The day is good. The running of it is brutal.
six weeks of work that nobody was hired to do
Nothing here is a technology problem. It is a coordination problem that has been handed to whoever had capacity, and it repeats every single year.
Then a school asks why it got eleven.
this is running, right now, on this page
Every partner school gets a number, and every school can see exactly how that number was reached. Equity-weighted pro-rata: a share proportional to Year 11–12 cohort size, weighted toward regional schools, low-SES catchments and cohorts with a high share of first-in-family students, with a floor so no partner school gets a token seat. Move a weight below and watch all twenty-four schools redistribute. Select any row for its own arithmetic.
Allocation policy
Set once, published, changed through governance — not by a coordinator mid-round.
| School | Priority | Yr 11–12 | Asked | Even | Gets | vs even |
|---|
Three people, three jobs, one record.
nobody does anyone else's job, and nobody re-types anything
For the university
Run the event, not the mailbox- Configure the day once.Days, sessions, timings, room capacities and the per-room school limit. Change the shape and every timetable, dropdown and allocation re-derives.
- A defensible allocation.Published weights, a floor, a cap at what each school asked for, and the arithmetic visible to everyone. No discretionary calls to defend.
- Nominations arrive clean.Consent already checked at the school, students already matched to sessions, amendments tracked rather than emailed.
- Capacity you can act on.See which rooms are full with a waitlist behind them and which are at 60%, while there is still time to move something.
- The interest signal, kept.What every attending student said they were curious about, ready to shape what they hear next.
For the career advisor
The job, in one afternoon- Your cohort, uploaded once.Drop a CSV from your SIS. Bad rows are named and explained rather than silently dropped.
- Choose how your school runs it.Students pick their own sessions, or you build the groups from a dropdown. The tool changes shape around the decision.
- A fair way to choose.When twenty-two students want twenty-one places, you read their written answers side by side and score them, instead of going first-come.
- Consent in one click.Parents get their child's actual plan for the day and two buttons. A decline releases the place and tells you straight away.
- Your number, explained.The same arithmetic the university sees, for your school, ready for the conversation with your principal.
For the student
A day, not a form- No login, ever.A link from their own careers advisor opens straight into their own form. Nothing to remember, nothing to install.
- They build the day.Pick interests, choose a session in each block, join a waitlist if something is full. Live places remaining, so the choice is honest.
- They say why.A written answer that actually counts for something, rather than a race to register fastest.
- A one-pager to keep.Their day, hour by hour, printable and emailable to them and their parents.
- An answer either way.Students who miss out get a written reply and a reason to come and talk to their advisor — not silence.
Allocate, invite, apply, consent, confirm.
one chain, six weeks, no re-keying
A rule, not a judgement call
Cohort-proportional, weighted for access, floored so every partner school brings a real group, capped at what each school asked for, and settled to whole students so the total lands exactly.
What it saves you: the twenty defensive phone calls after the numbers go out.
One link each, parents copied
Magic link with no login, or link plus school email and student ID if your school's IT position needs it. The school chooses the rule; it takes effect immediately.
What it saves you: password resets for sixteen-year-olds who will not ask twice.
Ask them why, and mean it
Build the question set — long answer, short answer, multiple choice, scale — with word limits enforced as they type. Advisors read responses side by side and score for effort.
What it saves you: the first-come scramble, and the students it quietly excludes.
Built for minors, not bolted on
Parents receive their child's real timetable, the what-to-bring list and two buttons. Consent gates the nomination: no name reaches the university without it.
What it saves you: the form that came home in a bag and never came back.
Submitted, confirmed, amendable
The school sends one batch, the university confirms and the places are held. Late changes are normal, so amendments are a feature: what was added, what was withdrawn, re-queued.
What it saves you: the version-control argument in week five.
Written once, sent on time
Invitations, itineraries, consent requests, confirmations and outcome letters all generate from the same record — including a one-pager invite composed from the programme you actually built.
What it saves you: the last job on the list, done first.
The year, not the day.
Discovery Day is the first time most of these students set foot on a campus, and it is the point where a school partnership becomes a relationship rather than a mailing list. It sits alongside the moments UniLoop already covers.
What this page is. The allocation engine above is not a mock-up. It is the same rule that runs in the product, with the same twenty-four schools and the same numbers, computing in your browser as you move the sliders. Nothing is sent anywhere and no data leaves this file.
The full interactive demo — three working portals, live inboxes, consent, nominations and the invite generator — is one self-contained file we can send you, or walk you through live. A production deployment is the connected build: your event, your schools, your policy weights, your brand.
Bring us your allocation argument.
Tell us the school that rang last year to ask why it got eleven places. We will run your real cohort numbers through the rule on the call and show you the answer you would have been able to give.