Can you get into medical school with 8 GCSEs?

[sheep73]

Just that really..

The school is likely to push DDs science set into dual award rather than triple award sciences which will leave her with 8 rather than 9 GCSEs. Will this leave here at a disadvantage for A levels / medical school? She will cover the triple award material but likely sit the dual award exam.

Many thanks

Forgive my ignorance, but how can they be allowed to use this to decide, when it's not the kid's fault that their school only offers 8/9?

Not true

Could the school be persuaded to do the triple award? Or will it have been set already?
DD did triple and is sitting physics, chemistry and maths A levels. The college wanted an 8 at GCSE to be able to sit these subjects. Does 8 in the double award translate to being an 8 when requesting to sit A levels in all three or even two sciences.

That is not true. Universities only look at the best 8 GCSE's anyway, some only look at the best 6. Since the reform of GCSE's and the new 9-1 grades even the most academic schools have stopped doing 11-12, 13 GCSE's. Most do 9, some do 8, a few do 10 if they offer an extra curricular subject or Further Maths.

When applying for medicine most universities place much more emphasis on the results of the UCAT test, predicted A level grades and work experience. Most applicants apply strategically, if they have a good UCAT score they apply to those who weight that more heavily and if they have a lower score but better academics the opposite.

This ^

You could argue that taking 8 GCSEs is actually an advantage as only the top 8 grades are used to rank applicants. Easier to get 8 good grades if you are only studying 8 subjects than if you are studying 12.

It’s important to apply strategically to med school, Apply to universities that match her criteria for what she wants from a med school AND that she best fits their selection criteria for interview. There are lots of knowledgeable posters on the medicine threads on the higher education board.

You can find all information about all the UK med schools, such as GCSE requirements, here:

www.medschools.ac.uk/studying-medicine/how-to-apply-to-medical-school-in-the-uk

"More concerning that she is presumably in the lowest science set"

Not necessarily. Some schools only do dual award for everyone, including the top set.

I think it's worth pointing out that if the school are trying to game the system here it's presumably because they think your daughter will get a higher grade as a result. It's not to her detriment!

They can't and don't, it's nonsense.
Not to mention the fact that last year only 1.8% of pupils in England sat 11 or more GCSEs and of course they won't all want to do medicine so each medical school is highly unlikely to have a large number of applicants with 11 or 12 GCSEs. It is true that a pupil who does manage to get high grades in that number of GCSEs may well also do very well at A level and the UCAT, have the right personal attributes and be highly motivated etc so is potentially a very strong candidate but that's not guaranteed. And if such pupils do get into medical school it's more likely to be the case that they got in because they are extremely able people and also they got 12 GCSEs because they are very able people and had that opportunity. They won't have got a medical school place because they have 12 GCSEs - correlation doesn't equal causation.

Yeah that’s not an issue. Very very few dc take 12 or more GCSEs, and as @MrsAvocet says, unis will be aware that the number of GCSEs sat is mainly decided by the school, and is not a reflection of student ability. Those doing 12 GCSEs will not have any advantage.

I am a doctor and have sat on admission panels for medical school. Unfortunately, there is a lot of misinformation here.

GCSEs absolutely do count for medical school, and it would be very unusual for someone to gain a place with only 8 GCSEs, unless there are extenuating circumstances.

When there are over 10 highly qualified candidates per place, all with good predicted A-level grades, other metrics need to be reviewed and considered.

It would be unusual to be called to interview with only 8 GCSEs, unless there are clear extenuating circumstances, or perhaps applying to a newer, less competitive, medical school. When I sat on the interview panel the candidates typically had 10+ GCSEs. 13 was not unheard of.

When was that Wonderberry? Was it pre or post 2018? Several of my friend's children have been admitted into medical school since 2020 and the average number of GCSE's they had was 9 which allies to national data.

Most of the universities are very transparent in how they score candidates in terms of an interview offer.

Nothing here says she's in the lowest set,

At the school I taught at in some years only 8/200 students chose triple as it was an option open to everyone that was really interested in Science

DDs school don't even offer triple as an option because the local Sixth Form has to accept double award as do University's as like DDs school not everywhere offers it.

