Year 12 - 2024/25 - Support, Discussion and Looking After Each Other (Thread 2)

That’s great @ComingInByAnsible! From indecision to certainty in a few hours is a very successful day’s work.

He probably has lots to work with for the TSA, but just to say that when helping prep for it in the past I have found The Ultimate TSA Collection (from Amazon) to be a useful resource. Not perfect, mind - when using the 2023 version we found several errors in the multiple choice answers. But if you’re able to spot the errors, I guess that’s a sign you’re on track with the prep!

Best of luck to him.

Catching up with the thread, it’s moving fast!

Well, the Oxford open day did it - finally DS is enthusiastic about uni and finally he knows what and where he wants to study. He seems to have gone from complete indecision to complete certainly within a matter of hours.

The trouble is, it’s PPE at Oxford so the chances of actually getting in are miniscule.

Such exciting summer plans for many on this thread. Nepal and amazing courses and work experience - wow! We are just doing the usual travel to see family, but otherwise it’s going to be a busy summer for DS completing his NEAs, learning to drive, and now practicing the TSA.

DS seems to have missed the boat with work experience due to us moving house at the crucial time earlier in the year, so it doesn’t look like it will happen this summer.

Not long until the summer hols now. We were in Portugal this time last year. I'm so looking forward to term time holidays again!

DS has no real plans for the summer. He is 17 on 28th and we are on holiday for the first 2 weeks of August.

Jobs here are pretty impossible, he has applied for all sorts and no joy.

I might see if I can persuade him to do some volunteering just to get a bit of work experience for his CV/UCAS.
I also want him to do some general life skills stuff while he is off and we are at work. Cooking once a week and knowing what ingredients he needs , doing some laundry, etc. He can do all of these but rarely does so I think a plan will be needed

Have you/DD thought of Surrey @wonderstuff ? The offer is AAB but if the student has A Level Economics or Maths it's reduced to ABB. Economics BSc (Hons) degree course 2026 entry | University of Surrey

It's very well regarded (Top 20 in CUG).

I have heard that some Economics degrees are more maths than economics so if you daughter is less keen on Maths she would need to check the course contents. Or maybe an Economics mix like Economics and Finance (or Management)? She has her gap year planned so can apply with grades in hand if necessary (as you say).

Thank you @JessyCarr , it feels like the more advice we get the more confusing it becomes! She wants to study economics, which is her strongest A and the one she enjoys most. Maths is her weakest, which is currently C/B borderline, she doesn’t love pure maths but does enjoy stats and mechanics. We went to Brighton Uni a couple weeks back and DSIL thinks ‘she can do better than bloody Brighton’ and has had her head of economics send a list of top unis with courses that are within reach based on lowest grades accepted last year. Liverpool and Lancaster are the only ones that were on dd list and dsil list. DSIL is on the senior team at Lancaster, which does look like a solid choice, but it’s a really long way away and I don’t want dd picking a uni just because her aunt is there. Anyway she’s taking a year out, so we’ve time and she could apply again next year with her achieved grades. Just would be good to get an application in while college can support her. Seems like such an enormous decision, but I’m sure whatever happens she’ll be fine.

DH worries about her setting her heart on a high tariff uni and being disappointed, but I am trying to encourage her to aim as high as she wants.

@wonderstuff RG shouldn’t really be used as a deciding factor for an undergraduate’s choices. The Russell Group is a self-selecting group of research-led universities who do some joint marketing and campaigning under the RG brand in addition to their individual brands. There are plenty of excellent universities which are not members of that group, and the quality of the undergraduate experience (and subsequent employability) doesn’t turn on whether their university is in the group or not.

Unhelpfully, some schools use RG as a proxy for “elite UK university” in their reporting of student destinations, which wrongly gives the impression that non-RG institutions are in a lower tier.

Which subject is she planning to apply for? Rankings in the Times/Sunday Times Guide or Complete University Guide tend to be the most helpful, I think. The Guardian’s rankings can be a bit out of step.

Just catching up, hard to keep up with this thread! We don’t have many plans for summer, a few nights in Aberystwyth catching up with family, and potentially a northern universities tour, dd had a list of unis to look at, she shared it with dsil, an academic, who felt she should be aiming higher, and now it’s a different, longer, list, however predicted grades have come back slightly different to expected, so who knows? She thought ABB with A in economics, it’s ABB but the A is psychology, which doesn’t really track with her grades so far, she thinks predicted A in economics would be fair, and that’s her best subject. This leaves her potentially looking at quite a few RG universities. What this means in not really sure, does RG make a big difference? There’s certainly a big gap between the grade tariffs and the rest. So anyway still no closer to knowing what to put on her UCAS form.

So glad you had a good visit to Oxford @Countrylife2002. Which colleges did you see?

Oxford open day was amazing. Tough months ahead as dd makes her application. It would never have been remotely my thing but gosh I can see dd there.

sigh

DD has just given up her job. I’m glad actually because she needs a rest plus has a lot to do over the summer with coursework/personal statement/Oxford prep and also has exams the first week back! It looks a lot easier to get casual work once she’s 18 so hopefully she can work next summer.
We’ve a week away and she’s also going to Reading.

