Hacker News Reader

Comment by LatteLazy | Hacker News Reader

People should note that even in non-covid times, UK domestic university admissions is almost entirely based on predicted grades. Predicted grades are much more important than actual grades. The only difference this year is an extra layer of noise in the form of an algorithm. It's a very strange, unfair, socially regressive system (I may be a little bitter).

View on HN

Unless things have changed in the last 24 years * , offers are based on predicted grades, and requirements are set on the actual grades achieved in order for that offer to transform into a place. Those students who did not achieve the requirements and those universities who still have places to fill then enter the "clearing" process to match up.

Were you predicted worse grades than you achieved, and as a result not offered places where you would have liked?

( * they may have, significantly, it's been a long time)

In Scotland you do Highers in 5th year and apply to universities during 6th year after you get your grades.

Motivation for working hard during 6th year can be difficult if you get an unconditional offer based on results you already have....

Yeah I can imagine that does make things weird! So there's nothing happens in the final year that can affect the outcome much?

I effectively got an unconditional offer in England way back when, was predicted something like 3 As and a B, and was given an offer to my preferred place at two Cs. Still brought in two As and two Bs though.

If you get an unconditional that you are happy with then that's it - you have 6 months where you can either work hard for exams that don't count or, like me (and indeed my son who recently went through this process), you can use that time to enjoy yourself and get a job to earn some money before going to Uni. Schools tend to be a bit unhappy about this approach though.

If you have a conditional offer then you face the prospect of being like everyone in the rUK.

It's pretty nice if you get unconditional offers!

There are a lot of unconditional offers these days, which means that the university will not look at actual A levels' results at all.

Edit:

"38% of applicants (97,045 applicants) received at least one offer with an unconditional component in 2019, increasing from 34% (87,540 applicants) in 2018, and continuing the year-on-year growth in offers with an unconditional component since 2013." [1]

This year at least one Oxford College has already decided to honour all offers without looking at actual A-Level results , whereby effectively turning all offers into unconditional offers [1]. Granted, this is not a normal year.

Let's be honest, though, if you got an offer from Oxbridge you're very good so they're not exactly taking a risk and it gets them brownie points.

[1] (PDF) https://www.ucas.com/file/250931/download?token=R8Nn7uoI#:~:....

[2] https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/aug/15/a-levels-r...

Interesting. They were pretty rare back then.

The only unconditional offers I've ever heard of have been for less prestigious courses.

A common trick the universities use is to tell candidates that they'll upgrade them from a conditional (e.g. AAB offer) to an unconditional offer if they make that university their firm choice within X days.

I believe it's a way for them to better predict how many students they'll have next year, otherwise it can fluctuate pretty wildly based on exam day results.

I should pre-disclaim this by saying I actually really enjoyed my time at Exeter and it's an excellent school but at the time I felt I'd been treated very unfairly. I think my case is a good example of how the system is badly designed, and then operates in a way that's worse than the theoretical design.

>Were you predicted worse grades than you achieved, and as a result not offered places where you would have liked?

Yes. Story time but skip to the next quote if it's boring :)

I got 4 A's at AS level back in 2001 (I did my Alevels in 2002, the first year of the AS/A2 split). My subject teachers all agreed I'd get the same at A Level. My School decided that "to avoid over estimating" they would reduce all the predictions by 3 levels. So I was predicted BBB. What the Fuck? My friend was friends with the head of VI form (he did theater with her after school, they got drunk together at after show parties, he was very pretty and charming and she was 50+, super weird and dodgy but whatever). Somehow he was predicted AAB. The only one in the school year of ~90 students over BBB. Some people even cried over this as they wanted to do medicine and that's difficult with AAA predicted...

My friend was called for interview at Imperial, where we both wanted to go and study Physics. He went and was offered AAA. I was not called for interview.

Results came in and I got my AAA. He got BBB. Imperial didn't care and admitted him anyway.

I think I am sort of a perfect example of what's wrong with the current system: I was poor and badly turned out and a bit brutish but ferociously bright. He was sort of the opposite. I got good grades, he was better at getting predictions. He was the one that got the Imperial place.

>Those students who did not achieve the requirements and those universities who still have places to fill then enter the "clearing" process to match up.

I think this is the issue because this rarely happens even though it's meant to. There are 2 sides to this:

* If you miss the required grades, you generally keep your place. Universities routinely make an offer at X and then take you whether you get the grades. I understand why: when you reject a candidate with BBB, you're not guaranteed one with AAA, your going to end up with whatever clearing gives you. And not many AAA candidates are in clearing are they? This becomes a self fulfilling prophecy of sorts.

* If you blow through your predicted grades (As instead of Bs) you have 3 options: 1. Stick with the school you were offered at (I did this). 2. Take a whole year out and re-apply next year with your grades. That's a pretty huge step for an 18 years old to take. 3. Enter clearing, but you know that Imperial, Oxbridge etc don't really do clearing do that?

