Management of Confirmation of Acceptance for Studies (CAS) PGR Guidance Document for Schools

Transcription

1 COLLEGE of SCIENCE and ENGINEERING Management of Confirmation of Acceptance for Studies (CAS) PGR Guidance Document for Schools The Recruitment and Admissions Team at the College of Science and Engineering will take over responsibility for issuing CASs for PGR programmes from 1 August This document provides a summary of the procedures School staff should follow so that the CAS can be issued. School staff who make unconditional offers will be responsible for ensuring all necessary documents are in place BEFORE an unconditional offer is issued. At point of application School staff must request all relevant documents and upload these to the applicants EUCLID record; applicants should not be made an unconditional offer until all outstanding documents have been received. This includes the following documents, where applicable: Master s degree certificate (final degree certificate NOT provisional) Academic transcript from Master s degree (official final transcript) Bachelor s degree certificate (final degree certificate NOT provisional) Academic transcript from Bachelor s degree (official final transcript) English Language test (if required)* - this test result should be verified using the online verification service of the relevant test provider before an unconditional offer is made. (*i.e. IELTS, TOEFL, Cambridge Certificate of Proficiency in English (CPE), Cambridge Certificate in Advanced English (CAE) or Pearson Test of English) Two references (at least one letter must be signed, dated and written on official headed paper.) English tests are not required in the following circumstances: 1. If a student is a national of a UKBA-listed majority English-speaking country listed below: Antigua and Barbuda Australia The Bahamas Barbados Belize Canada Dominica Grenada Guyana Jamaica New Zealand St Kitts and Nevis St Lucia St Vincent and the Grenadines Trinidad and Tobago United States of America

2 2. If a student has previously completed a qualification equivalent to a UK degree which was taught in one of the following majority English-speaking countries: Antigua and Barbuda Australia The Bahamas Barbados Belize Dominica Grenada Guyana Ireland Jamaica New Zealand St Kitts and Nevis St Lucia St Vincent and the Grenadines Trinidad and Tobago The UK United States of America School staff must make sure that they have copies of the evidence attached to the EUCLID record before the unconditional offer is made. Recruitment and Admissions staff will NOT issue a CAS if the documents provided are not considered to be sufficient or if they have doubts concerning the authenticity of documents uploaded. In such cases it will be the responsibility of the school to request appropriate documents from the student to meet the requirements so that a CAS can be issued. ATAS Certificates As a result of further consideration by the UKBA, the International Office has confirmed in October 2012 that CAS creators no longer have to check that ATAS certificates have been uploaded to EUCLID before issuing a CAS to the applicant concerned. The immigration rules require students of certain courses to hold a valid ATAS certificate issued by the FCO. They will need to hold this at the time they make their application to the UKBA. The CAS, issued by the sponsor, is required to confirm if the course is one for which the applicant must hold an ATAS certificate but there is not a requirement for the sponsor to wait until the applicant has obtained an ATAS certificate before issuing the CAS Progression - Restrictions to Length of Study within the UK It is the School s responsibility to ensure that each student meets the current UKBA time limits on study within the UK. For Research students the current time limit is 8 years, i.e. Tier 4 PhD students will have 8 years to complete their PhD study regardless of the time spend in the UK before. What this means in practice is that if our student does a UG then PGT within the 5/6 years (as relevant) then goes on to a PhD, they can take as long as our academic regulations allow them to complete the PhD. However, the normal rules about academic progression would still apply (e.g. a student who had one UK PhD could not come here to do a second one). If the School requires clarification as to whether a student will be eligible for a Tier 4 student visa, please contact Lynsey Noble, International Student Advisor, on [email protected]. Funding/Scholarships Any funding/scholarships which the student is to receive must be added to their CAS. Students are required to demonstrate that they have sufficient funds to cover their tuition fees for the year as well as their living costs. Proof of funding/scholarships will be accepted in lieu of this or reduces the amount students have to show in other evidence so must be included in the CAS.

