Frequently Asked Questions
The Student Recruitment and Admissions Office is responsible for managing the admissions process within Durham University for full and part time undergraduate courses. Academic Departments are responsible for considering each application and making offers and passing successful applications to one of the sixteen colleges for consideration, whilst the Student Recruitment and Admissions Office ensures that this process occurs as fairly and as transparently as possible and that decisions are communicated to UCAS within agreed deadlines.
The questions below have all been asked by our applicants or their parents at one time or another, and are intended to provide further information regarding the application process, some of our requirements, our collegiate system, the University and life as a student.
If you find that your query is not addressed or if you have any specific questions, please do not hesitate to contact the Student Recruitment and Admissions Team directly. Our email address is admissions@durham.ac.uk.
How is contextual information presented to admissions selectors?
In addition to the contextual information provided to us by UCAS, which includes the educational journey since age 11, an indicator of whether the applicant has spent time in care, and contextual information contained in the personal statement and reference, the University also provides our selectors with the following contextual information:
- if an applicant is from a neighbourhood where progression to Higher Education is low (termed ‘low participation neighbourhood');
- if an applicant has participated in a significant outreach activity organised by the University e.g. a Summer School; and
- an indicator of whether the average school performance where the applicant took their GCSEs is above or below the national average.
No individual piece of the contextual information will be more important than any other. All information will be presented in a similar format using letters of the alphabet as shorthand for items of contextual information. For example, for Low Participation Neighbourhood there will be three possible letters indicating the applicant is from a Low Participation Neighbourhood, applicant is not from a Low Participation Neighbourhood or unknown (no information exists for the neighbourhood). We do not wish to use numbers because our admissions process is not based on adding up numbers or points awarded to different parts of the application. Instead it is a qualitative judgment based on an assessment of the individual application and not one that is formulaic. Our admissions selectors will therefore include in their consideration information about a candidate’s broad educational context, and we welcome the inclusion in the reference any information that teachers believe has a bearing on the context of educational achievement.
