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Staying Sane in UCAS Season

13th November 2007

While going to university is, for most of us, the probable outcome of our two years at Hereford Sixth Form, the actual application process is much like a brick - it hits you hard and suddenly. One minute, you’re just beginning the first year, then it’s May already and you’re drowning in AS exams, then BAM! Careers lessons worm their way onto your timetable (always in your best free period of the week, incidentally) and you start panicking about where to apply. This is the failsafe, completely useless guide to surviving the stampede.

1. Choosing your five universities: It’s a tricky decision, and one which your parents, your friends, your tutors and Bob next door (particularly him) will have copious amounts of advice on. They’ll tell you that Warwick is simply the only place to do English, my dear, or that Manchester is too big and scary for a country bumpkin like you. I have a piece of advice for you too: don’t listen to any of them. They’re either talking from personal experience (in which case they’re biased) or they’re not (so they know nothing and are talking nonsense). Just look at a prospectus or two, go on trips to various campuses, and you’ll probably find one you like the look of. Simple, but largely effective.


2. Using the online UCAS system: It’s a well-known fact that the new UCAS form was designed by a small Jack Russell, and as such it is completely incomprehensible to a British student of average intelligence. The only answer is to start early, long before the deadline, and spend a month or so gradually filling it in. You’ll be required to find out the exam board, official title and code for every exam you sat at AS. I don’t think of myself as a reactionary, but I long for a return to good, old-fashioned paper - it doesn’t vanish when you have a power cut, what you write stays written, and there’s always the amusing possibility it’ll get lost in the post.


3. The personal statement is supposedly one of the most important parts of the application, and it’s definitely the most enjoyable. A chance to big yourself up in 4000 characters - what a hoot! The one major tip I have here is never, ever, start with the words, ‘Since I was a small child I have loved English / neuroscience; indeed, at the age of five I was reading Tolstoy / conducting lobotomies’, and so on. Absolutely everyone begins by trying to convince the admissions tutor that they were a child prodigy and knew what they wanted to do at university before they’d crawled from the womb, and it’s rarely true. Try to find something relatively original without giving the impression you’ve been on acid for most of your college life.

From here, you are on your own. No, this guide isn’t failsafe, it isn’t complete, but it’s been fun. At the time of writing, I have received offers from two of my five universities. Whether I get any more, and justify the writing of this guide, remains to be seen. Be prepared for a hastily back-tracking follow-up article.

Cecily Blench

The Review Online