GCSE Options Problem.... Choices Blocked!

[IJustWantAUserNameThatDoesntExistAlready]

Hi there, looking for advice from anyone who may be in a similar position with a bit more knowledge. My first post here, so apologies for any presentation errors...
My son is about to select GCSE options. He has the core, plus 3 optional.
Core is English Lang / Lit, Math, Combined Science and MFL (French). All good so far.
For his options, he needs to select one from each of the following blocks:
Block 1: Geography, History
Block 2: RE, Sociology
Block 3: Triple Science, Art, Geography (only if History chosen as Block 1), Computing... plus a bunch of vocational stuff.

Here's the problem. He's academic, and is determined (since he was 4) to make a career in the historical sciences (details don't matter). As a result, he wants to take Geography, History and Triple Science. All 3 would be very beneficial to him, and allow him to select the A-levels appropriate to progress into a degree in the appropriate area.
But because of the structure of the options, he can't. He has to drop one of these in favour of RE / Sociology, both of which are utterly useless to him (I'm not knocking them as subjects - I personally took RE to A-Level - but they're not suitable for his purposes).

Does anyone have any experience in how to approach the school to try and get this limitation changed? I'm quite happy to play softball or hardball with them to get the options he wants. Or does he just have to do a subject that is a waste of time for him, and get whichever of the preferred subjects we can't get through school privately (he already has private tutoring, I'm not bothered about the cost, but the additional schooling on top of what he already does might be too much?) If I say to the school "fine - force him to do a subject he doesn't want to do that will be a waste of time for all concerned, but don't be surprised if this straight-A student lands an F and brings down your school when he could get an A in his useful subject" - will this bounce back on him?

So frustrated that we're being blocked from GCSE options that he wants that could hinder him through the rest of his education!
Grateful for any advice...

@@IJustWantAUserNameThatDoesntExistAlready
You say he’s stubborn and he won’t apply himself to what he doesn’t want to do. Maybe you need to take this as the opportunity to negotiate, you’ll help him do the subject he wants, but in return he works hard at the subject he doesn’t want, so that he learns that in life we have to work at things we don’t necessarily want to in order to move forwards. That’s just life. Might be a good lesson

I’d suggest history, geography and sociology as his 3 options with science covered with the combined science ( it is fine to go and carry on with A level biology with combined science gcse).

if he’s concerned about combined science rather than triple science have a chat with the head of science who could outline the differences and perhaps give a heads up of additional study in biology to ensure he’s up to speed for A level ( if I recall the majority of the courses are the same with additional things in the triple science courses )

If triple science is still just the normal double science papers plus some extra exams (this is what I was offered back in the day!) that would be the one to take privately. But I agree with PPs that he can do those a levels with just double science.

He will still be able to do them A levels with combined science (I did combined science and then took chemistry and biology at A level).

I personally wouldn’t get him to do one out of school/ privately as it’s more work for him and it would be more beneficial to revise for other subjects to get higher grades.

As long as he gets good grades he will be able to do them A levels and from my personal experience once you have the A levels GCSEs don’t matter very much.

School are very unlikely to change the options ‘just for you’ even though it would make sense for all students to be doing the things most useful to them. It’s a matter of timetabling and staff resource. It’s really rubbish but pushing them wont get you anywhere, other than labelled as ‘that parent’.

That said, doing combined science and history and geography will set him up fine for his chosen path. You can do any science A Level with combined science GCSE assuming you have the correct Grade achieved (usually a 6 or 7).

There will be a few topics not covered which he could easily get up to speed on outside of school if he’s a bright, motivated student.

I wouldn’t get too het up about it.

Nothing of value to add, but this kind of thing really pisses me off. Sociology or RE is a waste on an option, IMHO. I had the same 30 years ago. Absolute bobbins. I'm still annoyed I couldn't do history. And double science was not a good enough foundation for an A level vs. peers who'd done single science GCSEs.

History and geography are both a levels he can take without a gcse in the subject at most schools. Take one now and then take both for a level.

Gosh, that's very limiting, isn't it.

My ds would have no interest in block two either. He has the core three plus a MFL, and then triple science, DT and Geography.

I’d recommend doing RE and then self-studying for either history or geography. Suggest to the school if there is an interest in doing a twilight GCSE class - it will be staffing stopping them. So hard to get teachers.

RE would seem like a very sensible option if he's wanting to do archeology

I know it doesn't seem like it when they're just about to choose options but GCSE content really is incredibly basic. He would be able to do history and geography A levels without having taken the GCSE

This takes me right back to choosing my GCSE options in the late 1980s. My school offered three languages - french, German and Welsh, and you could choose two languages. Great, I would do French and Welsh, I’d always got As in both. No, I was told I couldn’t, if you wanted to do two it had to be French and German.

15% of my year group, so 25 kids, wanted to do French and Welsh, and we weren’t allowed.

I ended up doing French and Computing, and got a C in Computing, whilst 37 out of 40 of the others got a D or below.

Dd did this and did ok. Think she got B at a level with next to no work.

I think you have been given excellent advice here, especially regarding working backwards from university applications, and A level requirements.
I am sure many of our children have come across similar problems. One of my children had to take combined science, but was still able to take biology and chemistry as two of their 4 full A levels, take medicine and become a Doctor.

Lastly when you contact the school please avoid stating that your son has wanted a career in historical sciences since the age of 4! (In your opening post).
It’s totally understandable that you are proud of him, but it will diminish your credibility, and earn you the accolade of ‘that type of parent’ and an eye-roll thrown in.

I don't think the school will budge - as others have said it will be too with timetabling and availability of staff. I'd suggest if there were enough students that wanted to do History, and it was viable to run a group the school might do it after school. My school did that for us. About eight of us did History GCSE after school on a Monday.

