As March descends upon us, you may find yourself in the lucky group of students who are holding admission offers from universities. As more and more offers are made, more and more students will have to make difficult decisions in picking a university from their offers. The sooner you hear from your potential universities, the more time you’ll have before the May deadline to make this important decision. This can be both a blessing and a curse, as you get more time to mull over the pros and cons, but also more time to second guess yourself. So today we’ll talk about a few things to consider when picking a university from your offers.
You’ve probably thought about your preference order for the universities applied to before now, but if not it’s a good idea to do this now. If you haven’t received offers from all (or even from any) yet, don’t let the potential disappointment of not getting into your top choice put you off thinking about this. It’s important to make an educated decision in picking a university from your offers rather than picking your top choice at the last minute. One way of doing this is to write out your choices in order, along with a bit about why they fit in that order. This will help you to focus on the reasons for wanting to attend each university, as well as see that they all have their good points, which will hopefully help you deal with things if you don’t get into your first choice. And remember that your preferences aren’t set in stone – as you learn more about a specific university or programme, you may find yourself more or less interested in that choice. Listen to these feelings and allow yourself to consider whether it’s the right choice for you. However, there is a warning with changing feelings, which brings us to our next point.
Beware of sudden changes of heart. When you receive an offer from more than one place, you might find yourself quickly and dramatically swayed into thinking that you’d prefer to attend a different institution. This may be especially true if you were truly excited with your first offer, and then received an offer from another institution which was also among your top choices. This is a really difficult situation to be in, and it may take some of the shine off your initial excitement as you wonder which one is the right choice for you! One word of advice here is not to make any decisions to change paths rashly. There was probably a reason you were really excited for that first programme, and so it definitely shouldn’t be discounted. Take some time and have a look at the websites for each university and department, and consider which one will truly make you happiest. And remember that you’re lucky to be in this situation, even if it seems like picking a university from your offers is an agonising decision!
That being said, even if you’re perfectly happy with your first offer, it’s worth waiting a bit to see what other offers may come your way if the deadline isn’t too close. While we caution against making rash decisions based on a sudden change of heart in picking a university from your offers, it’s good to know all your options before choosing a course. This is especially true if you’ve applied to study different subjects, as it’ll give you a bit more time to consider which one it is that really interests you. However, you’ll have to be sure not to let important acceptance deadlines pass, as you might end up with nothing!