3 If the student has provided evidence of funding before their offer has been made unconditional then the School should upload this to the students ACD record and add a note confirming that evidence of funding has been uploaded to the record in the Application Notes section of the ACD screen. If the student has provided evidence of funding after their offer has been made unconditional then the nominated School contact should complete the steps above and also the Admissions Office to confirm that this information has been added to the students ACD record. Please [email protected] and title your PGR CAS - Update. The Admissions team will then update the CAS if necessary. Tuition Fee/Accommodation Payments Any payments which the student has made towards their tuition fees or accommodation costs must be added to their CAS. Students are required to demonstrate that they have sufficient funds to cover their tuition fees for the year as well as their living costs. Pre-payment of fees reduces the amount students have to show in other evidence so must be included in the CAS. If a student contacts the School and asks for tuition fee or accommodation payments to be added to their CAS, then the nominated School contact should [email protected]. Please title the PGR CAS - Update, and provide details of the payment (i.e. amount paid and date of payment) in order for the Admissions Office to verify the payment and add this to the CAS. Please note that payments can only be added to the CAS once they have been verified on the Finance Channel. Passport If a student contacts the School as they have been issued with a new passport then the nominated School contact should [email protected] and title their PGR CAS - Update, confirming the students new passport number. The Admissions team will then update the CAS if necessary. PLEASE NOTE that a nominated person from each school will act as the main point of contact for all PGR CAS related queries. If Recruitment and Admissions staff have any questions regarding the information to go on a CAS, or requires additional supporting documentation to be provided, then they will get in touch with the nominated contact to request this information.

4 What Documents Do You Need? Acceptable and Unacceptable Documents In order for documents to be accepted, we expect them to be in certain formats, and contain certain information. Below are some examples of the correct documents that we are looking for, as well as those that we would not be able to accept. References In order to comply with university regulations, we require references to be on headed paper, dated within 6 months of making the application, signed, and where possible stamped. We would not accept references in Word document formats, however other formats such as PDF are perfectly acceptable. Where references are ed, these should come from academic addresses, not those such as hotmail or yahoo. An Unacceptable Reference: We would not be able to accept this reference as it is not on headed paper, is not dated, signed or stamped. It is also on a word document, which we do not accept as they are easily altered.

5 An Acceptable Reference: We would be happy to accept this as it is on headed paper, signed, stamped and dated. It is also in PDF format.

6 CRTC 26/06/13 - PAPER E Academic Transcript An academic transcript outlines all of the individual courses which an applicant has studied, and the grades which they received. We cannot accept web-links, screen shots or online print outs. Instead, we need the official document issued by the applicant s university. These are commonly on headed paper and stamped and signed by the issuing department. Before an unconditional offer can be made we require a transcript which details the full duration of the applicants degree. If the transcript is not in English, we will require both the original document and a certified English translation. For the translation to be official it should be stamped and signed by the institution which translating it. We cannot accept translations made by the applicant themselves. An Unacceptable Transcript: This transcript would not be accepted as it has been printed from the student s online portal. It also does not have the results for the student s final year. Although we can accept partial transcripts (if officially produced by the university), we cannot issue an unconditional offer without the full transcript.

7 An Acceptable Transcript: We would accept this as it has the university logo on it, is signed and details all courses taken and grades.

8 Degree certificates: We require to see the final certificate issued to the applicants at the end of their degree, confirming their award. If their degree certificate is not in English, we will require both the original document and a certified English translation. For the translation to be official it should be stamped and signed by the institution which translating it. We cannot accept translations made by the applicant themselves. An Unacceptable (Provisional) Degree Certificate: We would not accept this as it is not an official degree certificate. Provisional degree certificates cannot be accepted in lieu of an official degree certificate as they are only valid on a temporary basis and are available before the official degree certificate has been awarded.

