SPA - Supporting Professionalism in Admissions

Good Practice

Entry Profiles

In the Consultation Paper Improving the HE Application Process (September 2005), responses from HEIs and other stakeholders showed that there was 99% support for UCAS to continue its work to encourage the provision of clear, comparable entry requirement information, with a view to moving toward 100% provision of information for students wishing to enter HE in 2009.

This work has been taken forward by SPA as it matches our objectives in terms of fairness and transparency in the admissions and recruitment process. The Director of SPA chairs the Entry Profiles Working Group and the Group has progressed the work to encourage the provision of clear, comparable entry requirement information through Entry Profiles.

SPA took this work forward in June 2007 with a survey of Entry Profile (EP) usage by current applicants. In the case of home students, 2596 responses were received. The responses validated the previous small survey of actual students. The 352 responses from international students indicated that they used individual HEI websites slightly more than they used UCAS, possibly because in the early stages of applying they were probably not yet aware of UCAS. The responses indicated that website entry profiles are important for recruiting international students.

Evidence from the survey showed:

  • 94% of home students and 96% of international students stated that EPs were either extremely helpful or helpful within the application process.
  • In finding out about courses in HE the two most used sources of information were EPs on UCAS Course Search and HEIs websites, with EPs being used by 84% of all respondents to the question.

SPA, in conjunction with the Delivery Partnership Steering Group and the Entry Profiles Working Group has produced the Key Benefits paper:

Entry Profiles – Key messages and benefits for HEIs

This was sent to all Vice Chancellors and to the admin-ucas mailbase in November 2007.

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Reviewed and updated: June 2009