Numbers of successful applicants to university hits an all-time high

By Sophie Count

UCAS’s mid-December ‘End of Cycle Report’ determined that a record-breaking number of applicants had been accepted in to full-time undergraduate study in the U.K. after the 2013-14 admissions cycle. This peak of 495,600 successful applicants marked a variation in the trend in applications following the tuition fee increase, which had seen both applications and university take-up drop in number significantly. Also on the rise is the number of successful applicants from lower-income backgrounds, an increase credited mainly to the work of widening participation organisations in conjunction with university outreach programmes.

Conservative politicians such as David Willetts, Minister for Universities and Science, have been quick to utilise these record highs as vindication for the 2010 increase of the university fee cap to £9,000. Willetts claimed that the beliefs held by many individuals and organisations surrounding the tuition fee increase, namely that these higher fees would scare off prospective students from families of lower socio-economic status, has been refuted by these new findings by UCAS and that young people from this type of family are still able to view university as a viable option.

We would like to take this opportunity to congratulate once more all of IntoUniversity’s class of 2013, successful applicants in the 2013-14 UCAS admissions cycle, who have just completed their first term at university.