Post-Qualification Admissions: How do we get it right in practice?

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Post-Qualification Admissions: How do we get it right in practice?

PQA is back on the agenda. A flurry of recent announcements, from the DfE, UCAS, Universities UK, and a research paper from the Sutton Trust, have all nodded broadly in the same direction. In the coming months you’ll hear a lot about the reliance on flawed predicted grades in our current system, the rise in unconditional offers and particular concerns for high-attaining disadvantaged students. What you’ll hear less of are detailed proposals for how teachers will be supported to make any changes in the application process work in practice.

PQA could be transformative, but it could also end up being a disaster. We need to get this right and, as always, the devil will be in the detail. There are three vital questions we need to be asking now, to help steer us towards a system which delivers on the bold promises being made.

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Writing UCAS references in the time of COVID-19

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Writing UCAS references in the time of COVID-19

I do not envy the role of the teacher right now; some students in school, some not in school but everyone needing to be educated, exasperated parents asking you to set work, but not too much work and constant changes in guidelines being issued. For some reason everyone thinks you’ve only just reopened when you never actually closed and then of all people, Andrew Adonis, thinks you’re not doing enough compared to private schools and wants to start up the ‘lazy teacher’ chant that comes around at least every year. Thank goodness the summer break is here and we can all get away on a well-deserved…oh, maybe no.

In this context, the university admissions juggernaut moves on as though students had not had a day out of school and teachers have all remained at work. It seems that amidst this chaos there are still plenty of students applying to university. I am impressed by that, it’s not an easy time to be making future plans, I can barely make a choice about tomorrow’s dinner as the stock at my supermarket is so erratic.

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Fair Access Coalition and the Fair Education Alliance Statement regarding A-level grade allocations

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A group of leading educational access charities and not-for profit organisations is calling for the government to take action to ensure that young people from less advantaged backgrounds do not face additional barriers in accessing further study, training and employment opportunities, following the allocation of A-level grades this year.

We recognise that the circumstances surrounding this year’s A-levels made any ideal outcome impossible, but it is clear that – in a significant number of cases – individual students have been left with their future plans in disarray. What’s more concerning is that many of these students are from the least advantaged backgrounds. These are the young people who already face the biggest barriers in accessing higher education; barriers that have been compounded during lockdown. Every hour, we are encountering more young people whose plans for university, apprenticeships or jobs have been seriously affected because they were statistical exceptions.

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