QTAC Preferences

har

Im Kind of confused in how to order my QTAC preferences. So Basically two courses Im considering are Bachelor and Masters of Engineering at UQ (97) and the Bachelor of Engineering and Masters of AI at QUT(91), now the thing is Im more inclined towards UQ so I've put UQ as a top preference (1st), and QUT as a 2nd preference. The problem is, Im aiming to get the QUT Excellence scholarship and you can only get it if you've placed it as your first preference and if you get a 98+ atar, so I want to change the preference from QUT 2nd to first, but Im unsure if UQ will accept me if I keep them as a second preference. I am predicted to exceed requirements for both, its just this thing Im unsure about, I've heard that people with 98.05 atar not getting in so Im kinda unsure.

jinx_58

har
I believe with the excellence scholarship, you only get it if you accept QUT's offer. What I mean is, when it comes to offer rounds, you may be offered a spot by both UQ and QUT. Then you decide where you wanna go. So if you don't get the excellence scholarship from QUT, you've got an offer from UQ so you'll be good to go.

Ask more question if you wanna,
-jinx_58

manorina

har

hi, so just to clarify: in order to be eligible for the QUT scholarship, you need it as your first pref. Unfortunately, this means you won't be able to receive an offer from UQ - as you will receive one offer each round, and it goes to your highest eligible preference. (If you meet the UQ threshold you'll also meet the QUT one as it's lower, and then receive a QUT offer as it's your higher pref). Both these courses only participate in the 11 Jan offer round (you can see that on qtac course search), so you can't do a conditional acceptance and change your preferences. Really this means you need to choose between UQ and the QUT scholarship - it's a tough choice. Good luck 🙂

har

manorina

Wait so If i have UQ as second preference will they not consider me? Suppose my selection rank is 99.95, and UQ second preference would they not consider me?

har

manorina

For example referring to the following link:
https://study.uq.edu.au/admissions/undergraduate/review-entry-requirements/guaranteed-atar
UQ has listed their guarantee atar thresholds, would that threshold still be in place if you placed UQ as 2nd preference? As I've heard that your top two are considered your "dream courses".

manorina

har

yeah the guaranteed ATAR threshold is still in place regardless of which preference UQ is, however qtac only gives you one offer per offer round. So what they do is they look at each preference in order and determine whether youre eligible for an offer - if you're eligible for your first preference you will receive that offer, if not they look at your second, and so on. If you put UQ second, there's no chance you will get the offer even if you're eligible for it. Because if you are, that means youre also eligible for QUT (bc lower ATAR), which is your highest preference and thus the one they'll give you the offer to. I hope that makes sense, know it's a little disappointing

edit: and in another scenario you could get around this by conditionally accepting QUT and then reordering prefs to put UQ first for the next offer round, but unfortunately your two courses only participate in the main January offer round, so there's only one chance to get an offer for either

har

manorina
That is true, see what I was thinking is because the scholarships are given out like December to January, Ill keep QUT first until the day before the preference deadlines and if I get it thats good Ill conditionally accept it, and if not Ill just make UQ first.