Access UCL Scheme

UCL is committed to widening access to higher education and seeks to recruit and retain the brightest students who will thrive in our rigorous teaching and learning environment.

What are IMD and TUNDRA?

IMD (Index of Multiple of Deprivation) is a measure of relative deprivation for small geographical areas. IMD ranks every small area from most deprived area to least deprived area.

TUNDRA (tracking underrepresentation by area) classifies local areas across England based on the proportion of 16-year-old state-funded mainstream school pupils who participate in higher education aged 18 or 19 years. UCL uses the TUNDRA LSOA (Lower Super Output Area) as our measure. 

Which datasets are UCL using in the 2025 admissions cycle?

IMD: LSOA11 Code sourced from the ONS postcode directory November 2023 and IMD datasets as follows: England: 2019; Northern Ireland: 2017; Scotland: 2020; Wales: 2019. (Quintile 1/Decile 1 or 2 eligible for scheme).

TUNDRA: Office for Students (OfS) postcode look-up data from September 2023 and OfS TUNDRA LSOA data from March 2021. (Quintile 1 eligible for scheme).

Care experienced applicants

To be eligible for Access UCL as a care experienced student, you must meet all of the following criteria:

1. Be attending or have attended a UK state school or a UK independent school for the award of the qualifications that you are offering to meet UCL’s entry requirements. The only qualifications that are eligible for a lower contextual offer are A levels, International Baccalaureate Diploma, Cambridge Pre-U Principal Subjects, Scottish Advanced Highers or Welsh Baccalaureate.

2. Be aged under 25 on your first day at UCL.

3. Have been looked after by a local authority or been in kinship care as a formal agreement with the local authority, for a minimum of three months (a minimum of 84 days) of your life. The months do not need to be consecutive.

If this applies to you, please make sure you tick the 'time in care' box on your UCAS form.

Qualified applicants in the 2025 entry UCAS admissions cycle who have ticked the box in their UCAS application to indicate that they are care experienced, will be contacted by UCL with details of how to submit evidence once their application has received an initial assessment.

For care experienced students, the evidence we ask for is an email directly from a trusted third party’s professional email address or a scanned letter on organisational headed paper from a trusted third party.  This must confirm that the applicant was looked after by a local authority or in kinship care as a formal agreement with the local authority and the dates that this applied. 

We expect this to be provided by the Local Authority of which the applicant is/was in care.  In exceptional circumstances (or when an applicant spent time in a comparable situation in another country), we will review the documentation provided on a case-by-case basis to ascertain whether an applicant is eligible through the care experienced route. 

Applicants who are estranged from their parents

To be eligible for Access UCL as an estranged student, you must meet all of the following criteria:

1. Be attending or have attended a UK state school for the award of the qualifications that you are offering to meet UCL’s entry requirements.  The only qualifications that are eligible for a lower contextual offer are A levels, International Baccalaureate Diploma, Cambridge Pre-U Principal Subjects, Scottish Advanced Highers or Welsh Baccalaureate.
2. Be aged under 25 on your first day at UCL.
3. Be permanently estranged from both parents with no support from, or contact with, either parent for at least a year and whilst undertaking the qualifications that you are using to meet UCL’s entry requirements.

If this applies to you, please make sure you tick the ‘estranged student’ box on your UCAS form.

Qualified applicants in the 2025 entry UCAS admissions cycle who have ticked the box in their UCAS application to indicate that they are estranged will be contacted by UCL with details of how to submit evidence once their application has received an initial assessment.

For estranged students, the evidence we ask for is:

1. A short statement written by the applicant that briefly outlines the circumstances of their estrangement and their current living situation.
2. Supporting statement(s) from trusted independent third parties who can confirm permanent estrangement.  This person (not a relative or family friend) should have a good standing in the community (for example a teacher, a doctor or local authority representative) and should have known about the situation for a substantial period of time. We ask for an email directly from a trusted third party’s professional email address or a scanned letter on organisational headed paper from a trusted third party.

The statement(s) from the trusted independent third party should include the following information about your situation:

• Details of your current living arrangements (for example, who you live with).
• Details of when the estrangement began and confirmation that it is ongoing. 
• Details of any financial support you receive because you are estranged. If the third party would not be able to confirm this, you can email us scans of documents confirming financial support related to estrangement instead.   