We don’t have plans for the summer - funds are a bit tight this year.

ds will have a week of work experience and a few days away camping with friends. He’ll do some gardening work for his grandad and some of his friends and get paid for that (usually quite generously!) then needs to knuckle down with MAT preparation and thinking about his personal statement.

Nepal, and the French lessons sound amazing!

Rent for the 'rents is the lowest on the list of priorities @JustHereWithMyPopcorn ! Glad he is settling in well.

Your son is clearly very committed @SilverBlue56 The school wouldn't have considered taking him if they felt he wouldn't be able to cope well with the trip. I understand that none of this eases your concerns though.

DS is at Wimbledon today with one of his tennis club friends. Even via the club he works for Wimbledon tickets are hard to get - they are allocated a certain number by the LTA and then have an internal ballot - this is the first time DS has managed to get one. I think today may end up being the highlight of his summer.

Indeed @bibliomania - 3 big Uni's here too. I think 18 is easier for part time jobs, they can sell alcohol.

Blimey, some very grand summer plans! We expect to do lots of chilling with a week of family holiday in Austria added in. I will fail to remember most of my German and DD2 will pretend she did not do German GCSE 😁 I expect her to do lots of art, as that is her passion, and some reading. Roll on the summer hols...

@GirlsInGreen , it's important for them to work out what not to do too. Here it seems to be teens in the villages around the city who have been able to pick up jobs more easily - we have 2 universities in a small city and maybe the students get the city centre jobs. Or maybe DD hasn't tried hard enough.... But they can't do everything.

@bibliomania - my one looks shattered & is rake thin despite eating like a horse. A good rest is just the order. DD has been really disciplined about sleep & no tech, she's knows she'll crash otherwise.
My one wouldn't do DofE - its hard going isn't it? No luck here on the PT job front either, what happened to all the Saturday jobs?🙁

@Waspie its going so well he's already bought himself a new phone and looking at upgrading his car - all after a week there. Of course there's no sign of contributing to his household costs though! 😂

No real holiday this year as (a) I'm broke and (b) I can't see when we'd manage it. DD has the DoE Silver expedition, a 2-week work experience, driving lessons plus we'll spend a week with extended family. The rest of the time she wants to hang out with her boyfriend and friends. I would like her to get a PT job, but she's tried and hasn't had much luck and tbf she has been doing a lot.

They are spending a day in Kathmandu then travelling to Pokhara (by road not air) and then driving out to a new school site to do work for the Pahar Trust for a few days and then off trekking to Australian base camp, back to Pokhara and then return to Kathmandu for another night before coming home. 15 days total, flying via Istanbul. 😬

School have tried reassuring me that's it's fine because the insurance is great and if anything happens they'll fly me out there but I am disabled and wouldn't be able to go, someone else from my family would have to.

I know he will probably have the time of his life but the roads, crowds and water situation is giving me the fear. He doesn't know how stressed I am, fortunately he is quite oblivious to the suffering of his mother 🤣

He's been training for the trek for 6 months but is very much a computer in the bedroom kind of teen generally. Argh.

Oxford do seem to enjoy these unusual combinations of subjects @JustHereWithMyPopcorn Good to have your son's work experience confirmed. I'm sure he'll enjoy it. How is your DS1's new job going?

Aw @SilverBlue56 whilst it's hard on you your DS will have the time of his life and have memories and stories forever. What an amazing experience. The teachers and staff will not let anything happen to him. The worst thing will be that he potentially wears the same pair of socks for a fortnight!

That sounds like my sort of London city break too @GirlsInGreen - enjoy!

Four language GCSE's is so rare; your DD is lucky. My son took GCSE Mandarin. We were in Oxford yesterday and got caught up in a group of Chinese tourists all talking very animatedly. Once we had escaped I, jokingly, asked DS what they had been speaking about. He looked down his nose at me and said "How would I know, I didn't learn Cantonese" as if I would know the difference😂

I'm sure your daughter will find some time for friends and socialising and have a lovely summer@bluefineliner

Blimey @GirlsInGreen 4 languages?? I could barely manage French at school! 😂

@SilverBlue56 Nepal sounds amazing, what will they be doing there? It's horrible letting he go off on these trips without us but I am sure the school will have everything planned down to a T. It won't stop the worry I know.

Nepal @SilverBlue56 trip of a life time! No doubt he will be fine, best attitude to have - roll with😁.
For a first time abroad alone - brilliant.

My son is about to go to Nepal with school (missing the last week, and taking up first week of the holidays) 😫

I am internally beside myself and have had a terrible headache for 5 days, and he hasn't even gone yet.

Never been abroad, autistic, and yet seemingly chilled about hiking at altitude. Roll on July 26th.

@JustHereWithMyPopcorn - I dont think so, its not a residential, we've booked a bouji little flat in Marleybone - she'll be in class & I'm flitting between Nat portrait gallery/winebars/British Museum for the week😁 - thats the plan anyway!

She was very privileged to be able to do 4 languages for gcse at her school, although shes only taken one (latin) to A level.

Deffo not regaling her with tales of biker boyfriends😂 - the girl is a rapscallion as it is!