UWC South East Asia - Dover Campus

Entrance criteria

Immigration pass
All applications are first verified to ensure applicants would be able to attend the College based on their current, or planned future, immigration status.

This is particularly important for Singapore citizens who require a waiver from the Ministry of Education (MOE). In line with Singapore Government regulations that require Singaporean citizens to attend MOE schools, we accept applications from Singaporean citizens applying to Grade 1 and above in limited circumstances.

Once we understand that an applicant is likely to be able to enrol at the College, the application is reviewed to determine whether the applicant would be able to benefit fully from the opportunities offered by UWCSEA.

Entry criteria
Applicants need to demonstrate age-appropriate qualities and skills that will enable them to thrive in all five elements of our learning programme. These include but are not limited to:

• A positive approach to learning, as reflected in effort grades (typically, eligible applicants will be consistently in the upper levels of effort and approach within their current school’s assessment bands); this is just as important to us as academic attainment
• An academic profile that indicates the applicant can progress with confidence in our learning programme (typically, eligible applicants will be consistently in the upper levels of assessment within their current school’s assessment bands)
• Positive and collaborative classroom behaviour and social interactions with peers, as reflected in report comments
• Active engagement in activities and extracurricular interests, in relation to the applicant’s current context
• English proficiency that will enable the student to access our learning programme, possibly with additional EAL (English as an Additional Language) support if we have space available in the EAL programme
• Individual learning needs that can be supported by our Learning Support provision

At this point, we sometimes ask families to provide additional information so that we can clarify if we are able to support students, particularly those with EAL and Learning Support needs. This may include asking to contact the applicant's current school or by inviting an applicant to complete age-appropriate assessments or tests.

If our application review highlights that we are not able to meet the educational needs of the applicant, we will advise you of our decision and the reasons for it, and the application will be closed.

Holistic profile
Once we determine an applicant will be able to flourish in our holistic learning programme, we then look at each application based on creating deliberate diversity in our community. This is in alignment with our commitment to our mission and values, and means that we consider a variety of personal and experience factors for each applicant, including but not limited to the following:

• Gender, ethnicities, and nationalities
• Cultural, religious, and linguistic diversity
• Countries or regions of current and previous residency
• Variety of personalities (along the continuum from extroversion to introversion, among other things)
• Educational backgrounds (including types of schools, curricula studied, academic and other educational opportunities and experiences)
• Academic interests, talents, and skills
• Future aspirations (for older applicants)
• Extra-curricular interests, hobbies, and pursuits
• Variety of family backgrounds (nuclear, extended, interdependent, single-parent, blended families, career backgrounds, number of siblings, and other aspects of family situations)
• Special educational and other needs or circumstances

These factors are a natural part of a student’s identity, background, and personal experience. While we encourage applicants and their families to respond authentically to the questions we ask as part of your application, including those in the Student Statement for Grades 6–11, applicants should not try to demonstrate how ‘diverse’ they are.

Our holistic admissions review looks at all eligible applicants in the application pool in order to identify students who might best create further diversity within the campus, school section, grade or boarding community they would be joining.

Allocation decision
If there are more ‘eligible applicants’ than there are places available, we consider a variety of factors when allocating places. These factors depend upon the section of the school and grade that your child is applying to join. Above all, our allocation policy is driven by our mission, which directly informs our commitment to diversity and variety of experience. This is described on the holistic profile tab.

We are looking to build balanced and diverse cohorts in each grade level, taking into consideration a range of factors, including but not limited to:

• Personality
• Background and variety of experience
• Interests and activities
• Proactive involvement in school and community life
• The applicant’s potential to flourish within our learning programme
• The applicant’s potential to embrace the College mission and values (for applicants to Grade 6 and above, this can be highlighted in the handwritten Student Statement)

Other factors we take into consideration include:

• Gender balance within the grade applied for
• Applicant’s age within the age-range of the grade applied for
• Whether the applicant has a sibling currently enrolled at the same campus
• Placing siblings applying at the same time, where possible and appropriate
• Whether or not the applicant, or their parents, previously attended UWCSEA
• Whether or not the applicant previously applied to UWCSEA