OP is she actually learning the triple content but not sitting the exam? If so, why? It's a strange choice to make and there are Foundation Or Higher options for all ability levels so it can't be for that reason and if she wants to go the Medicine route presumably she's Higher across the board anyway.
Or have you misunderstood and she's studying all three (B, C & P) but at double award - a common misconceptions.

When my son was choosing options nearly 10 years ago he had to sit an exam and only the top 20% were allowed to do triple science. My concern would be is she good enough at science to make really good science grades? Schools are not being cruel but perhaps realistic. Maybe get a second opinion from a good science tutor?

And in fact although it was 2018 when the first cohort went through the reformed GCSE's it took the first lot of results before some schools realised the implications so from around 2021 onwards things began to change.

Same here with DDs school. Didn't offer the triple at all.

Not a problem
Dd did combined science gcse
A levels bio chemistry geography
2 med school offers

13 was not unheard of.
1.8% of pupils sat more than 10 GCSEs in 2024 and 0.1% over 11. It's been around that for a few years now if my memory serves me right. I think that any medical school worth it's salt would be fishing in a slightly bigger pool than that for the doctors of tomorrow! And also that selection panels would have a grasp of the concept that there are factors other than inate ability that determine how many GCSEs a pupil sits.

Did she only do 8 GCSEs? That's the concern OP has.

I don't know the answer on whether only 8 would be a problem but I understand why she's concerned seeing as it seems her daughter is academically capable of separate science and doing 9.

In my children's school 9 GCSEs is the baseline (if they do separate science they do 10). A child would only be doing 8 if it was felt they had challenges that meant they couldn't cope with the workload of 9.

I have no idea whether only 8 is an issue for medicine but as a minimum OP's DD would be unusual to be applying with only 8.

Yes. Just pick the right A levels.

Interesting @Wonderberry but yes when was that?

390 students sat 12 or more GCSEs last year. So I think 13 would now be unheard of. I bet fewer than 100 dc sat 13.

People sat a lot more when there was coursework and less content.

My younger dc took 10 bc triple was an extra for more able students; but for all I know that’s changed now (youngest sat GCSEs in 2019) and they offer fewer. Certs the school I used to teach at has started offering eight as standard. I don’t think it’s great at all but I see why. Medical schools would be foolish indeed to ignore otherwise promising applicants simply bc they had eight GCSEs not 11+. And they would be empty as well.

Agree that this is an odd assumption.

DS2 is doing combined science as that is all his school offers and expected to get 8/9.

He then intends to study physics and maths for A Level and do a degree in aeronautical engineering. All of which he is perfectly capable of

I think if the school only offer double rather than triple science then that is fine, but if she only takes double and the school do offer triple then that would be problematic. GCSE's are very much important for medicine. My daughter applied two years ago, and different unis have different requirements but they all required chemistry and one other science at A level.

In 2024 the average number of GCSE's taken across England was 8

Just over 28% took 9 subjects with around 25% taking 8. 12% took 10 subjects and 15.6% took 7.

Less than 2% of 16 year olds took 11 or more GCSE's (the percentage taking 6 or fewer was 17%)

I cannot find the date for pre-2018 but anecdotally I know more schools entered students for between 9-12 subjects as standard.

Attending a school that only offers the opportunity to take 8 GCSEs would be “extenuating circumstances”.

All the medical schools publish their GCSE requirements and the selection criteria they use to select candidates for interview and offers are available online (either from the university or FOI requests). A lot of med schools don’t use GCSE grades at all, others use the top 6-8 grades as one of the criteria. I am not aware of any that consider the number of GCSEs.

OP, @mumneedswine is the person to ask. She is a teacher with many years experience as the advisor to students at her school applying to med school, dentistry, vet school and Oxbridge, and is very helpful on the medicine threads. She has all the up to date data on entry requirements and selection criteria in some very detailed spreadsheets 😂 If anyone knows if any med schools require more than 8 GCSEs or consider the number of GCSEs as part of their selection criteria, she will. She has also just had 2 DDs go through med school and vet school, which might explain her user name 😂

Such a lot of misinformation and also sheer snobbery on this thread. How very dare someone even consider medical school without 14 GCSEs? What, your school doesn't offer 14 GCSEs? How sad, never mind. I'm sure there's BTec in hair and beauty you can do instead.....