Competition for leading UK universities ‘could be tougher’ this year

Students could face tougher competition for places on some courses at leading universities this year after a “massive expansion” of applicants in the wake of the Covid pandemic, the president of Universities UK has warned.

As A-level students await their results on 17 August, Sir Steve West said places on research-intensive courses such as medicine and dentistry at Russell Group universities could be harder to secure, after student numbers jumped over the past two years.

“In the first round of Covid, what you saw happening was universities had made offers, students then achieved the offers so there was very little drop-off and therefore research-intensive universities expanded significantly their undergraduate student population,” he said.

He added: “Now that’s put pressure on their infrastructure, their staffing, and what they’re trying to do is just to rebalance that back into some sense of normality.”

The Russell Group, which represents 24 leading universities including Oxford, Cambridge and the London School of Economics, recently warned that universities in England are having to subsidise students by an average of £2,500 a year, because of funding constraints.

Asked whether the squeeze on resources could mean greater competition than in previous years at Russell Group institutions, West said: “Possibly in some subject areas where there may be pressures on accommodation or type of teaching spaces, environments or staffing.

“Science, medicine and dentistry are the obvious ones because of workshops and laboratories. Some research-intensive universities will be limiting numbers into other areas and that’s purely and simply because of capacity in the institutions.”

Students did not sit formal A-level exams in the summer of 2020 or 2021, with results based on a more generous system of local assessment that led to record top grades.

West, who is the vice-chancellor of the University of the West of England, said: “There’s been massive expansion because of the difficulty in predicting grades.”

With grades set to return to the pre-pandemic norm this year, Dr Tim Bradshaw, chief executive of the Russell Group, played down the risk of a scramble for places.

“While competition for places at top universities remains high, there is a welcome increase in the proportion of students holding a firm offer from their preferred university this year. This reflects increased confidence in offer-making by institutions as school exam grading returns to the pre-pandemic profile,” he said.

Some academic experts have warned that restoring GCSE and A-level grading to the pre-pandemic pattern will disadvantage a cohort of students whose education was badly disrupted by school closures.

Earlier this month, a joint letter from the universities application service Ucas, and exams regulator Ofqual, warned students to be “mindful,” that places on the most selective courses “do get filled quickly”, after results day – and to “get ahead” by researching their options.

The letter to students acknowledged, “there will be competition for higher education places again this year”, due to an increase in the number of 18-year-olds in the population.

A-level students who fail to get the grades they need for their first choice or reserve university can find a place at another institution through the process of clearing. Ucas data from last year showed that of 21,000 students who did not have a place after getting their grades, 58% went on to secure on elsewhere.

Separately, a survey of more than 3,500 graduates has found that people who were the first in their families to go to university have a higher average starting salary than those who were following in their parents’ footsteps.

The research, carried out by Universities UK, found that graduates without a family history of higher education earned on average £30,111 a year in their first job – almost £3,000 more than the average for peers whose families had degrees.