a D which is more. Oxbridge say they want A*A*A* but actually you need somethign like A*A*A*A*A*. The average acceptance for Oxford on (i think) English last year was 511 points.

You may get one rejection from a top uni, but it means nothing if its Warrick because as said, they're well up there with the best in the country.

 

[KneeOn]

2A*s and an A is hugely impressive. Its not been unheard of for Unis to reject people because they perceive applicants to be almost too strong, presuming they will go somewhere else/better. Perhaps not the case for Warwick since it itself is a strong Uni but I wouldnt worry at all. For what its worth, tell him to go to Bristol!

Also this, many people bitch about how "easy" A-Levels have become but we can only work as hard as we are told to and we often get set up for piss easy GCSE's and then move on to a f***ing horrendous jump between GCSE and AS. AS and A2 is a nicer jump but still a jump upward in terms of difficulty and i'd be happy with ABB right now. A*A*A is fantastic.

Does Jnr have a job?

 

[HseagullsH]

Rejections are far more common at the top 5 or 6 universities (which Warwick just about fits into). Grades alone won't be enough, they'll judge him on his personal statement aswell as work experience etc. I would presume that nearly everyone applying for the course there will have similarly great predictions..

Other than those universities (Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial, Warwick) and sometimes UCL, Bath etc depending on the subject, you will usually get an offer aslong as you meet the required grades.


Pretty sure he'll get the other four offers. A good set of uni's there

 

[clarkey]

Oxbridge say they want A*A*A* but actually you need somethign like A*A*A*A*A*. The average acceptance for Oxford on (i think) English last year was 511 points.

Just a minor point but this isnt necessarily true. Your stat may be but in general not really. Im only in my 3rd year now and you certainly didnt need more than 3 A2s to get in to Oxbridge when I left college, and you still dont. The average acceptance is probably hugely inflated by the freaks you get who do 5/6/7. The majority do 3/4.

 

[Couldn't Be Hyypia]

Herts is the fall back and that's the offer. He needs a GCSE in Woodwork and a used bus ticket to get in there (slight exageration). He wasn't overly keen on Warwick as a Uni so it's no great loss to him personally - but I know he is very keen on Bristol - another toughie.

His school (Judd in Tonbridge) apparrently have a reputation for being very fair with grade predictions. They never predict up from the AS result unless there are exceptional circumstances - perhaps a couple of times a year. So that's not the issue. My guess is that the quality of other candidates nudged him out - staggering number of PSB's (public school boys) with 4A*'s predicted about!

I ended up at Brighton by accident - two years of non-attendance at BHASVIC - sorry Mr Ellis. But had a great time - got a good degree and have been gainfully employed in the most part for a long time. So I know the Uni choice isn't critical to later life. Good call Foolg on speaking to people - as they say in business "You buy the man, not the plan". If I was doing this today I'd find anyway I could to get to speak to someone at the Uni - stand out and make a case. Will report back on the other offers in due course.

 

[Foolg]

Herts is the fall back and that's the offer. He needs a GCSE in Woodwork and a used bus ticket to get in there (slight exageration). He wasn't overly keen on Warwick as a Uni so it's no great loss to him personally - but I know he is very keen on Bristol - another toughie.

His school (Judd in Tonbridge) apparrently have a reputation for being very fair with grade predictions. They never predict up from the AS result unless there are exceptional circumstances - perhaps a couple of times a year. So that's not the issue. My guess is that the quality of other candidates nudged him out - staggering number of PSB's (public school boys) with 4A*'s predicted about!

I ended up at Brighton by accident - two years of non-attendance at BHASVIC - sorry Mr Ellis. But had a great time - got a good degree and have been gainfully employed in the most part for a long time. So I know the Uni choice isn't critical to later life. Good call Foolg on speaking to people - as they say in business "You buy the man, not the plan". If I was doing this today I'd find anyway I could to get to speak to someone at the Uni - stand out and make a case. Will report back on the other offers in due course.

Thought so when i saw it listed with the other 4 names, but a fall backs a good idea.
Wish him the best of luck, with those predicted grades he'll be absolutely fine at Sheffield, two of my offers were from there and they were both as stated in the prospectus (AAB) and nothings changed. I'd be shocked if he didnt get in with A*A*A as predictions. As you say his college are smart with their predictions, so nothing wrong there. I've done hardly any work experience, in fact i walked out after the 2nd day and told them where to stick it, not the smartest idea granted, but i was getting nowhere with the whole thing so the importance of that is debatable. I was lucky to speak to admissions at Leeds in person, and it helped remarkably, not only with the statement but on deciding on courses/Uni's.
I know people who came back last weekend in their first year at Bristol, they love it, and so does a mate at Sheffield. Having said that, the first year is hardly much work.

 

[logan89]

Herts is the fall back and that's the offer. He needs a GCSE in Woodwork and a used bus ticket to get in there (slight exageration). He wasn't overly keen on Warwick as a Uni so it's no great loss to him personally - but I know he is very keen on Bristol - another toughie.

His school (Judd in Tonbridge) apparrently have a reputation for being very fair with grade predictions. They never predict up from the AS result unless there are exceptional circumstances - perhaps a couple of times a year. So that's not the issue. My guess is that the quality of other candidates nudged him out - staggering number of PSB's (public school boys) with 4A*'s predicted about!

I ended up at Brighton by accident - two years of non-attendance at BHASVIC - sorry Mr Ellis. But had a great time - got a good degree and have been gainfully employed in the most part for a long time. So I know the Uni choice isn't critical to later life. Good call Foolg on speaking to people - as they say in business "You buy the man, not the plan". If I was doing this today I'd find anyway I could to get to speak to someone at the Uni - stand out and make a case. Will report back on the other offers in due course.

That is probably what most colleges do isn't it? AS exams are far easier than the A2 ones so i can't see many people achieving higher in the harder exams.

And on the rejection front. I applied for 5 ad got rejected by one, Kent which was the worst one, and got accepted by the rest. So he need not worry just so long as all the ones that he's applied for, he actually wouldn't mind going to.