9 CRTC 26/06/13 - PAPER E An Acceptable Degree Certificate: This would be acceptable as it has the university logo on it, is signed, and confirms the name of the student, name of the course and the grade of award.

10 An Acceptable Degree and Graduation Certificate from China (With translations & official certification): Please note that students who completed a degree in China are presented with both a Graduation certificate and a Bachelor s degree certificate. You should request both documents, both the original version in Chinese and a certified English translation. The Graduation certificate confirms that they have successfully completed their course of study, but we also require the Bachelor s degree certificate to confirm that they were actually awarded a Bachelor s degree. The same would apply for students who completed a Master s degree from China.

11 Documents in Lieu of the Final Degree Certificate If a student has successfully completed a course of study but will not receive their final degree certificate before the course start date they may submit an academic transcript issued by their university instead of this, provided it includes all the information below. In order to fulfil the UKBA requirements, the transcript must contain the following details: Students name Name of the Academic Institution and Course Title Confirmation of the Award Confirmation that the degree has been awarded We cannot accept a letter from a University confirming that the degree has been awarded as this is not accepted by the UKBA. English Language Requirements Students must submit a copy of the original certificate issued from the awarding body. We cannot log into online systems in lieu of this, or receive online screen shots or print out. In the case of international students, we advise that this is particularly important as the UK Border Agency will not accept anything less than the original documents and their visa cannot be issued without it as they are required to submit this with their other supporting documents to the UKBA. Please see the link below as an example of the certificate required:

12 COLLEGE of SCIENCE and ENGINEERING Management of Confirmation of Acceptance for Studies (CAS) - CASs to Support Student Visa Extension Submissions These guidelines show the steps that CAS providers must take to create, communicate and manage CAS information for current full-time non-eu non-eea international students seeking to extend their Tier 4 student visa to complete their studies at the University of Edinburgh. For Doctoral and MPhil research students the period of studies includes a 12 month period allowed for writing up their theses, together with an additional 4 months to allow for expected post-viva correction work. --- STEPS 1 & 2: TO BE COMPLETED BY SCHOOL STAFF Step 1 Requesting a CAS Current international students should contact their School Office for a CAS no earlier than 6 months prior to their visa expiry date and no later than fifteen working days prior to their visa expiry date. Any student who makes this request directly to the College Office will be advised to contact their Teaching Organisation Administrator. Where an extension of study has been granted but the CAS extension not required within the following 6 months, it is the School s responsibility to retain this information on record and request the CAS at the appropriate time as stated above. If the CAS extension is requested before the six month time period then the College Office will not process the CAS and the onus placed back on the School to request this at the appropriate time. A CAS should not be issued if the student is completing courses which are assessment only as there is no formal requirement to attend the University. As best practice a CAS should not be issued to a research student once they have completed their viva as additional time has already been included in the original visa for corrections; as such this extension must be specifically requested by the School. A copy of the student s passport should be checked prior to the CAS being requested as the visa only needs to be issued if the previous visa has been cancelled, in which case the passport will state that this has been cancelled, or if the visa has reached the end of the time limit. For Masters students an extension should only be granted where the student has genuine medical or exceptional circumstances during which they returned to their home country throughout their leave of absence.

