More miss out on university places

More people will miss out on university places than ever before as the number of students filling vacancies through clearing reached 13,000
12 April 2012

More people will miss out on university places than ever before as the number of students filling vacancies through clearing reached 13,000.

So far, 419,000 students have been accepted to university and Ucas expects this figure to rise to around 480,000, a spokesman said.

This means around 200,000 people who applied will not go to university this year.

But while some continue to search for places through clearing, others will have withdrawn their applications or rejected offers earlier this year.

A record 682,514 people applied for university places this year with just over 192,000 people still able to apply through clearing, Ucas figures show.

Mary Curnock Cook, head of Ucas, told BBC News that 65,000 people who have already applied for places are still awaiting decisions from universities, while 62,000 places remain.

"The total number of applicants was up by about 1% this year, so it is more than ever before," she said.

Clearing matches students who did not get the grades they needed, or who turned down offers or received none, to courses with vacancies.

"The number in clearing is a self-balancing figure so as that goes down that is a good thing because it means that more people have been placed through the main scheme in choices they have been considering for a number of months," said Ms Curnock Cook.

A-Level results were published on Thursday and some students will now drop out and not enter clearing.

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