Admissions Policy and Response Letters/Response Time

Dear Mr/Ms Hunter

Thank you for your email of 20 February, 2010 in which you requested
information concerning, Undergraduate Admissions Policy, offers and
applications etc.

The University will comply with your request as soon as possible and
certainly within the 20 working days permitted under section 10 of the
Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002. As your email was received by
the University on 22 February 2010, the final date for compliance with
your request is  22 March 2010. I should point out that the 20 working
day period begins on the first working day following the date of receipt
of your request.

The University will contact you should further information be required in
order to identify and locate the information you have requested. If
additional information is sought from you, the 20 working day period in
which the University is required to comply with your request starts from
the working day following the date of receipt by the University of that
additional information. I refer you to sections 1(3) and 10(1) of the Act.
The Act is available from the Scottish Information Commissioner’s
website at [1]www.itspublicknowledge.info/Law/FOISA/FOISA.asp

If the University is not able to provide all of the information you have
requested you will receive notification that, as appropriate:

• Some or all of the information you have requested is not held by the
University. I refer you to section 17 of the Act.

• Some or all of the information you have requested has been withheld
from disclosure under one or more of the exemptions under sections 25 to
41 of the
Act. If information is withheld, you will be advised which exemptions
apply and why. I refer you to section 16 of the Act.

• The University has applied the Fees Regulations and that either the
information will be provided on payment of a fee or that the estimated
cost of
complying with your request exceeds the amount prescribed in the
Regulations. I refer you to sections 9 and 12 of the Act and to the
Regulations themselves
which can be accessed at the Commissioner’s website as above.

Should any of the above circumstances apply you will be advised of your
rights of review by the University and of appeal to the Commissioner under
sections
20(1) and 47(1) of the Act as appropriate.

Guidance about your rights under the Act is available from the
Commissioner’s website at
[2]www.itspublicknowledge.info/YourRights/YourRights.asp

Finally, should you have any questions please contact me.

Yours sincerely

June

June Weir
Freedom of Information Officer
University of St Andrews
Business Improvements
Butts Wynd
Fife KY16 9AL

Tel No. 01334 462776; Fax 01334 462759
Web: [3]www.st-andrews.ac.uk/business-improvements
The University of St Andrews is a charity registered in Scotland: No SC013532

F.L. Hunter wrote:

Dear University of St Andrews,

I would like a copy of your Undergraduate Admissions Policy, along
with minutes from any meetings over the last three years where
changes to this policy have been discussed.

I would like a copy of the standard letter you send making an offer
(conditional and unconditional) to a prospective student; and a
copy of the standard letter you send rejecting an applicant.

I would like you to confirm the average time taken to respond to
Undergraduate applicants last year, with details of whether this
varies depending on the type of offer made; or whether there is
variation across the different academic areas of the the
University.

Yours faithfully,

F.L. Hunter

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Dear Mr/Ms Hunter,

Your request below for information under the Freedom of Information
(Scotland) Act 2002 is due to be responded to by Monday next week, 22
March, 2002. Unfortunately, the member of staff who has been working on
your request has had a sudden family bereavement and therefore is behind
schedule in finalising your data as planned.

I am therefore writing to give advance notice that there may be a delay
in getting the information to you but please be assured that we will
endeavour to send a response to you as soon as possible. In the
meantime please accept our apologies for any inconvenience this may cause.

June

June Weir
Freedom of Information Officer
University of St Andrews
Business Improvements
Butts Wynd
Fife KY16 9AL

Tel No. 01334 462776; Fax 01334 462759
Web: www.st-andrews.ac.uk/business-improvements
The University of St Andrews is a charity registered in Scotland: No SC013532

F.L. Hunter wrote:

show quoted sections

Dear Mr/Ms Hunter,

I refer to your request below dated 20 February, 2010 under the Freedom of
Information (Scotland) Act 2002 and the University's response is noted
below:

1. A copy of your Undergraduate Admissions Policy, along with minutes from
any meetings over the last three years where changes to this policy have
been discussed.

    The University's Admissions Statement which has not changed in the
last three years can be found on our web-site at
[1]http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/admissions/S...

2. A copy of the standard letter you send making an offer (conditional and
unconditional) to a prospective student; and a copy of the standard letter
you send rejecting an applicant.

