Admission Data for University of Warwick Economics and Maths courses with and without further maths.

The request was refused by University of Warwick.

Dear University of Warwick,

May I please request the following information for the entry years of 2017, 2018 and 2019 for the courses : Economics (BSc), Mathematics and Statistics (BSc), Mathematics (BSc).

1) Number of Applicants with Further Maths AS / A-Level
2) Number of Applicants without Further Maths
3) Number of Offers Made to both parties
4) Mean number of A* predicted grades for those sitting the A-Level, of whom received an offer 5) Mean number of A* achieved grades at GCSE, of whom received an offer

Yours faithfully,

Humzah Enver

infocompliance, Resource, University of Warwick

Thank you for your email which has been received by the University's
Information and Data Compliance Team. 
The University undertakes to respond to Freedom of Information Requests
within 20 working days and to Data Subject Rights Requests within one
month.*

If your query is not related to a Freedom of Information Request or Data
Subject Rights Request, but is related to a data protection
matter, please redirect it to [1][email address].

Kind regards

Information and Data Compliance Team.

 

*Please note that due to the global Covid-19 pandemic, the University of
Warwick is following the advice of the UK Government and where possible
staff are working from home. New working arrangements coupled with the
prioritisation of university resources may impact upon the University’s
ability to respond to your request within the statutory timescales and you
may experience delays when making information rights requests during the
pandemic. Thank you for your patience during these unprecedented times.

References

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infocompliance, Resource, University of Warwick

Humzah Enver

 

Thank you for submitting an FOI request, requesting information from the
University of Warwick. In order to comply with your request, we would be
grateful if you could please clarify the following:

 

·        When you say ‘Number of Offers Made to both parties' - to whom
are you referring when you say both parties?

 

Unfortunately, information regarding GCSE grades and predicted A-Level
grades, are not necessarily held for each applicant within the
University’s systems. There is no standard field for these on the UCAS
form but rather a free standing text box where an applicant can choose to
fill it in however they like therefore the University does not store it as
a field within SITS (the University’s student record system). As such, to
obtain the requested information for questions 5 and 6 of your request
alone would require a manual retrieval of each applicant’s application
form to manually extract the information requested, which the University
estimates would exceed the cost limit. Section 12(1) of the Freedom of
Information Act states that a public authority is not obliged to comply
with a request for information if the authority estimates that the cost of
complying with the request would exceed the appropriate limit. This is
currently £450, which equates to 18 hours of staff time calculated at £25
an hour as set out in the Freedom of Information and Data Protection
(Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004.

 

The University is obliged to offer guidance as to what would be manageable
under the costs limit so with that in mind, it would be able to provide
data in relation to questions 1-3 of your original request, once the above
clarification has also been provided. If this information would be of
interest to you then please submit a refined request confirming that you
would still like the University to provide a response to question 1-3 of
your original request. If you do submit a refined request, please also
provide the clarification requested above.   

 

If you do submit a refined request, the University will treat it as a
substitute request to your original request below. In the absence of a
refined request, the University will send an official response to your
original request, engaging the costs limit exemption under section 12(1)
of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 within 20 working days of this
email.

 

Please be advised that the University will also be unable to proceed with
your request until you have provided the requested clarifications and the
20 working day statutory time limit does not begin until clarification has
been received. Should we not receive a reply to this email, your request
will be closed in 20 working days.

 

Kind Regards

 

Legal and Compliance Services

 

show quoted sections

Dear infocompliance, Resource,

Those who applied with further maths and those who did not.

Yours sincerely,

Humzah Enver

infocompliance, Resource, University of Warwick

Humzah Enver,

Thank you for providing the below clarification however it is not entirely
clear if you would like to proceed on the basis that the University will
only provide you with a response to questions 1 - 3, as per your original
request.

 

As explained in our previous email, dated 17 August 2020, should the above
information be of interest to you we kindly ask that you confirm by
resubmitting your request with you clarification included to ensure that
everything is clearly specified.

 

Please be advised that if you do submit a refined request, the University
will treat it as a substitute request to your original request below. In
the absence of a refined request, the University will send an official
response to your original request, engaging the costs limit exemption
under section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 within 20
working days of this email.

 

The University will be unable to advance with your request until you have 
provided the requested clarifications and the 20 working day statutory 
time limit does not begin until clarification has been received. Should
we  not receive a reply to this email, your request will be closed in 20 
working days.

 

Kind regards,

 

Legal and Compliance Services

 

 

show quoted sections

Dear University of Warwick,

May I please request the following information for the entry years of 2017, 2018 and 2019 for the courses : Economics (BSc), Mathematics and Statistics (BSc), Mathematics (BSc).

