Worried about GCSEs

[alevelbtec]

I can't sleep at night as worried about teen dd and her results. She failed all her mock exams except English. I want her to do A Levels and go on to University like most of my family but I don't think she will be able to. I am really panicking about her future. AIBU!? I think it's effecting me more, she pretends she's ok or maybe she isn't I don't know.

And if everyone was a LSE Economics graduate, they’re be no primary school teachers to teach the kiddies to read! It’s a very narrow minded view of what makes for a happy and successful life.

Your daughter may just not be academically bright and therefore uni not the best fit for her. You seem very fixated that this is the only acceptable route

Sadly you are worrying about 2 years too late. If she failed all her mocks thats not good and would have been the big red flag that she would need intervention and a lot of support to get whatever she needed to be accepted into sixth form. My son has already got a college place , has she got an offer with conditions etc for her to enrol on? I mean she will have to retake her maths and English till she gets a standard pass of a grade 4. When you say failed what grades did she get? If less then a 4 then its not great.

Early careers specialist here, who works for a pretty well known company.

University is just one option and it’s not for everyone. If your daughter is potentially not going to pass her GCSE’s with decent grades, then she is not going to be a Doctor or Lawyer.

Apprenticeships give a huge amount of options, at different levels. They can be far more competitive than getting into Uni.

A couple of examples of what some of my past apprentices have achieved:

Female welder - did a L3 welding and fabrication apprenticeship (had 4 GCSE’s grades 4/5).Absolutely smashed her apprenticeship and went onto being a welding inspector and is now a welding tutor at a local college. Earnings at the moment around £40k at the age of 25 and being developed into a head of department role. This girl originally wanted to be a nail technician when I first met her at a careers event!

A lad who applied for a quantity surveying apprenticeship after doing a BTEC in general engineering. Completed his L4 apprenticeship and went onto do a degree apprenticeship. 7 years on he is now a project quantity surveyor earning £45k. Have him got any idea what a Commercial Manager or Director can earn after being a QS?

Had another lad who did a BTEC and applied for a level 5 minerals higher level apprenticeship. He is now an assistant quarry manager in his early 20’s. Earning potential for him in the future could be upwards of £100k in a regional role.

I have lots of apprentices who are happy to do a L2 apprenticeship and will be happy to spend their days driving huge dumper trucks, road surfacing or general engineering role in manufacturing, but that’s their choice.

None of those young people have any student debt hanging round their necks either.

When I advertise for a degree apprenticeship role, I can get over 500 applications in the space of 2 weeks. It’s easier to get into Uni that get an apprenticeship where I work.

I do take graduates on, but they end up wishing they had gone down the apprenticeship route. They are not always ‘work ready’ as Uni’s are actually not great at that.

I sincerely hope she doesn’t know that you are having sleepless nights over her GCSE results, this will just put lots of pressure on herself and she’ll feel really shit for not living up to your expectations. Let her find her own way in life and stop the pressure about Uni.

Those type of roles are usually naturally academically intelligent straight A students. A child who failed their mocks is unlikely to achieve those results, and A level is a massive jump up from GCSE.

I get you may feel disappointed she won't be following your family's footsteps, but she is her own person with her own set of skills. Dont put too much pressure on her. Of course you want her to do well and have options.

I'm currently having worries with my own DD, she didn't do as well at GCSE as hoped, but enough for the next step. I knew at this point we could write off the careers like you have mentioned. Didn't do well at all in her 1st year of A level. She is hoping to start again this coming year. I have always said to her just get the A level and then you got options for the future if you are then in a better head space for further study. Of course I'm disappointed as I wanted it to come naturally for her and pave an easier life. But I wont or don't pile the pressure. Some kids just don't find these education settings easy. I was a natural, even though I hated it. But we cant expect them to be clones of ourselves, she is her own person. If she fails next year we will look for other options.

