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HE/UCAS
Key skills making the difference to HE
The Powerpoint presentation summarises the findings of research carried out jointly by LSDA and UCAS in 2002/3. This project analysed a 7% sample of universities' Entry Profiles. It aimed to explore the match between the skills and personal qualities identified by HE as contributing to successful degree level study and those developed through the QCA key skills units.
In 2004, the findings, conclusions and implications of this research remain valid. Entry Profiles have now been published for 14,000 degree programmes by 180 HEIs. Another 5,000 are in draft form. HEIs continue to recognise the value of key skills and many Entry Profiles emphasise their development at higher levels within degree programmes.
View summary of UCAS and LSDA research.
Advice about entry to Higher Education
The UCAS Tariff is a system used widely by HEIs as a basis on which to express entry requirements and/or to make conditional offers to applicants. The Tariff establishes agreed equivalencies between different types of qualifications by means of a points system which reports achievement in a numerical format. This provides comparisons between applicants with different types and volumes of achievement.
According to UCAS 'Analysis of offers Involving Curriculum 2000 Qualifications for 2004 Entry', 44.9% of offers were made using the tariff system, a higher proportion than in 2002 when only 40.8% of courses used it.
Any qualification falling within a National Qualifications Framework (NQF) and used as an entry route to higher education, may be considered for inclusion in the UCAS Tariff. All six key skiills are included in the UCAS Tariff as they have NQF status. Each key skill at level 2 carries 10 Credit Accumulation and Transfer (CAT) points and level 3 key skills carry 20 CAT points.
For more information about the UCAS Tariff, click on the link below:
www.ucas.com/candq/tariff/index.html
Key skills and offers for 2004 entry
The UCAS paper 'Analysis of Offers Involving Curriculum 2000 Qualifications for 2004 Entry' describes the number and types of conditional offers made to applicants for entry into full-time undergraduate higher education in 2004. This analysis is based on a random sample of HEIs, weighted to allow valid comparisons with 2002 offer data.
In analysing references to key skills in the offers made to applicants, three categories were identified:
- 'Key Skills No Reference' where key skills have not been specifically excluded
- 'Key Skills Excluded' where key skills have specifically been excluded from offers
- 'Key Skills Referred To' reference made to key skills as part of the offer
In its analysis of conditional offers by HEIs using the UCAS tariff system, these were identified as having been made to six types of centre: Further Education (FE) colleges; grammar schools; independent schools; other; sixth forms; state schools. The following table, taken directly from the report, presents the frequency with which references to key skills appeared in offers to centres in each category:
Table 4.1: Attitude to Key Skills broken down by centre type
| Centre Type |
Excluded |
No Reference |
Specifically Included |
Total |
| Frequency |
% |
Frequency |
% |
Frequency |
% |
Frequency |
% |
| FE College |
56 |
20.4 |
196 |
71.2 |
23 |
8.5 |
275 |
100.0 |
| Grammar |
30 |
16.2 |
152 |
82.4 |
3 |
1.4 |
184 |
100.0 |
| Independent |
54 |
13.0 |
355 |
85.8 |
5 |
1.2 |
414 |
100.0 |
| Other |
6 |
17.9 |
27 |
74.9 |
3 |
7.2 |
36 |
100.0 |
| Sixth Form |
65 |
19.8 |
252 |
76.6 |
12 |
3.5 |
329 |
100.0 |
| State |
216 |
21.5 |
744 |
74.2 |
44 |
4.4 |
1004 |
100.0 |
A second table presents references to key skills in conditional offers for 2004 entry by type of HE institution:
Table 4.2: Attitude to Key Skills broken down by HEI type
| HEI Type |
Excluded |
No Reference |
Specifically Included |
Total |
| Frequency |
% |
Frequency |
% |
Frequency |
% |
Frequency |
% |
| FE College |
33 |
35.0 |
62 |
65.0 |
0 |
0.0 |
96 |
100.0 |
| HE College |
33 |
20.3 |
125 |
75.9 |
6 |
3.8 |
165 |
100.0 |
| Post-92 University |
272 |
32.7 |
483 |
58.0 |
77 |
9.3 |
833 |
100.0 |
| Pre-92 University |
88 |
7.6 |
1055 |
91.9 |
6 |
0.5 |
1148 |
100.0 |
In summary, key skills were specifically included in only a small minority of cases (9.3% of offers made by Post-92 Universities, 3.8% of offers made by HE Colleges and 0.5% of Pre-92 Universities). This represents only a marginal increase for Post-92 Universities on the 2002 figure (6.1%) and reflects continuing differences in attitudes between institution types.
The 4.0% of offers which specifically referred to key skills, is only a slight increase on 2.8% from the 2002 analysis. However, the paper stressed that only 19.0% of HEIs overall excluded key skills, which is a much lower percentage than 65.2% excluded from the 2002 analysis. For those institutions giving offers in terms of the Tariff, 40.1% excluded key skills, with 59.9% either specifically including them or not referring to them. FE Colleges and Pre-92 Universities were the most likely to exclude key skills in their Tariff offers, with Post-92 Universities the most likely specifically to include them.
Around half of the FE Colleges, Post-92 and Pre-92 Universities used in the analysis, and just over 65% of HE Colleges made offers which might have allowed key skills points to contribute towards an overall Tariff offer (though without making a specific reference to it). This might have been indicative of a willingness on the part of institutions to recognise formally these skills, but as the qualifications that the candidates were taking had not been analysed, it could also have been because key skills were not being offered.
Key skills and Foundation degrees
Foundation Degrees are employment-related higher education qualifications, available via full and part-time routes. They are validated by universities and offered not only by universities, but also at colleges of both higher and further education. Successful completion of a foundation degree allows students to progress to further professional qualifications including to the honours degree.
The core features of a foundation degree include:
- the development of skills and knowledge
- technical and work specific skills, relevant to the sector
- underpinning by rigorous and broad-based academic learning
- key skills in communication, team working, problem solving, application of number, use of information technology and improving own learning and performance
- generic skills, for instance, reasoning and work process management
For more information on Foundation Degrees, please click on the following links:
Summary of this section