1) Number of Applicants with Further Maths AS / A-Level .
2) Number of Applicants without Further Maths .
3) Number of Offers Made to those with Further Maths AS / A-Level and those without Further Maths.

Yours faithfully,

Humzah Enver

infocompliance, Resource, University of Warwick

Hello

Thank you for submitting an FOI request, requesting information from the University of Warwick.

The University estimates from its preliminary assessment that this would most likely exceed the appropriate costs limit under S.12 FOIA 2000. After running an access query for one of the years requested, it produced over 100,000 lines of data because the issue is that every single qualification for every applicant is one line of data and the system does not allow to filter by a certain qualification topic/type. Section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act states that a public authority is not obliged to comply with a request for information if the authority estimates that the cost of complying with the request would exceed the appropriate limit. This is currently £450, which equates to 18 hours of staff time calculated at £25 an hour as set out in the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004.

The University is obliged to offer guidance as to what would be manageable under the costs limit so with that in mind, it may be able to provide some qualification data if you narrowed the scope of your request to only include one academic year and also by either (a) home students or (b) overseas students, but not both. It is therefore advised that you submit a refined request. Alternatively, the University can confirm that nobody would receive an offer for Maths without having both Maths and Further Maths A-levels. Maths and Further Maths A-levels don not feature in the decision to make an offer for the other courses listed in your request.

If you do submit a refined request, the University will treat it as a substitute request to your original request below. In the absence of a refined request, the University will send an official response to your original request, engaging the costs limit exemption under section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 within the 20 working day limit.

Please be advised that if you do submit a refined request the University will still be unable to proceed with your request until you have also provided the requested clarifications and the 20 working day statutory time limit does not begin until clarification has been received.

Kind Regards

Legal and Compliance Services

show quoted sections

infocompliance, Resource, University of Warwick

Humzah Enver

 

Thank you for your email dated 14 August 2020 requesting information from
the University of Warwick under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
Please find below your request and the University’s response.

FOI Request
May I please request the following information for the entry years of
2017, 2018 and 2019 for the courses : Economics (BSc), Mathematics and
Statistics (BSc), Mathematics (BSc).

1) Number of Applicants with Further Maths AS / A-Level

2) Number of Applicants without Further Maths

3) Number of Offers Made to both parties

4) Mean number of A* predicted grades for those sitting the A-Level, of
whom received an offer 5) Mean number of A* achieved grades at GCSE, of
whom received an offer

After the University sought clarification from you on 17 and 18 August
2020, you changed your request to:

May I please request the following information for the entry years of
2017, 2018 and 2019 for the courses : Economics (BSc), Mathematics and
Statistics (BSc), Mathematics (BSc).

 

1) Number of Applicants with Further Maths AS / A-Level .

 

2) Number of Applicants without Further Maths .

 

3) Number of Offers Made to those with Further Maths AS / A-Level and
those without Further Maths.

The University communicated with you regarding your request (email dated
02 September 2020), advising that from its preliminary assessment, in its
current format, your FOI request would be likely to exceed the appropriate
costs limit under section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000. As
explained, the amount data that would be produced and need to be manually
reviewed would be excessive (over 100,000 lines of data for one year
alone) because every single qualification for every applicant is one line
of data and the system does not allow to filter by a certain qualification
topic/type. As such, the University estimated that this would take in
excess of the 18 hours allowed under the Freedom of Information Act
therefore the cost of complying with the request would exceed the
appropriate limit. Public authorities are not obliged to work past the
appropriate costs limit under section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information
Act 2000. This is currently £450, which equates to 18 hours of staff time
calculated at £25 an hour as set out in the Freedom of Information and
Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004.

The University offered guidance as to what may be manageable under the
cost limit however, as the University has not received any communication
containing a refined request, the exemption under Section 12(1) of the
Freedom of Information Act is now engaged.

 

I trust that this information will be helpful to you, however, should you
be dissatisfied with the way in which your request has been handled you
can request an internal review within one month of our response and, in
the first instance, you are advised to follow the procedure outlined here:
[1]http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/services/legal...

 

If you remain dissatisfied with how your request has been handled, you
have a right to appeal to the Information Commissioner at: The Information
Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Walter Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire,
SK9 5AF (0303 123 1113) ([2]https://ico.org.uk/) There is no charge for
making an appeal.

Yours sincerely,

Charlotte Ridley
Associate Director - Marketing | Marketing and Communications | Engagement
Group 
[3]University of Warwick | University House | Kirby Corner Road | Coventry
| CV4 8UW

References

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1. http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/services/legal...
2. https://ico.org.uk/
3. http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/