The University of Western Australia will offer alternative admission pathways again this year to help reduce stress and improve mental health and wellbeing among Year 12 ATAR students.

Professor David Sadler, UWA’s Deputy Vice-Chancellor Education, said UWA had been the first Australian university to launch an early offers scheme last year to help Year 12s make the best of their Year 11 predicted ATAR to gain university entry.

Professor Sadler said a survey of secondary school leaders including principals, careers advisers and teachers revealed support for the scheme.

“With a major global pandemic on our hands, we decided to trial something new last year and received positive feedback about many aspects, particularly the mental health benefits,” he said.

“It would be remiss of us not to trial this again this year, with some refinements based on feedback and data.”

Professor Sadler said fears that many students would not be motivated to study as hard once they had accepted their early offer had been unfounded.

“After reviewing our data we found that less than one per cent of those students who accepted early offers did not complete their ATAR,” he said.

Students must still complete Year 12 ATAR unless they opt to take the Special Tertiary Admissions STAT pathway.

To obtain an early offer, students must achieve a predicted ATAR three points higher than the entry requirement for their nominated course for courses with an entry requirement of up to 92 and one point higher for courses above 92.

The 2022 early offers scheme applies to any undergraduate degree, the new combined Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees and assured pathways to Architecture, Landscape Architecture, Law, Translation Studies and Teaching.

Courses that are not available are assured pathways to Medicine, Dentistry, Pharmacy, Podiatry and Optometry. Students who wish to apply for these courses will need to submit an application through TISC.  

“We continue to monitor academic performance of the first group that transitioned to UWA through this scheme and will be better informed on how best to support these students towards the end of this year,” Professor Sadler said.

“We still believe that studying ATAR courses is vital and that students must achieve their academic potential, because it provides important preparation for their university studies.”

Students can apply direct to UWA with their Year 11 secondary school report, or Year 12 semester 1 report.  Applications are now open and will close when ATAR results are released. Students can apply via the UWA website.

For more information, visit UWA’s Open Day next Sunday 28 March.