Sixth Formers across the country have received their A-Level results this morning, with 300,000 students finding out their grades.

The results were released simultaneously to colleges nationwide by exams boards.

As Clearing begins, the University of Leeds will be trying to prevent another student shortage, which has been a concern since the introduction of increased tuition fees in 2012.

At the time of writing, Leeds currently has 376 courses available in Clearing. This is comparably high to other Universities in Leeds’ ranking, such as the University of Birmingham which has 181 Clearing places available and the University of Sheffield which has 296.

Speaking before the results were released, a spokesperson for the University said: ‘We anticipate that the majority of our courses will have vacancies for students with good exam results.”

This year marks the third consecutive year that students receiving A grades has fallen slightly, from 26.3 per cent in 2013 to 26 per cent.

The overall pass rate has also declined, as for the first time in 32 years the number of students with an least an E grade has fallen.

However, there is a record proportion of papers that have been awarded an A*.

Sixth Former James Candler was one of the students expressing their elation, after discovering he had been accepted to the University of Leeds to study English Language and Literature: “I’m really excited, but also mostly just relieved at the moment.”

Talking about his reason for choosing Leeds, James said it was “partly because I knew it was a respected Uni, but mostly because I really liked the look and feel of the place. I thought Leeds would be a good place to live.”

UCAS, the nationwide admissions service, has released a statement saying that 396,990 students have so far been accepted on degree courses at UK universities, a figure 3% higher than this point last year.

Sean Hayes