Filling out the UCAS Form

The UCAS form has a number of different sections that need completing. This can seem confusing at first, but expand the sections below to find useful information about filling out each section - take it one section at a time!

Personal details

- Basic information about things like your name, date of birth and gender.

Nationality

- Information about your country of birth and your nationality (usually as set out in your passport or any official documents).

Where you live

- Any addresses you’ve lived at since a certain date. This might only be one address, or it could be many. - This also asks for your area of permanent residence (like the council or town where you live) and your residential category (e.g. UK Citizen)

Contact details

- Details such as your email address, phone number and postal address.

Supporting information

- Details of whether you, or a parent, have ever lived or worked in the EU, or an EU National. If you’re not sure, the answer is probably no.

Finance and funding

- Information about how you will fund your course. This is usually “UK, Chl, IoM or EU student finance services” and then you will need to put the detail of your local council in (e.g. Barnsley, Sheffield, etc.)

Diversity and inclusion

- Details about whether you have ever been in care (if you’re not sure then the answer will be no.) - Details about your ethnicity. - Details about your parents level of education (if they have a degree) and their occupational background (the job that your highest earning parent does.)

More about you

- Details about disabilities, caring responsibilities, refugee / asylum status, working in the armed forces. - This also asks if you’re entitled to free school meals. Not everyone who receives Learner Support Fund counts as “free school meals”, as it’s separate funding. Ask your tutor if you are unsure if this is something that applies to you. This year students who receive free school meals don’t have to pay for their application sending, so it’s important that you get the information in this section right.

Education

- Put in details for your college and secondary education. - Add details of every qualification you have sat (regardless of the grade you achieved) under the relevant school or college. Include all GCSE resits completed under college and any pending qualifications too. - Make sure your qualifications are listed exactly as they are on your certificates. - If it’s a pass / merit / distinction grade then this is usually not a GCSE, but some form of BTEC certificate or award instead. - Make sure your GCSE Science is inputted correctly – if it’s a Double Award then you need to have entered this as a GCSE Double Award rather than a single. - Add details of your BTEC registration number if you have sat any BTEC qualifications. - Add your Unique Learner Number (ULN) which is a 10 digit number found on all of your certificates. If you can’t find this, your tutor may be able to find this on a college system. This just helps the admissions tutors pull up your full academic record. - If relevant, add details of any English tests you’ve had to complete if English isn’t your first language.

Employment

- Put in details of any paid work that you’ve had. - Don’t include work placements in here.

Extra activities

- Include details of any extra activities you have completed to help with going to HE. This includes any summer schools or schemes put on by universities. Don’t worry if you don’t have anything to add here, not everyone does!

Personal Statement

- This is where you add your personal statement. There's no spell-check so we recommend typing this on Word and then copying in here. Click "read more" for more detail.

Choices

Add details of up to 5 university / course choices. Click "read more" for more information on researching these choices. It's important to get it right!

Click the PowerPoint icon to download UCAS' step-by-step guide on how to complete the application form for 2027 entry!

Step-by-step UCAS Walkthrough Guide

Once each of these sections are completed you can submit your application!

Click here for information on what happens after you submit your application.