To ask the Minister for the Economy to detail any conversations she has had with universities regarding students who cannot secure an offer of a place, despite having high predicted grades.

Northern Ireland’s universities are autonomous bodies. As such, responsibility for setting admissions criteria and practices lies with each of the universities.

However, universities will take a view of more than just predicted grades when considering whether to make offers to students. They take into account a range of contextual information to assess how successful an applicant is likely to be in coping with the demands of university life, with predicted grades making up only one element of this information.