To think that 4 G.C.S.E's needed to do business studies is ridiculous

[magicalmadmadamim]

My eldest DS is 16 and been at college since September. He has 2 G.C.S.E equivalent certificates in English and Maths.
I'm sure back when I was in college business studies was always a foundation course?
He really wanted to do business studies and they have put him on some really rubbish courses that he is super bored with.
Is it me or is education getting much harder now?
Hardly any of his school friends passed any g.c.s.e's :(

Summer babies even out way before GCSE level. And no, teenagers are not overgrown children, theyre young adults who have accountability for their choices. If you talk to your son this way- excusing away his poor behavior and making him the victim in everything rather than the architect of his own life- youre doing him no favors at all.

Just tell him to work hard even if its boring to get what he needs to move on to the next level.

Being underprivileged is not a character defect or an insult. Most people would have more time for a child who came from a deprived background but did their best under difficult circumstances than a child who had everything they needed to succeed and failed due to bad attitude.

Back in my day you needed a minimum of 4 passes to do anything.

This is incredibly patronising. You are stereotyping this person who’s just asking for a bit of advice. Does it make you feel better about yourself?

Just to add to the OP: your son doesn’t need a business qualification to run his business. He’ll probably learn more by just doing the research himself. I think it it’s unfair that he isn’t able to do the course he wants, as usually people exceed in their personal interests. But if he can prove himself in the other subjects, he’ll probably have more of a leg to stand on when asking to switch

This makes sense.

So he just has to put up with it being too easy for a few more months (will he finish in June - that really isn’t long at all) and the he can do the course he wants?

If he struggled all these years in the school environment then doing a course that is a bit easy will probably be good for his confidence.

What he needs to do is two things:-

1. Confirm what he needs to do in this year’s course to get on the Level 2 Business Studies
2. Get his head down and absolutely smash the course.

If anything I think that is a low requirement
Places on all courses are limited to a certain number. It is completely reasonable that a college put a minimum requirement on entry. It is partly to ensure that the people they allow to take the course will commit to the necessary work.
Maybe now he is away from the group of non achievers he can play catch up with his qualifications.

Of course not …but white working class/ lower socio-economic status boys are currently the lowest performing ethnic group in the uk ( excluding gypsy/roma /traveller boys), consistently underperforming and with, on average, only 1/3 passing GCSE maths and English. It does lock you out from many opportunities.

Most colleges don't have the resources to offer actual GCSE retakes in individual subjects other than maths and English and in certain circumstances, Science. Hence why they offer a range of Level 1 and Level 2 Awards and diplomas instead.

I taught many summer-born teenagers who worked hard and did brilliantly. In a couple of decades of teaching, I can remember very few Year 11s who got themselves excluded before exams. Exclusion was in itself a very drawn-out and difficult process. Students who brought knives to school weren't permanently excluded. Students came back after violence and drugs. Certainly no one ever got excluded for harmless 'teenage horseplay'. Most students, whenever their birthday, stay in school and pass some exams. Those who make mistakes and bad choices need to prove themselves when they move on. The college need to see what he's capable of, and his boredom and frustration now is the result of his past behaviour. He's better off accepting this than complaining, and using it to help him learn to make better choices in the future. His previous ones are much more serious than most silly teenage behaviour.

OP, the issue is that if your son is not from a deprived background, and you say he is not, then two GCSEs is a very poor tally. Why would a college risk overloading someone who only managed two basic GCSEs last time?

If your ds wants to do something more advanced, he needs to prove he is capable, which means knuckling down, aceing the course that is 'too easy' and showing them that he is up to understanding the higher level.

Business studies is not an easy choice, it involves some elements of accounting, law, business strategy, economics and computing. Don't underestimate it.

Ah, summer baby... YES. My son too. Very youngest in his year. He is super bright with an amazing short term memory - he should have walked his GCSEs - and yet. He's definitely nowhere near as mature as his friends.

He did the bare minimum at GCSE and got 8 passes, mostly 5s, 4 in maths. Which is fine and enough to see him through to college, which was his objective and mantra when I was trying to motivate him to study harder. "I just need 5 4s - CHILL BRO!" The bigger picture was not something he could grasp.

