Don’t fret that you didn’t get the offer/grades you wanted. Clearing could be the start of something beautiful!
Why Clearing can be the start of something beautiful!
If I were a betting man (or girl), I’d bet you a tenner that you will look back on the day that you got you’re A-Level or Higher results, and you will smile. It might be a small, wry one. It might be a medium smile. It might be a megawatt, supernova grin that would take the shine off the sun. It might even be a smile of relief, and just to yourself, that things turned out the way that they did.
I’m also thinking that you might not quite be at the smiling point yet. But, please, bear in mind it has only been a couple of weeks since those little letters set your future in stone.
The A-Level journey. The Scottish High-er Road. The IB highway. The last two or three years have been, and will continue to be, some of the most important in your life. They are the years during which you have decided exactly what you want to be and how you are going to do it. You’ve read the books, applied for the uni course, sat the exam, got the grades and you’re off. Simples! If you have not followed the above one-line guide and smashed it, you’re out for life. Or, so we are led to believe. It’s not really the case.
This is just the point at which we all come to realise that life’s path is not straight. It’s bendy and curly and awesome. We don’t exist in a black and white world. It also means that life does not end if you did not get the grades that you wanted, or expected, or were expected to get. It can be tough to deal with the practical side of missing out on your number one choice of uni and course as well as piecing together the emotional side of how you feel. My advice – don’t try to do both at the same time. Go through Clearing (you can still do this until mid-September) and find something you like, somewhere you like and give it a go. Get to work on the practicalities of preparing for the next stage of your life and park the emotional side until some day in the future when you are ready to deal with it and feelings aren’t so raw. On a beach with a cocktail, halfway down a ski slope, mid-mosh at your new student union.
Let’s take a moment to think about Clearing. UCAS Clearing is a little bit like a dating site. It helps match up courses with students who are right for them. It helps universities find people who had not considered them first time round. It allows you to shop around, with the luxury of knowing your results. It opens doors and creates opportunities that simply did not exist when you were working towards the On Time Application date. Clearing is your chance to make sure that everything will be exactly how you like it.
The great news is that Clearing does not come with a big T-shirt that says “I got in through Clearing”. When you turn up to move into halls, or to matriculate, or to discover just how many bars there are in the Students’ Union (use responsibly :oD), it does not matter how you arrived. Your new course and your new uni may not have been your hearts’ desire, but you will find course mates who feel they are living the dream – this was their first choice! Academic teaching staff don’t judge either. Universities count on Clearing to help them fill seats – it’s just how it works.
Be brave and embrace your opportunity. You’ve just cleared one of life’s first big hurdles. And for every one that finds happiness through Clearing, someone somewhere is just realising that the course they aced their exam results to study on is just so very not for them. If you do find someone like this, would you do me a favour? Take them for a pint or a latte and reassure them that life’s path is not straight. It’s bendy and curly and awesome…