Likewise on the combined science / triple science point, check if the school will enter your son for triple science then look at the respective syllabuses for both. It could be the case that your son, if he's motivated enough, could do the Triple Science through self directed study. There will presumably be overlap between the two GCSE's.

I've known people do GCSE's privately whilst at school where their preferred subjects have not been available.

I dont like the look of those blocks its really very controlling
I think they should offer more per block.
As computing goes well with science.
And even with art.
All 4 of those re, sociology and geo hist are just choices they arent more important than other ones.

My choices were to do hist, 2 lang and science. And though i did do science alevels my other interest was languages.

I guess its actually harder on the less academic kids.

My dd school makes them do geo or history. It does seem silly when you do better on your interests

He should choose combined science. It will be no barrier whatsoever to taking science A levels

Option blocks are timetabled in at different times. This means that Option block A will run the different classes the exact same time, same as Option block B etc. This means that, unfortunately, it doesn’t matter if you play hardball - if the classes are running at the same time, he can’t be in 2 places at once. Adding another class to an option block means another teacher is required at that time which may not be physically possible as they may be required for other year groups at that time. Unfortunately, due to funding, not many schools have teachers with many spare hours to just allow for another class to run. The school wont go into specifics with you but it’ll just be a case of timetabling.

Similar for me in the 90s - I’d forgotten how irritating it was!

In my case we had to do a language; great, I’ll do German. Except actually they meant we had to do French unless we were crap at it, then we could take Spanish. German was available, but only as the free option choice, which meant to take it I’d have had to drop Music (which is what I wanted to do as a career).

I could have done without having to take DT as well, but I blame the government for that rather than the school as I think they were messing around with the National Curriculum at the time and it was compulsory for some unknown reason!

DT! I’d have been gutted if I’d had to do DT at the expense of something I was actually good at. There’s only so many wooden pencil boxes I could mess up.

I assumed from your OP that we'd be looking at archaeology so sociology won't be a total waste of time as there is usually a degree module archaeological theory and that will have a big slug of anthropology in it so sociological thinking helps. I'd suggest that he does the triple science module to get the extra biology and chemistry he needs and then geography at school as there's usually a field trip element. THen take history outside of school as it is the easiest to tutor.

If he only wants to do one Science at A-level then I would do Combined Science and then History and Geography.

A-level Biology will be no problem for him with Combined Science, he can always look at the ‘extra’ biology he’s missing prior to starting the A-level. I see no point in doing Triple Science if he only intends to take one Science A-level.

Also there is no need to take 4 A-levels. Have a look at admissions criteria of the University Courses he is interested in.

Thanks for the additional replies.

A lot of people have mentioned "it's down to timetabling issues". I'm incredulous that the school, who since the summer have been saying "you need to think carefully about this, you need to take this seriously, you need to make sure you select the right choices" - now say "oh, well you can't do them - logistics is hard dontcherknow??" 🤔

Quite a few people have mentioned that combined sciences would be sufficient for Biology A-Level - but Triple Science will (apparently) be including specific elements related to his areas of interest. Whether it's "essential" or not, it would certainly be more helpful than RE or sociology for him.
Likewise on the history / geography issue. Although A-level may not require the GCSE, the GCSE would be useful for laying methodological foundations, investigative and analytical concepts etc.
We have no "objection" to RE / Sociology as subjects in themselves - we talk about religion at home a lot (I was brought up Christian, my wife was brought up Muslim, we're an agnostic-to-atheist household now) as we are aware of the impact religion has had throughout history and continues to have today. His own interest, being historical, is in the older polytheistic frameworks rather than the prevalent "Big 5" of today, which are the only ones studied in this course. Likewise, we're a current-affairs-aware household, so many aspects of the sociology course are not useful for his aims, or are simply old news to him.

Because he's still at the "not quite sure" phase between archaeology / palaeontology (and specialisation is another matter entirely), most of the other subjects outside of the 3 originally mentioned are simply not of interest to him. Sure, he reads about many of the subjects in his down time (he's currently working his way through one of my Karen Armstrong books)
One of our biggest issues is that he's very goal-focused, and considers the idea of RE and Sociology GCSE to be a waste of time when he could be doing something useful, and will resent the lessons / time spent on it.

I'll try with the school, and I guess he'll just need extra time during the evenings to do one of these topics privately if there's no movement.
Thanks for input, I do appreciate the perspectives and additional information.

I don't think geography is necessary for history. You might be wise to look at A level choices as you might need to change for better options there. Humanities tend to be put together and many are multi disciplinary at degree level. GCSE's tend to be grouped like this but poor results are more of an issue than which besides core subjects. A level history varies in what is studied so check that too.

Thanks for this one - he decided on palaeontology before he could say it properly ("Historical science" was my phrasing - because he's since expanded his interest to ancient archaeology as well, but is set on one of those 2). Yeah, I'm proud of him, but it was intended to illustrate commitment to that area rather than anything else. I'll bear it in mind 👍

I stand by what I said about not needing to do Triple Science if he’s only wanting to do Biology A-level, but completely understand your point about it having elements related to his interests. My own son was forced to do a language and saw no value in doing so, achieved a grade 1 whereas his other subjects were 7s!

Timetabling is a massive task in secondary schools and they can’t possibly offer all combinations. That said, forcing everyone to choose between RS and Sociology does seem a bit odd. I’m sure those teachers aren’t looking forward to having classes full of kids who don’t want to be there but picked their subject because they had to!

Are you aware if the options have always been like this? Or a recent change due to staffing issues ? I don’t think the school will be able to do anything about it unfortunately. But if they have enough interest they might be able to put it on outside of the normal timetable, so it’s worth taking that route with your enquiry.