October Update: Verifiers and More

It is hard to believe the application closed 5 weeks ago and that the evaluation period is now well under way. The Admissions office is a lot quieter as people work diligently to review your transcripts, check your BC residency status (if applicable), ensure you have met the prerequisite requirements, and read about your non-academic activities. Because there is a long period of silence from us to you, we know this part of the process can be confusing. Here are the answers to some common questions that may help you navigate the next month:

1)      When will interview notifications be sent? The first week of December. We normally send notifications in batches over the course of the week. Sorry, we can’t say exactly when the regrets vs interview invites will be sent – just know that everyone will be notified sometime that week.

2)      Will the Admissions office contact me before then? There are a number of reasons we may contact you at any point in the application period, but especially over the next month. The most common reasons are:

  1. We need clarification regarding how you meet or plan to meet the prerequisite and/or 90 credit minimum requirements.
  2. We need clarification regarding one or more of your non-academic experiences. This could be because we are not sure what you meant in your entry, the dates were confusing, the hours were confusing, or we need additional information.
  3. We need you to provide a new verifier for a specific activity- this may be because we cannot get in touch with a verifier, or because the verifier you have provided is not appropriate for the activity.
  4. We need more information about your BC residency.

We will be sending you a notification email to inform you about the process and what to expect in the near future (this won’t happen until late November).

Please respond to our requests for information as quickly as possible through the communication feature in the Online Application System. If you do so, and you do not hear back from us, what you have provided is sufficient and we are very grateful for your prompt reply. It helps immensely.

3)      How many verifiers do you check and why? We check at least one verifier (usually more) for every applicant who receives a full file review. Sometimes we check a few, sometimes we check them all. We contact them either via email or phone. Verifiers are checked both randomly and for specific reasons. This is an integral component of our evaluation process. It helps to ensure that what you have written is an accurate reflection of your experiences.

4)      What happens if my verifier does not respond? If your verifier does not respond, we often try to contact them another way. If we are unable to reach them, and we must have a response about this activity, we will contact you and ask for a new verifier.

We do not deduct points from your non-academic evaluation for non-responsiveness of a verifier unless we have tried all methods to contact your verifier and you, and we have still not been able to reach anyone regarding your activity.

5)      What if my verifier says that what I wrote is wrong? We review your application with the corrected information and if necessary will adjust your score. For the protection of your verifier’s privacy we will not inform you about your verifier’s response, even if you made an honest mistake. If they choose to contact you and you wish to write us an email about what happened, that is fine. 

6)       I haven’t heard anything from you or my verifiers. Is this a bad sign? No, it’s not. We have not evaluated all applications yet, and you may not hear from us or your verifiers at all during the evaluation process. Verifiers are under no obligation to keep you updated when we contact them. They may choose to do so, but that is up to them. Additionally, we will only contact you for one of the reasons listed above (if necessary), in late November to let you know about the process for the upcoming interview notifications, and in December to let you know that a decision has been made about your application. Also, keep in mind that because UBC has a 50/50 evaluation process where 50% of your total file review score (TFR) is based on your academics and 50% is based on your non-academics, we are not able to determine who is invited for interview until we have evaluated all applications. We invite applicants for interview based on their TFR score.

6 responses to “October Update: Verifiers and More”

  1. Mike Jones

    So is it safe to say everyone should have a decision by December 5th? Or could it likely extend to the week of December 8th?

    Sorry for the specific question, I am planning on scheduling a work trip and would ideally like to book it after the decisions are done.

    1. Admissions

      Barring unforeseen circumstances, our plan is to notify everyone by December 5th, but unfortunately we cannot absolutely guarantee that.

      1. Mike Jones

        Thank you for your prompt and informative reply!

        It is much appreciated.

        1. Admissions

          Glad to help!

  2. Vida

    Hello,
    For a few of my non-academic activities, the verifier is aware of what I did and has seen the end result, but because much of my involvement occurred independently and on my own time, they will not know the exact number of hours of involvement. Will that be a problem? Are verifiers questioned about every aspect of the entry on the application?
    Thank you!

    1. Admissions

      In instances where a verifier may not have been directly involved in every aspect of an applicant’s activity (for things like hobbies or travelling), then it is understandable if they do not have an exact tally of the number of hours you contributed to that activity. However, they should have a strong general sense of what you did and the hours involved. Your verifier will have access to all the information in your entry and they should be able to confirm the entry as a whole. We would recommend getting in touch with them beforehand to confirm that they will be able to verify all the details that you provide.

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