Thread 27 Covid Cohort Snow or Like Spring? Let's Do This Thing!

[OrangeCinnamonCocktail]

This is a thread for supporting all young people post GCSEs 2020, regardless of their educational setting. It is respectfully requested that all are supportive and helpful to each other. If you want to start a debate, e.g state vs private, please don't within this thread. Please also be sensitive when responding to threads about grades.

Some of us have been here since first thread back in yr10, some will be new. Everyone has been friendly and helpful in the past. Everyone is welcome. It is hoped this will continue.

Our DS/DD may go down various paths (such as employment, apprenticeships, higher ed) We have decided for anyone interested they will most likely find us within the Further Ed board.

previous thread found here

@Zandathepanda thanks. I thought it looked correct. He's not had anything from Sussex confirming though. There were plenty of emails from the other universities saying why he should pick them. Ds had over 1000 unread emails in his inbox, a lot were obviously junk. He only reads the ones he wants to. I always delete everything I don't want as I go along.

Oh Piggy

Newnames 🍔 ha ha. I heard it mentioned. Fancied one myself.

Firm and insurance chosen? Nice one!

@Oblomov22 yes...I was worried as he did this beginning of Jan. but has had no confirmation email. Perhaps that is normal. I thought he may have had something from Sussex about accommodation etc.

Sorry I haven't been on the thread lately have gone back to read messages. Hope you are ok @Piggy all teachers do a fantastic job and we are all so grateful especially over the last two years. DS was 18 on Tuesday he didn't want to do anything but we went out for a meal and tried to make it special but he has been absolutely vile the last few months to us all.

Don't know of any further offers but I know Warwick seem to have started offering on the maths courses this week. Does anyone know if an offer was made whether you would get an email or would you have to check UCAS? Haven't a clue what DS is going to do but I have a feeling if he was offered Warwick he would decline and go for Birmingham.

Feeling really down at the moment and DS2 is in year 11 so have the double whammy this year. Hope everyone is doing ok and get the choices they want.

@icanbewhatiwant that’s what DD’s one says too. Waiting for confirmation. This is it now…. Nothing else they can do until their results come out!

@Nard75 I think DS has had an email from UCAS each time he got an offer, just telling him there’s been an update and to log in and check.

DS is being a pain lately, he seems to be constantly lying to us, and about really stupid things too, what food he had for lunch, which friends he is meeting, the fact he went to his girlfriends instead of the gym. Nothing that we would even care about so no point lying??
Then this morning he was late to college and we discovered he was up until 2am on his ipad, drinking fizzy drinks after he’d brushed his teeth!
He is 18 in 2 weeks and I’m feeling really down about trying to make a big effort as he doesn’t want to do anything with us and doesn’t make an effort to even chat to us anymore. I always liked to have the evening meal all together to talk about our day and catch up but he says his friends are never home for dinner so why should he be?
Also double whammy this year for us, but DS2 is being so much easier at the moment and I never thought I’d say that!

I’m sorry to hear about boys being difficult @Nard75 and @Fiddlersgreen. I’m sure it’s partly to do with uncertainty and the big changes ahead. Perhaps they’re just feeling really ready to move out? Which is sad but I guess it’s also what we’ve been preparing them for. Like all phases in parenting, it will pass… but it’s not fun while you’re going through it.

Ds is at his first big party tonight which makes me nervous and dd is at a gig. As usual my role is to drive around the city dropping off and picking up! They don’t like eating with us either, but at least they talk to me on all the car journeys!

Ds went to the pub last night for his first 'official' pint. They asked for his if, then refused to serve his girlfriend who isn't 18 till next month. Bar humbug. They then walked to sainsburys and bought a bottle of alcohol. Ds doesn't really drink, but I was unimpressed that the nice idea was ruined.

id. they asked for his id.

Struggling to keep up with the thread a bit at the moment but for Piggy, I cannot imagine how hard it must be when this happens with one of your students.

DS will be heading to the pub after hockey with his team-mates today, driving licence at the ready. He doesn't drink much either. It's an away match at a great distance and he has got a lift so will be out most of the day. Irritatingly a "UCAS Track has changed" email arrived yesterday but he's lost his password and he didn't get round to sorting it before heading off to hockey so I am stuck waiting to see, hopefully its an offer from RHUL.

