UCAS EXTRA, CLEARING and FINANCE

UCAS EXTRA

This part of UCAS allows you to make more choices online, depending on your circumstances. If you find yourself without any offers, for whatever reason, and you have used all your six choices, you will find Extra useful. It allows you to have another choice at an early stage in the cycle without having to wait until Clearing. It will operate from mid-March to the end of June 2007. Courses that have vacancies in Extra are listed at www.ucas.com. If you become eligible for Extra, UCAS will tell you and send you details automatically. You can then use Track to send your application to a university or college that has listed its vacancies on our website. It will then consider your application. You can apply to more than one course using Extra, but only one at a time. If your first Extra choice does not make you an offer, you can then apply for another course.

CLEARING

The Clearing process runs from the middle of July and helps students who have not got the right grades (or who have applied late) to find courses where there are still places available. Courses with vacancies in Clearing are listed at www.ucas.com. This list is regularly updated throughout the day. If your results are reasonable, and you are flexible about where and what to study, you have every chance of finding a place on a suitable course. You need to be available in person to deal with admissions tutors and make decisions. You should plan your summer holiday now, so that you are at home when your exam results come out! In Clearing, you can apply for any course that has places left. You don’t have to keep to the same subjects that you first applied for. You will be able to go through Clearing if:

• you hold no offers and you have not withdrawn from the UCAS scheme;
• your offers have not been confirmed because you have not met the conditions; or
• you decline or do not reply to a confirmed offer of a changed course and, as a result, hold no offers.

If you can go through Clearing, UCAS will automatically let you know. You can then find out your Clearing Entry Number using Track. Lists of courses with spaces in Clearing (including their entry requirements where possible) will be published from the middle of August until late September at www.ucas.com and in some national newspapers. You should check the lists for courses that interest you and then contact the university or college to ask if it will accept you. Do this yourself – the admissions tutor will want to speak to you personally, not through a parent or teacher! An admissions tutor who is seriously interested in you will tell you what to do next. If you find a place through Clearing, the university or college will tell UCAS and they will send you an official confirmation letter.  

STUDENT FINANCE

You will be given details of how to apply for finance/grants/loans in March 2007.

Variable tuition fees

You may have to contribute up to £3,000 a year towards the tuition costs of your course. However, student loans are available; you will not have to pay any fees at all until after you have graduated and are earning more than a specified level of income, to allow you to repay your loan.

Other expenses

Maintenance grants and loans are available, but the amount you receive depends on your family income. You can find out more about student finance by visiting the following websites.

The Department for Education and Skills (DfES) website is www.dfes.gov.uk/studentsupport.

Also see the Student Finance Direct website at www.studentsupportdirect.co.uk. The College website and intranet also has details on finance, grants and loans.