Back in 2002 there was actually discussion of forcing all uni's to keep X% of places for clearing for exactly this reason. It's also worth noting that these days something like 20% of offers are unconditional.

I think I did more than ok in the end. I had a better time than my friend (he had to live at home in first year and never really got the "experience" etc). But people should be aware of how the system works: you're actual grades make very little difference, predicted grades are KEY to getting into (not just an offer, actually into) a top uni, and the best way to get good grades is only about 50% about ability and hard work compared to looking nice and sucking up to the right people.

Maybe this is a great lesson for how life isn't fair :)

That's a sad tale, it is a shame that your predictions were poor when your record was so good. I think your AS grades should have been given much more weight. We didn't do AS levels in my day...

Imperial figures in my story too. I was predicted very highly, either 4 As or 3A+B, I already had an A at Mathematics under my belt, taken a year early. I approached Cambridge and Imperial. The Imperial open day was first and they offered at 2Cs, because they knew I was interested in Cambridge and figured that if I got a high offer from there I'd keep them as a backup.

The Cambridge interview day went badly. I came away feeling like I'd just been a complete dumbass, missed some really obvious stuff because I was stressed, and no offer was made. So I had Imperial on offer at 2Cs and no backup. And indeed I went there.

And that's when I discovered London nightlife, drugs, sex and dropping out. Failed the first year of my engineering course miserably and ended up studying CompSci at Southampton a year later. Which has turned out great, so no complaints :)

(I'm also lucky enough that there was nothing to pay for either course. I was in the last year through the system when there were no fees, what's happened on that front since is pretty awful, IMHO)

Yeah, to be honest I think I got the better end of the deal actually. Exeter gave me a lot of opportunities academically and the space to get my social abilities together. My friend did like you. There is something strangely inhumane about uni admissions: we over booked accommodation at Exeter by 10% (literally had people sleeping in the common rooms) because the administration said at least 10% would leave before the 6 month mark (homesick mostly). They were not wrong.

It's too much to hope for but... I actually think part of the answer is forcing everyone to wait a year to go to uni. Then they can get themselves together a bit more. They can get being 18 out of their systems. They can apply to what they want, not what mum and dad say. Forcing people to do national service would give people the experience of living away from home before they have to go and fail a degree over it or get a year in and realise they want to be somewhere else doing something else.

Not sure I'm down with the national service part, but in general I agree - a year to think about yourself and your life, maybe do something useful/productive, and a university application process based on grades you already have, would do a lot of people a lot of good.

Yeah, me either to be honest...

I'm the opposite example. I was going to study Computer Science at Warwick. Amazing course, I really wanted to do that. I was accepted for a place if I got ABB (iirc, this was 1988). I was predicted AAA. Life got in the way and I got BDE. I accepted a place at Oxford Polytechnic (now Headington University I believe). I completely messed it up and flunked out after 2 terms. Went off the rails completely, became a punk, worked in shitty manual jobs. Finally got a job as a developer at 25, and back on the rails from there.

I'm so glad it turned out that way. I had no idea who I was, and needed that time to discover myself. I shouldn't even have been applying for Uni, but that's the thing you do, isn't it?

I wonder how many people from this debacle will look back and say they're grateful it happened because it gave them a chance to take a different path.

Yeah, you're not wrong.

I do find the system of using predicted exam grades odd.

But using grades pupils have achieved during the previous years(s) seems fine to me and can potentially erase the issue of having a good/bad exam day.

In some countries, either they use exam results and/or they look at report cards for the previous years.

The only good reason I can think of is that the UK had a very tight focus on subjects: at GCSE you study 10+ things, at A(s) level 3-4, at university 1.5. You can't really use GCSE results for a UK degree entry because 80% of those subjects are irrelevant for this degree because (unlike EU\North America) a (say) physics degree has zero credits for English lit or history or even chemistry. A Level results are too late. So that puts everything on AS results (and I think the Tories got rid of the actual AS exams a few years back?).

I am a big "final exams not coursework please" guy. But they'd be better having end of term exams for the 6 terms in A Levels and using the results from the first 5 for most of admissions IMHO.

Yes, the current government reduced or got rid of much coursework and stopped As levels contributing to an A level.

In the previous system, there was more coursework in some subjects (almost always still <50%), thus recognising the abilities of those who don't do so well in exams, and still recognising the abilities of those who are better at exams than coursework. Exams were split over two years, with most of the material studied in year 1 examined in one go in year 1, and material studied in year 2 (building on year 1 material )examined in one go in year 2.

Now there is an almost total reliance on exams, all in one go at the end of the second year.

Hence (partly) the current storm.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com