To be sad DD might be limiting herself

[JanseyB]

I have twins, they are 17, in sixth form.
DD is on paper the more intelligent of the two, 8/9a at GCSE and predicted 2 A* and 2 As at a-level (French, German, Art and English). She is at a good local indie but the careers advisor seems to pay little attention to her (more interested in the Law, Medicine and Finance candidates).

DD has applied for Business/Management and German for uni. She's applied to Kings, UCL, Manchester, Bristol and Queen Mary, she has some offers back.

DD has now announced she wants to take a gap year, then maybe change her course of study all together. She has savings and will get some money for her 18th so she has said she wants to work and travel and figure it out.
DD actually wants to work in marketing but wants to do a degree related to foreign language as it's something she is naturally talented at.

DS is so much more put together, studying history then wants to do law and has a clear plan.

DD is saying she wants a gap year, 4 year (year abroad) undergrad then possibly marketing masters. Which just seems a bit chaotic.

She is so smart, I wasn't massively supportive of her A-level choices and I feel like we are going through it again. She got a bloody 9 in maths at GCSE and it feels such a waste to throw it away. She's also very sociable, likeable, sporty and works so hard, it just seems she's a bit lost?!

DH and I are both doctors, our path was quite clear and laid out from leaving school so I'm not sure how to approach this.

AIBU thinking she might be throwing it all away. How can I get her better careers advice when school aren't helping? She used to want to work in finance and I'm a little sad that over the last 2 years that has lost appeal to her!

Anyone here know a path that might suit DD, with her want of modern languages under grad and marking as a career with study abroad and gap years?

Gosh I’m rather glad you’re not my mum! She’s 17 and she’s not flaking out and deciding to make candles from earwax to sell at Glastonbury!

Loads of people take gap years, reassess their uni course choices and some even decide not to finish their course or not go in the first place! And do you know what, they do ok and some are extremely successful. There are some who are not but that also happens to people who go to university too!

From my personal experience I was forced into a uni course decision at 16 and made a hash of it that took a couple of years to unpick and damaged my mental health. I eventually went to uni and did well and I have a fantastic and well paid job. Is it what I thought I’d be doing when I was 16, no. Does it relate to my first degree choice, no. Give your child some space and love and support and let them make their own choices, otherwise you will have two burnt out people pleasing children that will resent you.

I did the degree my parents and teachers thought I “should” do. I hated it, got a 2.2, and am now doing something completely unrelated with much more relevance to the degree I should have done. Please don’t expect your daughter to follow a similar course in life to you, she must forge her own path, and the easiest way to do that is by following the things she is passionate about. Plus you’re talking like she wants to run away and join the circus, not take a year to earn money, study for two degrees and enter a respected profession at the other end! I think you need to chill a bit, frankly!

Totally agree with this.

I went straight from sixth form to uni, and I just did the subject that I was best at/most interested in. I don't exactly regret it as it was fascinating and I loved the degree, but I do think that a year out in the 'real world' before uni would probably have steered me into a more 'sensible' path of study and I'd be earning a lot more than I do right now!

She’s doing the very opposite of limiting herself — she’s keeping her options open. MFL are very desirable and Marketing is a perfectly respectable career path.

My mother could have written this about me (decades ago) except that I did what she and the school wanted and did double Maths A-level instead of French. Ruined my sixth form. You have to really LOVE Maths to do it at A-level.

My mother never understood my career. It sounds as if you, like her, think only the established professions are proper careers. But there are loads of really interesting opportunities in business, plus many more options for travel, sampling different sectors, etc.

If it was my daughter my main concern would be that she does what makes her happy. Your career choice is irrelevant. She has a plan. Let her live her life. If you don’t she will likely rebel.

I imagine she knows exactly what she wants to do but is avoiding telling you as she knows you’re judgmental and not supportive, as you have been with her previous choices.

Her plan sounds fine. It's just not the plan you'd have chosen. I did modern languages, have a Masters in Marketing, and now have a solid career that continues to progress.

Separate note - if your son wants to do law why is he doing history?

He’ll waste a year and massive expense doing GDL to cram the 7 modules into a year.

Better to do law undergrad to start with.

Taking a gap year is a great idea - gives them time to think, enjoy themselves, mature a bit so when they start uni they actually have had a taste of independence- you’ll push her away if you jerk trying to fit her in the box that you evolved her to get in to

OP, I was the kind of child you are talking about. Parents had a strong sense of what I should do. I stood my ground.

I'll tell you now, 30 years later it has had a ripple effect - which continues - on relationships with them and my Dsis, and my confidence professionally. I didn't settle to anything work wise in my 20s.

But I'm living my life, the life I chose and I'm very happy. And as it happens, I'm also very happy with the work I do

Thanks for this. My two are on very different paths, much like yours, and I worry for each equally (one no stability, the other no stories) but you are right, both have different paths which have different pros and cons. It would be worse if they both did what they thought they should do instead of what they want to do.

Op, it is your DD's life, let her live it.

Students who do languages degrees tend to grow up fast during their year abroad. You have to be quite switched on to work or study abroad in a foreign language and it is such a valuable year.

