Providers check a candidate’s qualifications when assessing their application, particularly in the early ‘sift’ to check that the candidate meets the minimum requirements of the course.
We started this piece of work because in some circumstances the service did not play back information given by candidates about GCSEs or equivalent qualifications.
Fixing this problem led to us making changes to other parts of the qualifications section.
What candidates are asked when they apply
When they apply, candidates are asked about their:
- GCSEs or equivalent qualifications
- English as a foreign language qualification, if they are not British or Irish
- A levels and other qualifications, if they want to add them
- degrees
GCSEs or equivalent qualifications
Candidates are asked about their English and maths qualifications. They’re also asked about science if they’re applying for a primary course.
For each subject, the candidate has to say whether they have:
- a GCSE
- an O level
- a Scottish National 5
- another UK qualification
- a non-UK qualification
- no GCSE or equivalent
GCSE, O level, Scottish National 5 or another UK qualification
Candidates who have a UK qualification are asked to enter:
- qualification name - if they answered ‘another UK qualification’
- grade
- year awarded
- whether they’re currently studying to retake the qualification - if their grade was below C or 4
- evidence of having English skills at the required standard - if they said they are not studying to retake the qualification
Non-UK qualification
Candidates with non-UK qualifications are asked for:
- qualification name, for example Baccalauréat Général
- the country or territory in which they studied
- if they have a statement of comparability from UK ENIC, the UK agency that recognises international qualifications and skills
- UK ENIC reference number - if they said they have a statement of comparability
- the comparable UK qualification - if they said they have a statement of comparability
- grade
- year awarded
The options for comparable UK qualifications are:
- GCSE (grades A* to C or 9 to 4)
- between GCSE and AS level
- AS level
- A level
The options for grade are:
- not applicable
- unknown
- other - the candidate needs to enter a grade if they choose this
No GCSE or equivalent qualification
Candidates who do not have a GCSE or equivalent qualification are if they’re currently studying for a GCSE or equivalent in the subject.
If they’re studying for it, they’re asked to enter details of the qualification they’re studying for.
If they are not studying for it, they’re asked for evidence of having skills at the required standard.
English as a foreign language qualification
Candidates who are not British or Irish are asked “Have you done an English as a foreign language assessment?”
The options are:
- yes
- no, English is not a foreign language to me
- no, I have not done an English as a foreign language assessment
The candidate has done an English as a foreign language assessment
If the candidate answered “yes” then they’re asked what assessment they did. The options are:
- International English Language Testing System (IELTS)
- Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL)
- other
If they did an IELTS assessment, they’re asked for:
- test report form (TRF) number
- overall band score
- year of assessment
If they did a TOEFL assessment, they’re asked for:
- TOEFL registration number
- total score
- year of assessment
If they did another assessment, they’re asked for:
- assessment name
- score or grade
- year of assessment
English is not a foreign language to the candidate
If the candidate answered “No, English is not a foreign language to me” then they do not need to answer any more questions.
The candidate has not done an English as a foreign language assessment
If the candidate answered “No, I have not done an English as a foreign language assessment” then they’re asked to enter details of any assessment they’re planning to take.
A levels and other qualifications
Candidates are asked “Do you want to add any A levels and other qualifications?” They can enter:
- A level
- AS level
- GCSE
- other UK qualification
- non-UK qualification
If the candidate wants to add a qualification, they must enter the details of the qualification.
For A level, AS level, GCSE and other UK qualifications, the candidate is asked for:
- qualification name - for other UK qualifications only
- subject
- grade
- year awarded
For non-UK qualifications, the candidate is asked for:
- qualification name
- subject - this is optional
- country or territory where they studied
- grade - this is optional
- year awarded
Degrees
Candidates are asked to add at least one undergraduate degree. The options are:
- UK degree
- non-UK degree
UK degree
Candidates are asked to enter:
- degree type - for example, “BSc Bachelor of Science”
- subject
- institution
- whether they have completed the degree
- grade - or the grade they expect they’ll get if they haven’t completed the degree
- start year
- graduation year
Non-UK degree
Candidates are asked to enter:
- type of qualification, for example, “Diplôme”
- subject
- institution name
- country or territory in which the institution is based
- whether they have a statement of comparability from UK ENIC
- UK ENIC reference number - if they said they have a statement of comparability
- the comparable UK degree - if they said they have a statement of comparability
- whether they have completed the degree
- grade - or the grade they expect they’ll get if they haven’t completed the degree
- start year
- graduation year
The list of comparable UK degrees is:
- bachelor (ordinary) degree
- bachelor (honours) degree
- postgraduate certificate or postgraduate diploma
- master’s degree or integrated master’s degree
- doctor of philosophy degree
- post doctoral award
What we changed
This piece of work was initially intended to improve how we show GCSEs, particularly where candidates may have entered a large amount of text.
We decided to show GCSEs in summary lists, rather than in cards. We did this because a summary list is:
- easier to understand because questions can be replayed alongside answers
- more capable of displaying long answers
- consistent with the rest of the application details page
- a standard pattern in the design system
We decided to also use summary lists for degrees and English as a foreign language assessments. We also made other changes to make sure the service accurately replays the information which candidates entered.
