What you can do to help prepare yourself for applications to UK universities
I have recently had a few of enquiries about various stages of applications to British universities and thought it might be useful to try and explain the process quite simply to people who have not been through it themselves or whose children are not at schools which can give them all the information they need when they want it.
First and foremost, to apply to any universities you will need to know about UCAS – the Universities and College Admissions Service hub who handle university applications and offers – see the link below even before it is time to apply as there is much, much more on their website. https://www.ucas.com/undergraduate/applying-to-university
However, be aware that once you get closer to your application deadline, that information for any year’s applications does not usually start until early summer the year before entry – so for September 2025 entry, UCAS did not go live until 30th April 2024, applications could commence by 14th April to be completed by 3rd September at the earliest. The more critical dates however are 15th October2024: closing date for applications which include Oxford and Cambridge; and 29th January 2025 when all other applications close. There are then further dates to change or confirm your applications / offers which are clear on UCAS.
But, there is a lot of thinking to do before you even get to UCAS and the point of this article is so that you are not thrown in at the deep end when UCAS comes along but can start thinking about useful things around 3 years before your planned university start.
This will probably start before you make your final choices for your Sixth form studies. For example, whether your subjects blend well together. In addition, if you want to do certain degrees – such as Economics - at certain universities think about if you might need Sixth form Maths. And if you do not want to rule out careers, such as Medicine (when interestingly enough Chemistry is generally more important than Biology) and Engineering, there are certain sixth form subjects you need to study. Whilst of course it makes sense to choose subjects that you have done well at GCSE, A level / IB courses can be quite different from GCSE so check what they include. And above all, go for what you enjoy as this will have greater longevity than sticking with something you think should be good to study.
And whilst the UCAS application process will be changing slightly from 2026 – moving away from vaguer Personal Statements to a more Q&A format – it is as well to start thinking about the following which will still generally be under consideration:
Why do you want to study a particular course?
How has your learning so far prepared you for this course?
And how have other experiences of your life prepared you for this course?
The third bullet in particular is something that you can be thinking about from your GCSE years if you have a particular route you want to follow – for example, if you are thinking about
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Veterinary studies, you could be doing some voluntary work with animals over a period of time. In other words, don’t just look for examples to put on your UCAS application when you apply, but start to think about activities you can do from before which will lead you to your goal. Hopefully this will link with your natural interests anyway.
Then, once you have embarked upon your sixth form studies and started to fine tune your potential university subject choices, you need to think about universities themselves. For this, the Complete University Guide is a useful resource as you can compare the ranking of different universities and courses – in other words, a top university for your course may not be such a highly ranked university overall and it is good to balance/ think about both. https://www.thecompleteuniversityguide.co.uk/
Once you have your Sixth form target grades, then you can start to look more specifically at entry requirements for different courses at different universities as it is important that you are on target for their grade requirements in order to get an offer. In addition, there is no point applying to different universities who all have the same offers as you want to have some as a fall back option should you need it. You should also check the modules of different courses as these can vary from university to university even though the course has the same name – for example, Anthropology can be more arts or scientific based and finding out about the course may make you change your mind to apply at a certain university. You can only put down five choices on UCAS (four for medical degrees) so you don’t want to waste any of your options.
Finally, be aware that for some degrees you may need to sit external tests in order to be considered – for example UKCAT and BMAT for medical studies; LNAT for law; and TSA for some Oxbridge courses. Therefore, being prepared and knowing you have academic commitments over and above your sixth form studies is important to factor in to your sixth form life. And be aware that Oxbridge and many professional training degrees - such as primary teaching - are likely to involve interviews, so you might need to prepare for this – but luckily most degree applications do not have interviews.
You should be able to get the relevant help from school each step of the way, but if you need any more advice at any stage, I can chat with you in the first instance and then I have sixth form specialists who can help you more specifically with your UCAS application once you have settled on a specific degree.
Good luck and do not be daunted; if you take one step at a time you will be fine.
Fiona Hodgkins June 2024