Now he's just applied for university and realised the red bricks are out of reach because of his GCSEs. He's also applying for degree apprenticeships and horribly aware that he's likely to not even be considered to enter the race despite his decent prediction of 144 UCAS points, because there's so much competition. He didn't Fuck Around as much as your son ;-), but is Finding Out nonetheless. He's ready to learn now, but the system isn't set up for kids like him and I too really wish I'd kept him back a year.

It used to really worry me because I was SUCH a try hard at school, but now I see that he will find his way, and it will be fine. Probably.

So are you saying that all children or teens who slip up, and it was a slip up, are from a so called deprived background and only the very well off are clever and well behaved?
What a load of narrow minded mumsnet shite

Summer baby? Jeez - he needs to own his mistakes thus far and deal with it, and formulate a plan for the future. Not be told it’s always someone/something else’s fault that he isn’t where he wants to be.

"Most of the people in his year group" Really? Is that a bit like my 10 year old telling me everyone else in her class has their ears pierced?! He's either at a ridiculously underperforming and challenging school or he has very gullible parents!

He needs to prove to a future employer that he has the ability to think, focus and achieve. Exam results are one way of doing that. He hasn't got that so he has to find another way to demonstrate that he can be a good employee. Can he get an apprenticeship or a junior role? Jobs in places like McDonalds or Tesco can teach you loads about customer service. business operations and the reality of work.

And yes, it's true, many successful people have no formal qualifications. They do have determination, drive and initiative. Arsing about and taking the easy option won't get your son anywhere.

So what did he actually do to get expelled @op ?
If you can't admit it to yourself you are hardly going to be able to get him to take responsibility for it.

We don't have to look far.

'Sadly he was expelled a few weeks before his exams which IMO was completely out of order. It wasn't worth expulsion at all.'

You are imo an enabler

Not putting what level the Business studies course is gives you an F

Re-sits beckon, nothing wrong with that - or a different course

"Plus he is a summer baby which has never helped. I sometimes wonder if it would have been better holding him back a year."

That won't fly either OP. My ds is August born, and the middle of his class but he got 10 GCSEs.

The basic fact is your DS has to knuckle down and work. There is no other way.

if it helps i got expelled from my very very expensive private school just before A-levels. Which i hugely fucked up.

But because i come from a lovely MC background with supportive parents, and i am a hard and good worker, it actually didn't have that much of a negative impact on my life. I have gone about things the hard way, but i am where i should be and am ok with that.

Your son just needs to knuckle down and do the boring thing before he gets to do the interesting thing. It will not hurt him.

I don't think being a summer baby has any effect once they're past primary. You are making excuse after excuse for him.

Let me explain.
After his expulsion he was not allowed back except so sit his gcses. he did them but did not pass these.
During the last 2 months of term he attended a different school where he took the english and maths functional skills which we were told are gcse equivalent and liked by employers.

Come off it with the 'summer baby' guff, OP. I'm not sure that still counts when they're in high school.

(FWIW, my 'summer baby' (mid August), got 9 GCSEs, 3 A-levels and graduated from university with a 2:1).

4 GCSEs at a grade 4 plus is a pretty basic requirement. Our local college requires average of 5 over 5 best results including maths and english to get on a level 3 course. If you want to do level 2 and you don't have maths and English you have to do them alongside your level 2 qualification.

@magicalmadmadamim it’s not the expulsion that caused him to fail his GCSEs….

Nah I'm with her on this. I have a summer boy and the difference in his maturity is MARKED compared to his friends. His Reception year at school was a complete waste of time because he just was not ready to be in a formal setting like that. I assumed it would help him - it did not. When his friends hit 14 and were wanting to go and hang out at the park to look at their phones and grunt at girls, he was still packing footballs and frisbees and trying to get them to play and they were all, not in these trainers... He still isn't really interested in girls (his friends tell me this - I know he wouldn't necessarily tell his mum). Or boys. He is still very very silly and immature.

He really isn't on the same development path as his peers, and I'm just lucky that he's also quite an anxious kid so not at all inclined to take stupid risks, and he had good friends.

I don't think all summer babies are like this. But I know enough that have been, to know that summer baby is A Thing.

What's a summer baby got to do with it. Yes my son was behind at primary but then flew at GCSE, A Level - getting a first from Loughborough. Stop making excuses. He needs to understand that he needs to work and get some qualifications under his belt.