Are all qualifications eligible for a reduced offer under the Access UCL scheme?

To be eligible for Access UCL, applicants need to be studying at a UK state school (or at a UK independent school if they are care experienced) for their A levels (or equivalent qualifications).

If an applicant is eligible for the Access UCL scheme and receives an offer, this will be at a lower level than the standard offer for applicants studying A levels, International Baccalaureate Diploma, Cambridge Pre-U Principal Subjects, Scottish Advanced Highers or Welsh Baccalaureate.

Does UCL accept resits?

Resits are generally considered for most UCL programmes. Any programmes that do not consider resits will outline this on their department webpages. If you are unsure whether the programme you wish to apply for accepts resits, please contact the UCL Admissions Team for further guidance.

Am I eligible for Access UCL if I studied at a state school, but took resits at an independent school?

If you sat your qualifications at a state school but are resitting one or more of them at an independent centre, you will not be eligible for Access UCL, unless you are only paying to sit your exams at this centre (or you meet the Access UCL criteria through being care experienced). 

Paid tuition at an independent educational establishment while resitting will invalidate eligibility for Access UCL.  Where possible, referees should clarify a resitting applicant’s situation regarding exam fee-only status or paid-for tuition within the UCAS application. 

Will all applicants who declare that they are care experienced or estranged be contacted to provide verification?

No. There are two instances in which UCL may not contact an applicant to verify this status:

1. Those who are automatically identified as eligible through their home postcode and school will not be contacted for verification of their care experienced or estranged status.
2. Where it is determined prior to verification being requested that an applicant has achieved or is predicted to achieve results that would not meet the minimum entry requirement for a contextual offer for the programme, a verification request will not be sent.

Please note that the request for verification and the initial assessment of an application may take place in either order and therefore receiving a request for verification does not indicate that an applicant may be qualified for entry and does not indicate the likelihood of an applicant receiving an offer.

Are mature applicants eligible for Access UCL?

Mature students are assessed against the same Access UCL eligibility criteria as all other applicants. Please note that if you have achieved an undergraduate degree or are in the final year of an undergraduate degree, you will not be eligible for Access UCL.

I am a forced migrant living in the UK, am I eligible for Access UCL on this basis?

Being a forced migrant does not, in itself, meet the Access UCL eligibility criteria. However, UCL does not restrict Access UCL eligibility based on fee or immigration status, therefore a forced migrant who meets the eligibility criteria will be considered eligible in the usual way.

I lived in a non-eligible postcode when I applied, but I have now moved to an eligible postcode, what should I do?

Please update your address via the UCAS hub and email the Access UCL Team at wp.accessucl@ucl.ac.uk to confirm your new address. The Access UCL Team will then contact your school to confirm your new address and reassess your eligibility for the scheme. All notification of changes of address must be received by UCL by 30 June in the year of application. 

Please note that UCL is not able to consider a change in postcode if an application has already been unsucessful.

Will UCL reconsider Access UCL eligibility decisions for 2024 entry?

Applications for the 2024 admissions cycle are now closed. UCL is not able to reconsider Access UCL eligibility decisions for 2024 entry applicants as all deadlines have now passed.

For 2024 entry the eligibility requirements for the Access UCL scheme were:

Attend a UK state school and:

• live in an area that has a high level of financial, social or economic deprivation, or low progression to higher education (as measured by the Index of Multiple Deprivation, Acorn data and POLAR classification of home postcode); or
• meet the 2024 Access UCL definition of a young carer; or
• meet the 2024 Access UCL definition of family estrangement.

or

• Attend a UK state school or UK independent school AND meet the 2024 Access UCL definition of being care experienced.

These eligibility criteria apply to 2024 entry only. Please see above for the eligibility requirements for 2025 entry.

Who should I contact if I have further questions?

If you have not found the answer to your questions, then please get in touch with the Access UCL team at wp.accessucl@ucl.ac.uk.

Got questions? Get in touch.

Contact us to talk about any questions you have about the Access UCL scheme, or your eligibility.

Access UCL

wp.accessucl@ucl.ac.uk