For present A-Degree college students, the UCAS software window is quick approaching.
It’s a essential course of for individuals who want to proceed their training at college, however usually a dreaded one, as many battle to jot down their private statements.
Farmers Weekly spoke to Liam Dowson, head of pupil recruitment on the Royal Agricultural College in Cirencester, to get his recommendation for writing a profitable software and choosing the proper course for you.
See additionally: Why pupil vets should not going into the trade
Prime recommendation
- Analysis the uni web site, significantly course specification and module choices
- Attend open days
- Present curiosity within the course with related experiences
- Comply with the ABC rule: Exercise, profit, course
- Try the scholars’ union web page
Analysis
For these contemplating going to school, step one ought to all the time be to hold out analysis to search out out which college, and course, is the best match.
Liam recommends taking time to look on college web sites, paying specific consideration to the course specification and module choices.
He says: “An agriculture course at one college may really be fairly totally different to an agricultural course at one other college.
“It’s worthwhile to take a look at the course content material, at what the themes are throughout the course, what modules you may be finding out, the pathways you’ll go on, and whether or not this matches your pursuits.”
Whereas preliminary analysis could be achieved on-line, Liam advises attending a college open day to get a way of what it could be prefer to be a pupil there.
“We do discover that going to open days is one of the simplest ways to get a really feel for a spot. It provides you the possibility to speak to the employees and college students, and take a look round all of the amenities, whether or not that’s the school rooms, the labs, lodging or pupil bar.
“We discover that college students are inclined to get really feel of a college even inside 10 minutes of being there,” he says.
Scholar life
A key a part of discovering the best college is with the ability to see your self finding out and residing there. To get a flavour of life on campus, Liam suggests wanting on Instagram on the college students’ union web page.
“Our college students’ union has received an Instagram web page, and as a college we don’t get any say in what they placed on there. It’s all completely genuine and student-led.
“I take a look at that and suppose it’s such an excellent perception into what it’s prefer to be a pupil right here, as a result of they’re posting pupil content material of all of the societies, golf equipment and journeys that they go on. You get a extremely good sense of what pupil life is like.”
Private assertion
The private assertion is the a part of the UCAS software that college students usually discover most troublesome.
It’s a brief essay which provides them the chance to reveal their pursuits and achievements.
Right here to take the stress out of the method, Liam has a tried-and-tested formulation for writing a robust private assertion.
“There isn’t any proper or flawed… as a result of it’s particular to the person. However what we wish is to learn by way of and see that the individual is genuinely actually within the course and has an actual need to return and research right here.
“A great way to reveal that is to speak about experiences which might be related to the course.
“This may very well be work expertise, the place you may speak about what you’ve realized and loved, and the way it will enable you sooner or later.
“It may very well be wider studying that you simply’ve achieved, or maybe a summer time college or taster course that’s run by a college that you simply’ve attended, or it may very well be webinars and Ted talks.”
The hot button is to take these experiences and clarify how they’ve been helpful, slightly than writing them as a listing.
“It’s barely tacky, however there’s one thing referred to as the ‘ABC rule’ which you can comply with,” says Liam.
“A stands for Exercise, so if you happen to’ve achieved one thing, that’s nice. However B stands for Profit, so you must clarify what the good thing about the exercise was. What have you ever realized from it? Take into consideration how has it helped you, and what insights you will have gained.
“C stands for Course, so the ultimate step is linking this again to the course. Why is it related to what you wish to research?
“In the event you can cowl these three parts, then you’ll have formulation for a robust private assertion.”
