UCAS has made changes to the academic reference process. Further information is available on the UCAS website, including examples of good practice (Word doc, 310KB).

King’s College London operates a centralised admissions process. Each application is assessed holistically, with academic references making up a part of this.

The new UCAS reference format has three distinct sections:

Section one:

Enter a general description about your school, college, or centre.

Many schools and colleges already provide a standard piece of text in their references regarding their institution. This can include, but is not restricted to:

• Details on any selection policies (are you an open access or academically selective school/college?), funding status (private or government funded), school performance, intake demographics, and progression rates to higher education.
• A brief explanation of the typical study paths your students take, such as the type and number of qualifications studied.
• Any policies or processes used for predicting grades (such as internal assessments). This is an opportunity to articulate any policy about not predicting grades for qualifications where the school or college feels the assessment method or qualification structure is not suited to predictions.
• If you are an international centre, you may wish to comment on English language delivery and support.

If you’re providing a reference for an applicant who is applying independently of a school or college, section one will instead ask you to briefly explain your relationship to the applicant (such as former teacher, private tutor, employer etc).

Section two:

Information about extenuating circumstances that may affect the applicant’s education and achievement.

We don’t expect this for all applicants, just those with extenuating circumstances.

As a guide, we recommend you include the following information where relevant in this section, with the applicant's consent:

• A brief statement on the student’s overall academic performance that contextualises their educational journey. The statement should include information on their current performance and any changes over time. This can be particularly helpful if their performance has changed since receiving their previous qualifications (such as GCSEs) and can help us interpret differences between predicted and achieved grades.
• Any individual circumstances such as a disability, a serious, acute, or chronic illness, bereavement, family disruption, or significant adverse personal circumstances. We consider extenuating circumstances very seriously and always want to know how an applicant’s performance may be impacted by their circumstances.
• Factors which have limited the individual’s choice of subjects at UK Level 3 or equivalent. This is helpful when considering applicants who may not have preferred subjects for their course, although, we can’t consider applicants missing essential subjects.
• Reasonable adjustments that've been identified by the school, college, centre or awarding organisation to support successful outcomes.
• Information about your school, college, or centre which may affect a student’s performance, such as significant staff changes or damage to buildings.

A short description outlining the circumstances is sufficient. We appreciate some applicants may be uncomfortable with sharing details about their circumstances, which is why all information is kept confidential and will only be used (where appropriate) to the applicant’s benefit.

We’re unable to consider information after an adverse decision has been made on an application.

As part of the admissions process here at King’s, we would also ask that a mitigating circumstances form is completed alongside the application, as appropriate. More information can be found on our Mitigating Circumstances webpage.

Section three:

Outline other supportive information specific to the applicant and relevant to the course applied for that you think universities or colleges should be aware of.

If you have no circumstances to note, this section can be left blank. We expect this to be the case for many applicants.

We don’t have any specific academic information requirements for this section and don’t expect you to provide individual comments from each subject teacher. We take predicted grades as your judgement on a student’s academic performance in each subject.

Only those circumstances that are relevant for your applicant need to be included here in short, clear statements.

Information that may be useful to include is:

• Barriers the applicant has faced in accessing work experience opportunities or extracurricular activities (only where relevant to the course applied to).
• Extracurricular activities that represent a significant commitment (including time away from school and evening or weekend activity) such as high-performance sports, music activities, and volunteering in the community.
• Additional qualification information – if your student studies outside of the UK school system, it’s helpful to include information about their study that isn’t already within their qualifications information. For example, their chosen specialisms or the individual subjects included.
• If your applicant is applying for a second time or after a gap (due to transferring universities, for example), it’s helpful to give a brief explanation of that change.
• If you’re providing a reference from another university, state whether your applicant is still registered or has formally left. It’s also helpful to know if there are any outstanding disciplinary matters.

If your applicant attends your school or college, we’ll need your reference to be provided with your official email address, or a generic published school email address and not a personal email account.

As a referee, UCAS provides a way for you to confirm you’ve verified all the qualifications listed by your applicant. You can reduce the evidence we ask applicants to provide by verifying their qualifications.

Check that applicants have entered their qualifications correctly, especially if the qualifications are available at different levels or offer similar subject titles, such as BTECs. Indicate whether each qualification is achieved or incomplete.

Evidence of grades achieved, such as GCSEs, may be required. If this is the case, the applicant will be informed directly. Admissions generally accepts scanned copies of documents, and we do not accept documents sent via post. However, the University may request original documents during the enrolment process, if required for the specific course.

References for applicants studying an Access to Higher Education Diploma or mature students may need more detailed information later in the application process. This is because your applicant may have only just begun their current studies.

Our priority at King’s is to always to ensure the application process is as fair and consistent as possible. If we need further information, we’ll contact the applicant directly to request this.