At least your DD has something she actually wants to do in mind. If she fails her GCSE, resit the vitals, then help her along with her chosen path. I know a lot of hairdressers as they run in extended family. Most by the time they hit 40 had their own salon and has done very well for themselves. Also it is a career they enjoy. I would absolutely love it if my DD had a plan B and interest, your DD will do fine in life, no matter what her next results are

You want your daughter to aspire to become a doctor, lawyer, engineer, architect or something of that ilk, yet she's likely to come out of secondary school with possibly a few low-grade GCSEs. I think you need to get real. Your DD is, for whatever reason, not going to benefit at this point in her life from A Levels and university. She'd be much better off learning a trade of some sort and then, if she finds the impetus and drive to do so, return to education later as a mature student. And if you push her into the route of doing a zillion resits with the aim of getting into a university to become one of the professionals you aspire for her to be, I pretty much predict that she will not be very happy with those choices and will probably also not be very successful at it (unless it is indeed her choice because she realises what happened during her GCSEs and now has had an epiphany). But that's unlikely to be the case. I speak from experience of teaching 14-19 year olds and also from teaching adults returning to education on Access to HE courses. You need to be motivated to want to study, just as you need to be motivated to learn a craft, not just driven by the prospect of how much you can earn in different jobs. I wish her well and sincerely hope you don't push her into something she is ill equipped to do right now.

As someone who was lucky enough to go to uni for free (trained a nurse), I wouldn’t force this on her even if she does well and goes for her A levels. There is more to life and work than uni unless it’s needed for a profession - even then there’s often other routes in. It’s costs an extortionate amount now and many people owe more than what they’ve paid off their debt now in uni fees. So many graduates can’t get jobs in their industry.
my sister is 24 hated school and didn’t do well academically (I think she’s actually got dyscalculia as she can’t do maths at all) she now works in retail and is about to be promoted to deputy store manager, she’s going to be on 35k a year plus bonus’s. She’s got money saved up and plans to move aboard in the future. Lucky to still live with my parents for pittance rent. I also know people who did bad at school but are now estate agents with huge property portfolios doing really well for themselves (not the flashy car kind of people either, sensible but living comfortably)

A child who can’t pass GCSEs despite their best efforts isn’t going to university. And probably will struggle with A Levels too. Find another route, academia isn’t for everyone and their are many routes via foundation courses to professions

Plus only about a third of their undergraduates are UK nationals anyway: it would be interesting to see a breakdown as I suspect the foreigners are often very motivated, and so they should be, considering what they pay!

OP, I really hope you are not making your very narrow-minded view of life and your dubious values obvious to your daughter. If so you are setting her up to feel like a failure and wrecking your future relationship with her.

But like other pps I cannot believe you are being serious - you can’t both claim to be intelligent and think in the blinkered way you seem to.

Your poor, poor child. What’s the point going on about the pay of doctors and lawyers when your child struggles academically and has an interest in hairdressing? She sounds like she has her head screwed on and already knows what she wants to do, which is more than a lot of her peers will at their age. You never know how her life could pan out anyway, she might be happy having a life doing something she enjoys that doesn’t pay mega bucks but is enough to get by, or she might excel and become the personal hairdresser to someone famous with support and encouragement. What you’re doing though is a sure fire way to end up with her going no contact and enrolling in therapy to unpick your pushy and unaccepting attitude towards her.

My son did an Engineering apprenticeship, followed by a degree apprenticeship in Civil Engineering, so no debt and a decent wage. He didn't want uni at 18 as he wasn't entirely sure what he wanted to do, he didn't want debt for a qualification he wasn't sure about.

I understand wanting you DC to chose a job where they are happy. But the vast majority of hairdressers don't make much. Do you want that for your DD? And you honestly don't care if she doesn't complete her university degree? Just wasted years for nothing?

I feel bad for thinking this but this just makes me think "this is what white parents are like". The whole "just do what makes you happy" kinda attitude. Very different to us Indian parents.

I agree that there's probs little point in doing a degree and acquiring huge debt without the inspiration or any real plan. It took me four days and £2k to get my truck licence and I earn more than a lot of my mates and more than in my graduate bid management job.

My mate recently did the free gov funded training scheme run by Flannery Plant Hire and learnt to drive 100 ton dump trucks in a week. At the age of 50. Two months later and he's on £24 p/h with 1.5x rate after eight hours. He'll easily make £60k this year and he was on about £30k before working in a tyre warehouse.

I was getting paid almost £400 a shift for just shy of four hours (16:00-19:45) on HS2 and was paid £200 to sit at home every Friday as they'd stand you down to rest in case they needed you in early on Monday. I'd never go back to spending most of my waking hours sat in a chair. Fine for those that want to but why try and push somebody that doesn't want to when there's so much competition for each job nowadays. Better to learn a skill that's in demand.

