AIBU to discourage my son from dropping GCSE art now?

[Bloomsburygirl]

My 15 year old DS wants to be a fashion designer. He is currently doing GCSE art but hates it. He loves designing fashions but dislikes painting, charcoal drawing etc. He wants to do A levels at King's Ely, but to get a place on the fashion and textiles course, he needs at least a 6 or above in GCSE art. They will consider a portfolio but only in exceptional circumstances. He has now decided he wants to drop GCSE art, despite the fact that King's Ely has pretty much said that the chances of him getting in without the required GCSEs are virtually non-existent. The fact that he has dropped art at this level will count against him, and entrance into the course is very competitive.

He has spent all Easter holidays working on one design, sometimes up to 10 hours per day. This is instead of doing his art portfolio. His other GCSE subjects are well on track - he is in the top sets for most of his subjects. AIBU to discourage him from dropping the one subject he needs to go to King's Ely or most other F&T courses? Or is this a case of letting him make his own decision, and his life will work out accordingly? When does a parent have to let go of the reins and let their child make their own decisions and possibly make mistakes? Please be gentle as I am just trying to be a good parent and support him. Should I back off and let him decide his own choices from now or do I intervene? What if it all goes wrong and he blames us for not guiding him?

Thank you for reading.

My DS used to love art. He would draw all the time. I have pages and pages of his pen and ink drawings, comics, calligraphy, ink drawings, waterolours etc...until he did GCSE Art. It's such a demoralising and prescriptive course. He finished it after a lot of time, endless visits to art galleries etc etc and has never even picked up a pencil to doodle since. I would tell DS to just try and suck it up, follow the instructions and do whatever he can just to get through to the next stage.

In my (v limited) experience, GCSE art is absolutely bonkers with random results anyway - my daughter got good marks all the way thru it, not top of class, but a clear pass (and it was heavily coursewrok based)...but she failed.

When i told the school we were going to appeal, they said it wasn't possible, because she had originally passed, then the board had rechecked and failed about half of the class.....she didn't need it for her planned career, fortunately, but absolutely no warning that her portfolio wasn't good enough, nor any feedback on why so many of them failed.

Appreciate that your son DOES need art for his career, thisnis more as a warning for those who think it could be a nice choice for their child.

Oh God how crushing for your DD. Hope the school was looked at, as it sounds like they didn't understand the spec either!

Has your son considered a more vocational 6th form option?

My DD is planning on doing an art related subject at college next year and (all being well, 1 more week of GCSEs!) she will be doing a level 3 BTEC next year. The entry requirements were 5 passes (including English and maths, but no other subject requirements, although she is sitting art) but also a portfolio, and an interview to discuss said portfolio. This was way more significant in the application process than academics and she is expected to be producing work over the summer too. Would something like this be worth looking into?

Does he think he might be discovered online by a random designer and be successful that way???

I have read others say about kids being put off art because of how much work it is and the written side of things.

Not sure sometimes if the teaching style makes a difference. Not saying any of the teachers are wrong in what they are doing, but different children respond well to different teaching styles. As art is less learning of facts, and more has more expression/feeling to it, I can see how a child can have a different feel for the subject if they don't relate to the teaching style.

When your son has looked at artists, has he been able to choose ones that are fashion related? Has he been able to link any of his pieces of artwork to fashion in any way? ( not sure how practical either of those would be). DC is interested in nature. They have chosen artists whose work includes flowers, animals and insects, and they have been included flowers, animaks and insects etc in some of the portfolio.

In addition to this, I would say fashion design is a very competitive industry. To get any form of experience he will probably need to do jobs he finds boring or doesn't want to do and work with people he doesn't like. ( just like lots of careers). If he gives up a level now, at future interviews would he be asked why he didn't do art/have up art GCSE. Will having given up on the art make it harder to stick things out later?

I think there a lot of things to be weighed up. Unless he is having health/mental health issues as a result of/or impacted by the art GCSE, as you have been I would try to discourage him ftom dropping the subject.