Introduction

Admissions is a critical function of the University, and the supporting systems and processes play a key role in helping institutions achieve their strategic goals. With decades of experience in the sector, Tribal remains at the forefront of developing innovative admissions solutions.

Context

The sector has seen increasing demand for domestic University places since 2006. UCAS projects a cohort of 1 million applicants by 2030, with each student able to submit up to 5 applications. The sector is therefore facing upwards of 5 million UCAS applications needing to be processed each year.

This demand intensified post COVID-19, as we saw the counter-cyclical enrolment phenomenon take effect; in the same manner we did post 2008, albeit with greater intensity. The mean reversion of this effect created the impression of reducing demand, conflated with concern about the ‘cost-of-living crisis’. Since the 2023 cycle, it is evident that domestic demand is resuming its upward trajectory. This can be seen as reflecting the net benefit of University to individuals and the state.

International demand also rebounded significantly post COVID-19, with the number of sponsored study visas issued rising by 50% between 2020 and 2024, despite the change to dependant visa rules. Each of these issued visas will be accompanied by multiple University applications.

UK Universities are facing financial pressures from a combination of inflation and fixed domestic tuition fees. This squeeze has created a sector-wide reliance on international student fees to cross subsidise domestic. Leading to institutions restructuring to match these financial circumstances, and the closure of less profitable courses.

The Labour Government support of increasing domestic tuition fees by £285 per annum (a 3% increase in the total tuition revenue for sector), whilst welcome, is unlikely to change this reliance significantly in the future.

This operating environment creates a focus within admissions teams on operational efficiency and conversion of applications. Specifically, to control the cost associated with processing increasing numbers of applications, and to create a student experience akin to the modern digital consumer experience expected by a 21st century cohort.

Tribal Admissions

Tribal Admissions is a SaaS admissions system, where many known and loved traditional admissions concepts are preserved and improved upon; desk and folder structures, clearance checks and document placeholders for example. In addition, new concepts and tooling help focus on increasing the number of applications admissions staff can process, without creating burn out or unmanageable levels of daily cognitive load.

The fundamentals of Tribal Admissions are all designed to increase efficiency:

Configuration - Intuitively create supported business logic workflows, application routing and applicant communication

The system has baked into the software definitions of entities and processes; enabling configuration of site-specific nuance of automated workflows and business logic to eliminate repetitive, manual tasks and to do so at scale with bulk actions.

This ‘goldilocks zone’ of configuration makes supporting the software possible without compromising an institution’s need for tailoring configuration to niche use cases. . The simplicity of the configuration allows for nominated admissions users to own the management of configurations to best suit the needs as they change with externalities and priorities.

Platform - Shipping code at the same rate as leading video content providers, with 99.9% uptime

The SaaS application build means there is no system downtime or upgrade disruption. The system is delivered on-the-go, with new features released on best-practice multiple environments; creating options on pace of adopting new features as they are delivered. The admissions platform enabling this is covered, which means you can trust the secure delivery and support needed for a critical system.

This also means critical local expertise is free to focus on the backlog of requests without factoring in the opportunity cost of admissions.

Integration - Simplify integration with 300+ APIs and events

Interoperability is a core design pillar of Tribal Admissions, using extensively documented, secure and performant, event driven API frameworks adhering to industry standards; allows easy integration with other systems, enabling notification of changes to application statuses simply and reliably.

Enabling more personalised and focussed marketing communications throughout the applicant journey within a CRM. Alongside key SITS integrations and other point solutions within an institution’s ecosystem.

These same APIs are available through the Power Automate connector - allowing citizen developed extensions into Teams, SharePoint and other Microsoft applications. Creating a diverse set of tools for reacting to unforeseen site specific or temporary requirements that occur during an admissions cycle.

Operations - Increase the speed of coming to decisions on applications by 16x

Enhancing operational efficiency—particularly by increasing the number of applications an admissions team can process—has been a core focus in the design and development of Tribal Admissions. Its capabilities are organised into three main categories: Administrative, Evaluation and Decision, and Communication.

The Administrative category features tools that drive efficiency through optimised application sorting, data management, and verification. A key feature is the Desk and Folders solution, designed with workflow and vertical security capabilities. This solution enables customers to establish a flexible, easy-to-configure processing structure for automated work allocation and sorting, with controlling access to applications or specific parts of applications as needed. This adaptability provides customers with the agility to manage resources efficiently and remain fluid in response to changing demands.

Other notable efficiency features in Tribal Admissions include Desk Action Management, which enables users to identify, access, and address specific types of outstanding tasks in bulk. This is especially beneficial and time saving when using temporary staff assigned to handle applications with specific or limited set of outstanding issues. Additionally, document intelligence tools with data extraction and comparison capabilities are being developed to streamline data management and verification, further enhancing overall processing efficiency.

At the core of the Evaluation and Decision capability is the ‘decision engine’; a knowledge repository that enables the codification of evaluation rules, allowing for automation of the decision-making process. Universities can control the level of automation, and the complexity of rules applied, providing a scalable solution that can be customised to align with departmental, cohort, or other requirements. This automation and flexibility empowers institutions to tailor the admissions process to operate more efficiently.

Beyond automated and multilingual communication, through email and letter generation the Communication efficiency capabilities focus on tracking and managing tasks. These features, developed following a task-focused design principle, prioritise components that help users to complete tasks efficiently. Key features include task creation and tracking, where users and other actors have easy, timely access to information on what needs to be done; once completed, tasks are automatically closed. This task-centric and, soon, more data-driven approach lays the foundation for predictive and prescriptive analytics to further enhance efficiency in the future.

Smaller UX-focused features also play a crucial role; for instance, the dynamically generated interfaces which will only display the specific documents that the applicant need to provide, reducing wasted effort and the need for follow-ups on missing documents and creating substantial efficiency gains for admissions teams.

What’s Next

By adopting Tribal Admissions, Universities position themselves at the forefront of admissions innovation—optimising workflows, cutting costs, and delivering a modern, applicant-centric experience.

We have a limited number of spaces on our early-adopter programme - join us and drive tangible, lasting change within your institution’s admissions operations.