You will no doubt be aware that late on Friday afternoon UCAS wrote to Vice Chancellors and UCAS Primary Correspondents regarding a mid-cycle update to their terms of service and admissions guide, with a deadline of 08 May to accept the new terms.
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As a customer of the UCAS Undergraduate service, there is an
expectation that all full-time undergraduate applications are processed
via UCAS, and that the UCAS service should be identified as the route
for application.
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The standard application route should be used to recruit
students. Records of Prior Acceptance should be used appropriately, and
not to reduce choice for students.
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Transmission of the type of offer, any academic conditions or
other conditions which could result in a conditional offer becoming
unconditional, subsequent decision/offer amendments, and Confirmation
decisions, are to be made to the applicant through UCAS’ systems.
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Offers made must clearly distinguish between those offer
conditions which must be met to be placed on the programme of study, and
those which are not an academic requirement (such as those that give
priority access to services, or change the type of offer prior to the
receipt of examination results).
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These Terms of Service also clarify the nature of our data
sharing relationship with government departments and regulators across
the UK
It also goes on to say:
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We may request that you provide us with certain information (about
applicants and acceptances, for example), so we can audit and assure
ourselves of adherence to our Terms of Service.
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For the 2021 entry cycle, we will be developing a framework
that recognises those institutions who follow our Terms of Service,
along with information on how we will manage any instances where
institutions fail to do so. We will send further information about this
to your UCAS primary correspondent in the coming weeks
While some is a more specific and strengthened articulation of expectations, that have always existed, as requirements, other parts are not and now includes reference to penalties. The issues around direct applicants, exclusive use of UCAS'
systems, their right to demand information from us and to audit us for
compliance is concerning. I also think the timing is
rather unhelpful, particularly when the sector is largely focussed on trying to manage the Covid-19 pandemic.
As you know, there was a
consultation group around the topic of business rules last year, but
having spoken with colleagues over the last few days who were involved
in that, there are various differences in what is being
presented now to what they were consulted on, and regardless, the
request from stakeholders was that this should be consulted more
widely, through UUK for example. There was also an expectation that any
changes would accompany the launch of UCAS Sync so they could complement and support each other in
delivering a good applicant experience.
ARC will be robustly discussing the matter with UCAS, with the aim for them to put the deadline for response to one side for now and instead engage in a meaningful consultation with the sector about the finalised changes to the terms of service they are proposing to bring in. Various Vice Chancellors are also raising this within UUK, to provide the same expectation from UCAS on meaningful consultation.
We will keep you up to date as things develop.
Yours sincerely,
Stephen Wiggins
Chair, Admissions Practitioner Group
Academic Registrar and Director of Student & Academic Administration,
University of Portsmouth.