The University has a contractual agreement with UCAS whereby decisions on
all applications must be notified to them for onward transmission to the
applicant.  Therefore this University does not send out additional offer
or reject letters to UCAS applicants.  Institutions are encouraged by
UCAS to provide feedback to unsuccessful applicants which the University
does on an individual request basis.  An explanation of the application
process and in particular how the University of St Andrews makes offers
can be found on our website at:
[2]http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/admissions/u...

3. I would like you to confirm the average time taken to respond to
Undergraduate applicants last year, with details of whether this varies
depending on the type of offer made; or whether there is a variation
across the different academic areas of the University.

All applicants receive an acknowledgement response on receipt by the
University of the electronic UCAS application.  The application deadline
for UK/EU applicants is 15th January (which UCAS extended to 22nd January
in 2010 because of the heavy snow).  For applicants to Medicine the UCAS
deadline is 15 October.  All applications received prior to these
deadlines are given equal consideration for the offer of a place. For
UK/EU applicants the University recieves 10 applications per place, and so
operates a "gathered field", in that no offers are sent out until the
equal consideration date has passed.  Therefore the response time at St
Andrews appears slower than other Universities, because offers other than
Medicine do not begin to go out until 15th January. Overseas fee status
applications are considered on a rolling basis.  The University provides
UCAS with all decisions made on applications received by the deadline
before the 31st March.

These are the main deadlines that the University works to and the response
time can vary depending on a number of factors such as application numbers
for specific subjects, insufficient information provided on application
requiring further correspondence to be entered into (eg clarifications of
some EU qualifications).  The table below gives the breakdown of the
average response time for a decision in the 2009 Entry cycle which was 71
days; 75 for Home/EU and 43 for Overseas fee status.  These figures are
based on undergraduate entry through UCAS and include all applications
registered with UCAS.

+-------------------------------------------+
|Average of Time to |Fee |  |  |
|decisions |Status| | |
|---------------------+------+--------+-----|
|Initial Decision |Home |Overseas|Grand|
| | | |Total|
|---------------------+------+--------+-----|
|Conditional |99 |47 |85 |
|---------------------+------+--------+-----|
|Reject |67 |56 |67 |
|---------------------+------+--------+-----|
|Unconditional |77 |34 |62 |
|---------------------+------+--------+-----|
|Grand Total |75 |43 |71 |
+-------------------------------------------+

Once again, I must apologise for the delay in responding to you due to
unforeseen circumstances and I trust this satisfies your request, however,
if you have any queries regarding the information which has been provided
please do not hesitate to contact me.

June Weir
Freedom of Information Officer
University of St Andrews
Business Improvements
Butts Wynd
Fife KY16 9AL

Tel No. 01334 462776; Fax 01334 462759
Web: [3]www.st-andrews.ac.uk/business-improvements
The University of St Andrews is a charity registered in Scotland: No SC013532

F.L. Hunter wrote:

Dear University of St Andrews,

I would like a copy of your Undergraduate Admissions Policy, along
with minutes from any meetings over the last three years where
changes to this policy have been discussed.

I would like a copy of the standard letter you send making an offer
(conditional and unconditional) to a prospective student; and a
copy of the standard letter you send rejecting an applicant.

I would like you to confirm the average time taken to respond to
Undergraduate applicants last year, with details of whether this
varies depending on the type of offer made; or whether there is
variation across the different academic areas of the the
University.

Yours faithfully,

F.L. Hunter

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Disclaimer: This message and any reply that you make will be
published on the internet. Our privacy and copyright policies:
[4]http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/help/about...

Please use this email address for all replies to this request:
[5][FOI #29381 email]

Is [6][University of St Andrews request email] the wrong address for Freedom of
Information requests to University of St Andrews? If so please
contact us using this form:
[7]http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/help/contact

If you find WhatDoTheyKnow useful as an FOI officer, please ask
your web manager to suggest us on your organisation's FOI page.
-------------------------------------------------------------------

References

Visible links
1. http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/admissions/S...
2. http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/admissions/u...
3. http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/business-imp...
4. http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/help/about...
5. mailto:[FOI #29381 email]
6. mailto:[University of St Andrews request email]
7. http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/help/contact