Plan for ‘post-results’ university applications system ditched

Ucas said there were “insurmountable difficulties” with the scheme because of differing term times and exam dates throughout the UK.

Instead, the admissions service now plans to make changes to the clearing system, the annual process which matches students without places to courses that still have vacancies.

It said there will also be improvements to the online application form, and defined offer deadlines.

Under proposals published for consultation by Ucas last October, universities would no longer have made offers to students based on their predicted grades.

The plans, seen as the biggest shake-up of the system for 50 years, would have seen students sitting their A-levels slightly earlier and then applying to university over the summer, after receiving their results.

However Ucas said yesterday it would not be recommending the introduction of a post-results system, known as PQA.

In a report it said that while it had generally been agreed in principle that PQA was a “logical and desirable goal”, there were concerns about the impact of the changes would have on both schools and universities. The report said that one of the biggest concerns was that the four UK countries have different term and exam timetables. There were also fears that PQA would have an effect on teaching in schools and colleges, and that the plans would need “radical” changes to the academic timetable.

Ucas chief executive Mary Curnock Cook said: “Although many respondents to our consultation felt instinctively that a post-results process should be fairer, we heard many well-articulated concerns from schools, colleges and the higher education sector about the practicalities of implementation and the potential disadvantages for significant groups of applicants.”