Applying through UCAS

UCAS, is the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service. It is responsible for handling nearly all the applications for Higher Education courses.

Applications to UCAS are made online via the UCAS website: www.ucas.com. Log onto the website to get a clear idea of the application process and detailed guidance. Your tutors will be available to assist and guide you through your application.

You can apply to up to six courses in six different institutions (but you can just apply to one if there is only one course in the whole country you want to do - alternatively you can apply for six courses at the same university, if you are determined to go there and are flexible with your choice of course).

The UCAS application asks for details about your qualifications so far and grades achieved. You will also need to complete a personal statement to sell yourself! Your tutors will be on hand to help you with this.

There are important deadlines so make sure that you don't miss them. If you are applying to Oxford, Cambridge or for medicine, dentistry or veterinary science/medicine you will need to submit your application by October 15 of your final year of Further Education. All other applications need to be submitted by 15 January of the year of expected entry into Higher Education.

• There is a fee to pay. The fee to pay for students starting university in 2010 is £17 (£7 for those who apply for only one course at one university).
• Once your application has been submitted, UCAS will send an acknowledgement back as well as sending your application to the admissions tutors in the institutions you have chosen.
• UCAS will inform you if you have been successful in your application.
• You may be called for an interview.
• If you are offered a place this will probably be conditional on you achieving certain results in your exams.
• If when your results come out in August, you do not have exactly the results needed, the institution may agree to take you anyway.
• If you do not get offered a place when your results are known, you can enter the 'clearing' system. This is basically when all the courses that are not yet filled and all the students who do not yet have a place try to match up with each other! It's a busy time as courses have to be filled between the end of August and the start of term. If you need to go through clearing, your tutors will help you through the process.  

ucasextra

Students who find themselves without an offer of a course, can take the ucasextra route, you don't have to wait until Clearing to carry on with your search for a place. You can apply via ucasextra from mid-March to the end of June in the year of intended entry into HE. You would be eligible to apply if:

• all six of your choices have been used up;
• you have not had any success with any of your choices;
• you have cancelled your choices and have no offers of places;
• you have declined all offers made to you.

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