13 Completing the proforma It is the Schools responsibility to collate the following information using the CAS extension proforma which can be downloaded from the Recruitment and Admissions Wiki page. Required Information Applicants UUN Formal approval of extension (from College Learning and Teaching Committee or senior representative in school) Clear explanation of why extension is required Evidence of sound academic standard/academic progression New end date of programme/length of required extension (For PhD students this should include an additional 4 months) Tuition fees Tuition Fees paid to date Accommodation Fees paid to date Evidence of sound financial standing/no outstanding debts within the University Placement will the student be required to go on placement during their remaining length of study? Confirmation that applicant adheres to UKBA length of stay timelines PhD students only has the student completed their viva? Required Supporting Documents Copy of passport Copy of existing visa, including date of expiry ATAS certificate (if applicable) Evidence of any pre-payments (e.g. fees/accommodation) Any request which does not include all the required paperwork will result in non-issue of the CAS and will be returned to the relevant school for completion. Step 2 - Check Student Finance CRTC 26/06/13 - PAPER E A CAS should only be issued to a student who has no outstanding debts. If any money is due to the University then the student must pay this before the CAS can be issued. Using the student s UUN, check the student s financial record in the Student Finance Channel. The SFC is available via MyEd once the Finance Dept. gives you access. The SFC will show: (a) Tuition fee value sought (including any additional programme costs) (b) Tuition fee amount paid (including amount paid by scholarships) (c) Tuition fee amount outstanding (d) Accommodation fee value sought (e) Accommodation fee amount paid (f) Accommodation fee amount outstanding. For details about using the SFC see Please specify whether the payment is for tuition fee deposits, other tuition fee payment, accommodation deposit or other accommodation payment. Any queries regarding student debts can be referred to Helen Adam in the Finance team; she will confirm whether the student can be issued with a CAS. If the student confirms that they have made a payment towards University accommodation then contact the Accommodation Office directly to confirm amount paid or request a copy of the students receipt confirming the payment. All the above information should now be passed to the Admissions Office by for the issuing of the CAS at [email protected]. Please title your CAS Extension Request.

14 STEPS 3-6: TO BE COMPLETED BY COLLEGE OFFICE STAFF CRTC 26/06/13 - PAPER E Step 3 Completing the UKBA SMS form CASs for current students seeking visa extensions need to be provided manually through the UKBA s on-line Sponsor Management System (SMS) to obtain Confirmation of Acceptance for Studies (CAS) rather than through EUCLID. If the student requires a visa but has never been issued one by the University then you should request a new VCR record be created through EUCLID by contacting SACS Managed Migration Support on [email protected]. To create a new single CAS: Select: Students - Create CAS - Create a new single CAS Next Complete the following sections on the CAS: o Student Details: o Family name o Given name(s) o Date of birth o Gender o Nationality o Place of birth o Country of birth o Passport number o Offer Details: o Course title Enter full course title, i.e. BSc (Hons) Chemistry o Course level Input the qualification level in terms of an SCQF level according to the qualification sought. The available SCQF levels are shown as a drop-down list in the UKBA s SMS: Bachelors Ordinary: SCQF Level 9 Bachelors Honours: SCQF Level 10 Masters (inc MPhil): SCQF Level 11 Doctoral: SCQF Level 12. o Course start date This should either be the date that the student is due to recommence their studies after a leave of absence OR the date that the students current visa expires OR if the visa is required immediately today or tomorrows date. o Course end date As noted by the School on the Proforma, although this can also be confirmed on the Students EUCLID record. o Hours per week 0 this will automatically populate as full-time o Tick if the course requires an Academic Technology Approval Scheme (ATAS) certificate. o Pre-stored Address UoE o Evidence Provided: o Is SELT required Not Required as student is continuing their studies o Reason not required Higher Education Institution (HEI) has made assessment o Tick if a previous student o Previous course level As an extender this would normally be the same level as