To ensure consistency we decided to create some rules about how we play back information. We will:
- keep separate questions and answers separate rather than combining them into a single line when we replay them
- leave out questions where the answer just allows the candidate to give details - for example, we do not replay “Do you have a UK ENIC statement of comparability?” if the answer is yes since we can just replay the details
- shorten simple questions - for example “What is your email address?” is shown as “Email address”
- show questions in full if doing so will help providers understand what was asked - for example, we show “Have you completed this degree?” since “Completed” could be ambiguous
How it works
We show details of the candidate’s qualifications in this order:
- degrees
- GCSEs or equivalents
- English as a foreign language qualification - if the candidate is not from the UK or Ireland, and did not say that English is not a foreign language to them
- A levels and other qualifications
Degrees
If the candidate has one degree, this section has the h3 heading “Degree”.
If the candidate has more than one degree, we show them in chronological order with the heading “First degree”, “Second degree” and so on.
We now show the full degree type, for example “Bachelor of Science (BSc)” rather than just “BSc”.
If the candidate’s grade is predicted, we show the label “Predicted grade” instead of “Grade”.
UK degree
For a UK degree, the fields we show are:
- Degree type
- Subject
- Institution
- Have you completed this degree? - we do not show this if they answered ‘yes’ to the question
- Grade - or predicted grade if they said that they have not completed the degree
- Start year
- Graduation year
Non-UK degree
For a non-UK degree, the fields we show are:
- Degree type
- Subject
- Institution name
- Country or territory - this is where the institution is based
- Have you completed this degree? - we do not show this if they answered ‘yes’ to the question
- Grade - or predicted grade if they said that they have not completed the degree
- Start year
- Graduation year
- Do you have a UK ENIC statement of comparability? - we do not show this if they answered ‘yes’ to the question
- UK ENIC reference number - if they said they have a statement of comparability
- Comparable UK degree - if they said they have a statement of comparability
GCSEs or equivalent
We now show GCSEs or equivalents in summary lists, rather than in cards. We have separate headings for English, maths and science.
Previously we did not show all the questions and answers when a candidate did not have a GCSE or equivalent qualification. We now replay them.
GCSE, O level, Scottish National 5 or other UK qualification
If the candidate has a UK qualification we show:
- Qualification type
- Grade
- Year awarded
If the candidate has a qualification but did not get a grade C or 4, or the equivalent, they have to answer extra questions. We show:
- Qualification type
- Grade
- Year awarded
- Are you currently studying to retake this qualification? - we replay this even if the candidate said ‘yes’ because they are not asked for details
- Evidence of having [subject] skills at the right level - if they are not studying to retake it
The evidence field is optional and we show “Not provided” if the candidate did not enter anything.
Non-UK qualification
If the candidate has a non-UK qualification, we show:
- Qualification type
- Country or territory
- Grade - this can be ‘Not applicable’, ‘Unknown’ or free text entry
- Year awarded
- Do you have a UK ENIC statement of comparability? - we do not show this if they answered ‘yes’ to the question
- UK ENIC reference number - if they said they have a statement of comparability
- Comparable UK qualification - if they said they have a statement of comparability
No GCSE or equivalent
If the candidate said that they do not have an English qualification yet, we show:
- What type of English qualification do you have? - the answer will be “I do not have a GCSE in [subject] (or equivalent) yet”
- Are you currently studying for this qualification?
- Details of the qualification you’re studying for - if they said they’re studying for it
- Evidence of having [subject] skills at the right level - if they said they are not studying for it
We decided to show ‘Are you currently studying for this qualification?’ even if they say ‘yes’ because we think the answer is more than just a way to give details.
English as a foreign language qualification
Candidates who are not from the UK or Ireland are asked whether they’ve done an English as a foreign language assessment.
If the candidate answers “No, English is not a foreign language to me” then we do not show this section in the application details.
We do show the section in the application details for candidates who answer:
- yes
- no, I have not done an English as a foreign language assessment
Candidates who have done an English as a foreign language assessment
If the candidate says that they did an English as a foreign language assessment, they’re asked what type it was.
Previously if the candidate answered ‘other’ we replayed this answer. We then replayed the assessment name on a separate line.
We will now not show ‘other’ because it has no meaning in itself. It is only an option to allow the candidate to enter details, so we just replay the assessment name.
If the candidate said they did an IELTS assessment, we show:
- Assessment type
- Test report form (TRF) number
- Overall band score
- Year completed
If the candidate said they did a TOEFL assessment, we show:
- Assessment type
- TOEFL registration number
- Total score
- Year completed
If the candidate said they did another type of assessment, we show:
- Assessment type
- Score or grade
- Year completed
Candidates who have not done an English as a foreign language assessment
If the candidate has not done an English as a foreign language assessment, we show:
- Have you done an English as a foreign language assessment?
- If you’re planning on doing an assessment, give details - we show “Not provided” if the candidate did not give details
A levels and other qualifications
The A levels and other qualifications section was recently changed to use a table. Using a summary list could make the section very long for some users, so we have left it as a table for now.
We will no longer play back the question “Do you want to add A levels and other qualifications?” if the answer was “yes”. This is because the answer was only given so that the candidate could give details.
We also changed the table heading “Qualification” to “Qualification type”. This was to make it consistent with the other parts of the qualifications section.
Other considerations
We should review the whole application details page because:
- working on this section revealed some inconsistencies between our service and the candidate service
- we’ve made some decisions which we should implement throughout the page, for example not showing questions and answers which exist only to allow candidates to enter further details
- we’d like to address other issues with the page which have been found in research, such as the order in which sections appear