Perfect match

Aytek Erdil examines what went wrong with university admissions this summer and suggests a solution

This summer, selective universities were overwhelmed with more students than they could accommodate. In some cases, new students were told to find housing in neighbouring towns and were even offered £10,000 to defer their studies or study elsewhere.

Why did these universities, which are meant to be selective, make many more offers than they could reasonably accommodate? Because when universities make their offers, they have no way of knowing how many will result in recruitment. The system is plagued with uncertainty and universities inevitably get things wrong. When uncertainty increases, mistakes can increase. A lot.