15 entered above unless student is changing course to a Masters level programme o Is current course higher, lower or at the same level as the previous course? Same, unless student is changing course to a Masters level programme o If the same or lower supply justification text The University of Edinburgh has assessed this student's suitability to complete the course on the basis of satisfactory progress and attendance to date. o o o Accommodation and Fees o Course fees charged for first year of the course (in pounds sterling) o Boarding or accommodation fees charged for the first year or current year (in pounds sterling) Can be left blank if unknown o Accommodation fees paid to date Can be left blank if unknown Work Placement Details o Tick if the applicant is undertaking a work placement as part of the course o Percentage of course undertaken as work placement optional field so ignore o Work placement address (if known) Can be left blank if unknown Save & Assign CAS. A copy of the payment confirmation should be printed for our records. Step 4 - Add Sponsors Notes Go back into the assign part of the SMS and, using the student s CAS number to select the correct SMS record, use the SMS Sponsorship Duties part to update text for sponsors notes. Funding/scholarships If the student has a scholarship confirmation of this should be added here. Example text: If the scholarship is a UoE scholarship (i.e. we can verify the bona fides): "The university pays fees of x and an annual maintenance of y" If the scholarship is another sort (i.e. the applicant tells us that they have a scholarship, but we have no direct proof): "The applicant informs us that s/he has a scholarship which pays fees of x and an annual maintenance of y" Industrial Placement If the student will be on placement during their studies then add the following statement: Work placement details to be confirmed. Doctoral or MPhil writing up year If the CAS is for a student on a Doctoral or MPhil programme then add words that explain about the writing up year: A typical sponsor s notes entry might say: Course started 1 Oct 08. The programme includes an additional 12 months, within which the student is still at the university full time and writing up the research thesis in preparation for examination submission. Step 5 Download & a PDF copy of the CAS Go back to the Students section of the SMS and choose View CAS. If you know the students CAS number, select Find by CAS number, otherwise select Search for single CAS. If your search identifies more than one CAS, select the required CAS and click Next or click Back to refine your

16 search. Scroll to the bottom of the CAS screen. To produce a PDF version of the CAS, choose Print. A file download dialogue box will appear, from which you can choose to save the PDF file to your own records. (Step by step instructions on how to complete this process can be downloaded as a separate attachment from the Recruitment and Admissions Wiki page.) This document should now be ed to the student with the appropriate School contact copied in for their records. Please also advise students to contact the International Office for help completing their visa extension form and refer them to the International Office web site guidance for students extending visas, at: Step 6 (if required) Update CAS Students may respond to CAS s by providing updated information, e.g. changes to passport details or additional fees paid. The text fields in live CASs cannot be edited, but if any of the previously submitted information is incorrect, then CAS creators can add a sponsor note to the CAS via the SMS. As the CAS has been assigned and is now live, you will need to go to the Sponsorship duties menu to make any changes. Click the Sponsorship duties link. Click the Manage live CAS by CAS search link on the left side of the screen. You can use the simple or advanced search to find the CAS. The students CAS is displayed and you have scrolled down to the end of the record. Click on the Sponsor note button. Click in the Sponsor note field. Once you are satisfied with the content of your note, you need to save it, which will submit the note to the UK Border Agency. Click on the Save button. Your note has been saved. Click on the OK button. Tuition or accommodation fees can be updated via the Manage Live CAS SMS function. CRTC 26/06/13 - PAPER E When the CAS update is complete, download a PDF copy of the CAS as outlined in Step 5 and send an to the extender showing the updated CAS details.

17 COLLEGE of SCIENCE and ENGINEERING CAS EXTENSION PROFORMA Information Required To be completed 1. Applicant UUN 2. Has the student received formal approval of extension (from College Learning and Teaching Committee or senior representative in school) 3. Clear explanation of why extension is required 4. Evidence of sound academic standard/academic progression 5. New end date of programme/length of required extension (For PhD students this should include an additional 4 months) 6. Tuition fees 7. Tuition Fees paid to date 8. Accommodation Fees paid to date 9. Evidence of sound financial standing/no outstanding debts within the University 10. Placement will the student be required to go on placement during their remaining length of study? 11. Confirmation that applicant adheres to UKBA length of stay timelines 12. PhD students only has the student completed their viva? Documentation Required (check box if provided) Copy of passport Copy of existing visa, including date of expiry ATAS certificate (if applicable) Evidence of any pre-payments (e.g. fees/accommodation) Name: Date: Please note that all paperwork must be supplied no earlier than six months prior to the visa expiry date and no later than fifteen working days prior to the visa expiry date. Any request which does not have all the required paperwork will result in non-issue of the CAS and will be returned to the relevant school for completion.