The girl that owns my local salon is minted! Drives a massive new Range Rover. She rents out chairs to quite a few stylists and now has a tanning/nails place next door (and apparently soon a coffee place too).

And a lot of women in corporate jobs end up going part time and never fully returning once they have kids. Having your own business gives you way more flexibility. Around here there are loads of rich Indians that run dessert shops and small businesses. My Sikh workmate drives trucks to keep himself busy but he doesn't need to work as he has three cash and carries and a rental property above one of them.

I chose unreasonable because of the uni thing. Why does she have to go? Plenty of routes into chosen employment that don’t come with crippling debt. Just like plenty of courses deliver good earnings potential. My DH is in construction on the legal and quantity surveying side and he works with plenty of apprentices and post apprentices who at 22 are earning very good money. And the route to employment is right there. Does she want to go? I didn’t want to. I was a home bird and so I didn’t go to uni and still got a post graduate degree by starting with the BTEC route. As a result I was earning a lot earlier than my friends. I put myself through a distance learning degree ten post graduate afterwards. This is the start of her living her life

No. Not at all. We don't have that attitude. If I just wanted to maximise happiness I wouldn't have made my children sit the 11+ (years of tutoring stress for them), go to a grammar multiple miles away and go to top top unis instead of less prestigious where they'd just have partied instead.

Work hard, work smart.

It’s too late to be anxious now. The time it would have made a difference was during preparation - getting a tutor, sitting down with her while she revises so she has a buddy, finding practice papers and making sure she understands what is needed to pass. Now you have to shut up and help her find a path through, whatever her results.

Uni is not the only route to success and your daughter just needs to find another way.

My son went to a grammar school that expects all of their pupils to go to Uni. He passed his A levels two years ago and his cohort had a much higher than usual number of kids who decided against taking up their Uni offers - my son included.

Many went for degree apprenticeships or business apprenticeships and some like my son just decided to try their luck in the job market.

My son is now doing the same role in The City as my friend's son who did Uni for three years and is on the same salary but the my son has the advantage of having no student debt to pay off.

So may young people are put off of Uni now due to the cost and the lack of face to face teaching. They just don't see it as value for money anymore.

I know a couple of graduates locally with law degrees working minimum wage jobs because they can't get a graduate job.

A friends son has a PHD and can't get work. Her daughter has a masters and it took her two years to find work. Just so many graduates struggling to find work.

My daughter will most likely end up in a fairly low paid job as she just isn't at all academic but my hope for her is just to be happy in whatever she does.

Shame Indian parents don’t teach their sons not to rape women then isn’t it, given that India has one of the highest rates of violent, sexual crimes.

Poor kids.

I'm quite friendly with the slinger (guy that directs the tower crane and attaches the slings/lands concrete skips etc) at one of the big highrise builds in central Brum. He's not the sharpest tool in the box but he's eager to learn and works hard.

He's only 23yo and he made £47k last year. He was telling me he's been offered the chance to do his tower crane ticket but would have to relocate an hour away. Basic salary is £53k and he wouldn't work long hours as they're very hot on H&S and don't want tired workers swinging heavy girders around overhead.

Also spoke to a Romanian lad on main HS2 compound who is making £1500 a week as a joiner. He smashes the hours in then has a three month holiday in the new year when it goes quiet.

Again this it a small %. Good on them for making it work. For putting hard work in to have successful businesses.

But the reality is that nearly 50% of new salons fail within the first two years, and of those that survive, most owners earn a standard stylist's wage.

I'm not saying don't do this or don't try it out. But perhaps do decent in school that you have other options.

What you can’t seem to grasp is that some kids despite working their socks off are never going to get top grades.

My daughter is doing the 11+, but purely from her own choice - it's her life, not mine. When our children do well, it can be tempting as a parent to take credit 'I pushed them' 'I paid for private'. But the achievement is theirs, and solely theirs.

My mum 'made me' sit for a private school scholarship. I did it so she would stop moaning at me. And tried to fail it by writing an essay entitled "why private schools should be banned". And got the place anyway and refused it. And got straight A's at gcse and A level at a dodgy comp, and an offer from Cambridge.

If your children were that bright, they would have thrived anywhere.