Entry to LSE is highly competitive and only a small proportion of applicants are successful. This means that every year, many students do not receive an offer of a place, despite being predicted grades which satisfy our standard minimum entry requirements.
The following advice will help teachers and tutors to ensure that students are well prepared, giving them the best possible chance of success.
General advice
The closing date for all applicants to LSE (home and overseas) is 15 January. Applications arriving at Universities' and Colleges' Admissions Service (UCAS) after this date are only considered if there are places remaining on the relevant programme, which, given the level of competition at LSE, is unlikely.
Applicants should read the programme pages| and the appropriate departmental admissions criteria pages| carefully to make sure that they meet the minimum criteria for admission. In some cases this includes not just predicted A level grades, but also GCSE and AS level performance. If you are writing a reference in support of an international student who does not have GCSE or IGCSE qualifications, or who did not complete compulsory education in their native country, we would appreciate it if you could ask them to forward a copy of their most recent school transcript, so that we can make an assessment of their academic profile and progress.
Applicants should read carefully our entry requirements| concerning the A level subjects which we classify as 'non-preferred'. These subjects are only accepted in combination with two traditional academic subjects.
Your students should also be aware that meeting or exceeding the minimum academic entry criteria does not automatically guarantee that we will make them an offer. Every cycle we receive far more applications from extremely well qualified students that we can physically accommodate. Thus each year many promising applicants are unsuccessful in securing an offer from us simply because of the level of competition for places at LSE.
All aspects of the students' UCAS application (achieved grades, predicted grades, personal statement and your reference) are considered before we make our decision.
Advice for referees
Please give realistic predictions for all qualifications that the student is taking. It is very helpful if these are given separately at the top of the reference. For the IB Diploma, please give the predicted total score (out of 45) and the individual Higher Level subject scores. The majority of applicants also include their AS grades, (or unit marks) and while this may not be compulsory, we find it extremely useful as we prefer students who have achieved excellent grades throughout their sixth-form studies. Thus your comments on their AS (year 12) performance in addition to their A2 (year 13 performance) are extremely helpful to us.
It is also useful to have an idea of the student's performance in the context of the overall levels of achievement at your school or college. For example, is s/he one of your brightest students or the best student you have taught in the past five years?
Undergraduate courses at LSE are very demanding and it is important that admissions tutors are satisfied that accepted students will cope at LSE; therefore we appreciate your comments on the student's capacity for hard work and attitude to study. Whilst at LSE students are required to undertake significant amounts of independent study and adopt a pro-active approach to learning.
If there are any personal or domestic circumstances which you feel may affect or have previously affected the student's performance, please tell us in your reference. If any such circumstances arise after the UCAS form has been submitted, please e-mail the Undergraduate Admissions Office at ug.admissions@lse.ac.uk| with this information, giving the student's UCAS number and course code.
Similarly, it is helpful to know if any circumstances or difficulties at your school or college may have impacted on a student's performance, for example if a key teacher has been absent for an extended period or if you have not been able to recruit an A level teacher in a particular subject. Likewise if there are any limitations to the subject options available at your school or college, for example, if you do not offer Further Maths or Economics A level please advise us using the reference section of the UCAS form.
Please also comment on the applicant's suitability for the chosen course, giving examples of their subject commitment. It will add weight to an application if the student's own statements are corroborated by those supplied by the referee. However, we very much appreciate your honesty and if you have any concerns about the student’s degree of suitability or level of preparation, please do not over emphasise their positives.
Many of our admissions tutors consider independent and original thinking to be an important quality in applicants. Therefore it is helpful if you can give an estimation of the student's ability to think for him or herself. If the student has undertaken an Extended Project (EP) as part of their sixth form programme, this can be a good indicator of both their independence and originality.
If the student has had any gaps in his or her study, such as time away from education in employment, or acting as a carer, or has repeated a year of schooling a brief explanation in their reference is appreciated.
Overseas students
It can be daunting for some students to come to London and live independently of their families for the first time. With this in mind please comment on your estimation of the student's ability to live and study abroad.
Finally, if the student's first language is not English it is essential that you comment on his or her English language ability and how well you believe they would cope with studying at degree level in the English language.
We have recently revised our list of accepted English Language qualifications, as we need to ensure that all students are competent and fluent users of all four aspects of communication (speaking, listening, reading and writing). Some students have well developed listening and writing skills but are less fluent or confident speakers of English. Other students are confident speakers, but may have more difficulty with reading or comprehension. Please therefore include a prediction for the relevant English language test, if one is being taken. Students who have not yet achieved LSE's minimum English Language requirements at the time of making their application will not be disadvantaged; however, they will be unable to register at LSE without achieving the approved standard.
We aim to make all decisions by 31 March, which gives those students for whom we request an additional English Language qualification adequate time to prepared for and take an approved English Language Test.
Please check our current requirements|, as each year we review our accepted English Language requirements, and just because a particular English Language qualification has been accepted in the past, there is no guarantee that it will still be accepted. Please also note that some qualifications (such as IELTS) only have a limited shelf-life. Unlike other universities who may use interviews to assess students' English language fluency, we base our requirements solely on recognised and approved qualifications.