School hosts Higher Education evening with Chief Executive of UCAS

Sevenoaks School hosted their annual Higher Education information evening on Thursday 21 May 2014. The audience was made up of 220+ Lower Sixth students and their parents and around 25 students, teachers and parents from the Knole Academy. The aim of the event was to give current and reliable information about applying to UK universities. We were delighted to welcome the following panellists:

Mary Curnock Cook, Chief Executive, UCASMike Nicholson, Head of Recruitment and Admissions, University of BathPaul Teulon, Director of Admissions, King’s College LondonAngela Milln, Director of Student Recruitment, Access and Admissions, University of BristolAndrew Tebbutt, Director of Student Recruitment and Outreach, Imperial College LondonDr Richard Harvey, Director of Admissions, University of East Anglia

In her introduction Wendy Heydorn, Assistant Director of Higher Education, said that ‘we hope that as a result of what you hear this evening you will feel more confident and better-informed in making choices about universities over the coming months’.  She outlined that this year at Sevenoaks, ‘we had an extremely good offer rate – which means that our students were successful with three quarters of their applications to UK universities.  75% is an outstanding result, and given the number of applications from Sevenoaks to the most competitive courses like Medicine and universities like Oxford and Cambridge, where 35 were successful, it is an exceptional offer rate.’

The key note speaker, Mary Curnock Cook, Chief Executive, UCAS commented that with around 170,000 A level students and 2500 IB students applying through UCAS each year, Sevenoaks is producing around 10% of IB applicants in the UK who ‘are in demand from universities’. She encouraged students to be aspirational in their choices and to apply to a range of universities for a course that is of genuine interest. She explained the changing features of the HE landscape and the growth of the creative industries and digital technology. 

The panel kindly answered some frequently asked questions and some questions from the floor. The representatives from each of the universities spoke about how to select a course and university, the selection criteria, the relative importance of Key Information  Set data and they gave advice about personal statements.

Mike Nicholson, Director of Student Recruitment and Admissions at the University of Bath Commented ‘I haven’t ever met an admissions tutor who doesn’t like the IB. As a preparation for Higher Education, the IB does the job.’ Andrew Tebbutt Director of Student Recruitment and Outreach at Imperial College London commented that IB students who achieve 40 points plus, 69% achieved a first class degree, 28% an Upper Second and only 4% got a Lower Second.

It was an extremely informative evening and feedback from students and parents alike was very positive.

The evening was organised by Ruth Greenhalgh, Director of Higher Education and Wendy Heydorn, Assistant Director of Higher Education.