I did a language degree- the trick is to get onto a grad scheme afterwards. From my cohort there are lawyers, investment bankers, senior civil servants, academics, journalists, teachers and all sorts in between.

Marketing is equally well paid to medicine at senior levels (and probably better at junior/mid-level), and a lot more fun in most cases!

Really varied opportinties across different industries and some great perks from travel to events to just general corpoate benefits that you'd never get working for the NHS.

Medicine seems like a miserable life to me to be honest. I don't really understand why anybody would choose it - especially people academic enough to have their pick of careers!?

Law, I'd consider slightly better (in fact I really considered it as a career myself). Admittedly well paid from very early on, and generally top knotch corp benefits. But 20 years in, most of my Lawyer friends are, if not burnt out, then generally a bit miserable. All but one or two wish they'd done something else.

Your daughter sounds like she's got her head screwed on to me!

She sounds like she has a plan though and an idea for her career path. Tbh it sounds more like it’s a you problem because it’s the not career path you want for her.

"Throwing it all away" and "chaotic" are a bit dramatic. I'll suggest a plan that suits her - it's the one that she designed herself. Sounds like a fabulous plan to me. There's so much value in international travel and living abroad. It's her life, you need to respect her right to make her own decisions. I never had a plan, I ended up highly qualified and in a very successful career by following my immediate passions at every step. She sounds like she'll go far whatever she does.

Sounds like she does have a plan to me, maybe just not the same one you had in mind! She's even planning to fund the gap year herself! Let her go, I actually wish I'd done a gap year, I'm a July baby so did A levels when not even 18, looking back I don't think I was emotionally ready for uni! I ended up changing courses and have done well in the end and the change of direction made no difference in the grand scheme of things

I was very academic and excelled in both maths and English. I applied to Oxford to do Eng Lit but didn’t get in, so took a gap year and changed my mind and reapplied to do psychology elsewhere because it interested me more. I actually wanted to do media studies but my parents intervened because they thought it wasn’t a proper degree. Long story short, I now have a very rewarding (and pretty well paid) career in TV broadcasting which I love. My parents are proud of my
achievements now and pleased that I followed my own dreams. My mum even said she regrets not letting me do a media studies degree because it would have been fine as an entry path to what I do now. Anyway, if your DD is interested in marketing, definitely get her to set up work experience in a few places to see if it does appeal as that will help with her decision making. And since she is not at degree level yet, she has loads of time on her side. Getting a language degree will be v impressive on her CV and the experience of living abroad for a year will broaden her horizons. She sounds amazing and so well rounded, so you should be very proud of her.

Law is only well paid early on if you are in a major firm or a magic circle situation.

I'm a solicitor and retrained when I was 40. On my training contract i was paid £17 k. When I qualified I was paid £22 k. I am now 50 and earning £28 k as a divorce lawyer in a small regional firm. Our directors are on circa £60 and will never get higher than that.

This is compared with a friend of mine on the same course also retraining and roughly the same age. She got her training contract in a magic circle firm and trained on 60K. But my story is more the usual state of affairs than hers. She jumped ship though as soon as she qualified because she was burnt out to the point of being suicidal. She's now in a regional firm bored out of her skull doing conveyancing and earning under £40k.

Jeez the kid is only 17… let her live a little and choose her own path in life. Not everyone has to be like you.

I have one son in uni and the other is 18 and saving up to travel next year. I couldn’t be happier for him! Let them love their own life; it’s their life not yours

There is a lovely Dutch poem in which a mother tells her child “you can become everything you want in life , except unhappy” (sorry for the crappy translation but surely you get what i mean)

I was in this club of highly intelligent girls in secondary and only a few of them have “big” traditional careers now. Some of them became sahm, some have small parttime jobs next to their family, some travel over the world and work here and there… Being very intelligent does not necessarily mean you want to have a big career.

The education process and our parenting is about getting them to be confident, think for themselves and be independent.
Then they are, little buggers eh!
Cope with it Mum, suspend judgement till she is 30.
With Love OP honestly with love.

DD is saying she wants a gap year, 4 year (year abroad) undergrad then possibly marketing masters. Which just seems a bit chaotic.

That sounds like a reasonable plan. Why on earth do you think it sounds chaotic.

She sounds like she's not sure and that's OK. Better to take the time out now forn1 year and travel etc than after her degree where it would be more of a hindrance in-between jobs/ graduate schemes etc.

Let her take the year with the rough idea but on the strict instructions she needs to give it serious thought before uni in a years time. Sounds like she has the grades for the courses she'd need so a yesr out won't make much if a difference at this point.

I think being intelligent is more than being academic. The fact your DD is reflecting on what she really wants is a sign of intelligence and confidence in her own beliefs.

She does have a plan though but it just doesn’t align with yours.
As parent of a similarly bright daughter who has left uni mid way in year 3 as she’s burnt out, let her figure it out. My daughter was poorly advised re degree courses at school and chose something she was very good at (economics) but she now hates the degree as her heart isn’t in it. She’s achieving firsts in her exams but needed to stop and take stock. I wish she’d done that before uni and realised beforehand it wasn’t for her.