Read on to find out more about university offers, the difference between firm and insurance choices and some of the things you should think about as you make your decision.
Universities make decisions on offers at different times, so don’t worry if you don’t hear back about all your applications at the same time. However, there are deadlines for when they should respond to your application. If you're applying for entry to university in 2024:
If you don’t hear back from a university by any of the relevant deadlines, your choice will be automatically unsuccessful.
If you applied late – after the UCAS deadline – and are wondering what effect this might have on your application, why not read our blog?
You may have been checking the progress of your applications or received an alert from UCAS telling you they’ve been updated. Either way, let’s take a look at the types of offers you could receive:
If your applications are unsuccessful and you haven’t been made any offers, don’t worry – you can still apply through UCAS Extra or through Clearing.
Once you’ve received all your offers you’ll need to decide on a firm choice and an insurance choice.
Your firm choice should be your first choice university – the one you really want to go to. If this is an unconditional offer, you don’t make an insurance choice. If it’s a conditional offer, that’s when you’ll need to make an insurance choice as well.
Once you’ve decided, you’ll need to log back into your application and select the university that’s your firm choice and, if necessary, your insurance choice. You’ll also need to decline any other offers you may be holding.
If you’ve received an unconditional offer it can be tempting to automatically make this your firm choice – after all, you won’t need to make an insurance choice and you won’t need to worry about your grades.
But you still need to make sure your unconditional offer is for your first-choice university. You’ll be spending three or more years there, so your unconditional offer still needs to tick all the boxes.
Before making your decision it’s worth thinking once again about:
You’ll have gathered all this information when you were researching the universities you wanted to apply to, but it’s still worth reviewing this detail now, just in case your priorities have changed.
If you’ve received conditional offers and now need to choose which one to make your firm choice, then the same sort of process applies – choose the university you really want to go to, weighing up all the pros and cons of your conditional offers.
If your firm choice is a conditional offer and you need to make an insurance choice, think of this as your backup – just in case you don’t get the grades you need.
Your insurance choice should still be a university you really want to attend, but this time consider broadening your options and choosing one that’s asking for slightly lower grades, or offering a less demanding programme.
You’ll only attend your insurance choice university if you don’t meet the conditions of your firm choice, but you still need to feel confident and happy about your decision.
After you’ve made your choices, and unless you’ve made an unconditional offer your firm choice, the university you eventually go to will depend on your exam results.
Now’s the time to really concentrate on your studies so you achieve the best results you can.
Even if you accept an unconditional offer, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t continue to work hard and stay focused. Your exams help prepare you to study at university and some employers also take A Level, or equivalent qualifications, into account when looking at job applications, so they’re still very important.