Evening meals together regularly - that ship sailed here many years ago, partly because DH works irregular hours, but mainly because of all the sport and other hobbies we all do in the evenings making it impossible. We try and eat together on Saturday evenings otherwise most of our talking time is on car journeys.

Ah that’s annoying @Oblomov22. I don’t really understand the age limit thing in relation to pubs? Do they just refuse to serve you alcohol but you can still go in/eat?

There was alcohol at the 15th birthday party ds went to yesterday but he said he only had one drink. And he was fine when I picked him up, although I was a bit early getting him apparently - at midnight!

Fingers crossed for an offer from RHUL @ExtremelyDelighted.

We almost always eat our evening meal together. When dh farmed, 90% of the time he could stop and come in for dinner, then he'd go back out. Now he's retired he's home anyway, the dc's used to swim after school and Ds2 used to play football, but no clubs anymore. So we are always home, but during meals the dc's either don't speak or they argue. Occasionally we get a decent conversation.
I used to chat on car journeys with them too. That used to be a great opportunity as they can't escape. But now the older 2 drive, that doesn't happen. Even ds3 rarely comes in the car with me.

Look at any Attenborough programme on ‘teenage’ animals in a pack and it’s the same - especially males. It’s nature - ie time to leave the pack and breed somewhere else. Obviously not advocating any of this for our Great Ape offspring but we’re all animals.
I also think the modern thing of cramming lots of facts/essay structures into your head is very ‘unnatural’ in the big scheme of things too which is why it’s so stressful.

Fingers crossed for RHUL, Extremely. DD has a fab offer from them for liberal arts. The course looks fantastic, the campus is gorgeous…but she thinks it’s too remote, as in, not enough night life off campus.
We’ve tried to point out that Windsor is nearby and London’s not far, but at the moment, she only has eyes for Birmingham (which needs AAB…a stretch in light of her mock results).

We had the same issue, re drinking, when we went away to celebrate DD’s 18th a few days before her birthday. The hotel we stayed in refused to let DH order for her - the Batman actually demanded to know who the drinks order was for!
Bizarrely, we’d already been out to dinner that evening, and the restaurant had no issue with DD having a couple of cocktails.
The law says you can purchase wine, beer or cider with a meal for your 15 year old, which seems totally inconsistent with nearly 18 year olds not being able to order a pint in a pub.

Evening meals here are always at the kitchen table, except on the rare occasion either DC isn’t at home. DH quite often has performances in the evening, so it may just be me and them, but we always talk and it quite often gets quite (very!) loud and lively.

…speaking as an ex-biology teacher!

Well the RHUL offer was disappointing (and unachievable). The website had indicated CCC (its a foundation entry) and the offer was C Distinction Merit (=CAC, DS is taking two BTECs). Unfortunately his two BTECs are on course for results the other way round - it was specified which had to be the distinction and he can't achieve that now I'm pretty sure. I guess this is why it took so long to make the offer, non-standard subjects. One of the BTECs is, I would say, more academically rigorous, the other more practical and I guess that's the logic.

However he had a good day out with his hockey teammates, they lost but the hosting team had a great clubhouse with pool tables etc and he didn't have any bother getting served.

DD still says she can't get on to ucas track?

Just checking and , up to my ears in work including weekends, so will come back when things quiet down a bit.

Still waiting on Warwick and York, I wish they would just hurry up fgs!

@ExtremelyDelighted. We have applied for the RH history foundation too. My understanding is that they will accept you if you drop a grade, but I don’t know if this applies to Foundation courses too.

@Zebracat I think, to be honest, it might be pushing it for DS. DH and I talked about it and feel he'd probably be better off as a mid-range student in a lower ranked uni than the one who scraped into a higher ranked one and is on the back foot from Day 1, even in the Foundation year. He can hold his head up high and say he had an offer from RHUL, which if you'd have asked me a couple of years ago would have seemed vanishingly unlikely.

NEA for geography writing up and data analysis finally underway this weekend after a lot of stress and not starting it all summer and then all last term. DD only started the research and data collection in the Christmas holidays!!?! The project is worth 20% of the overall mark but I wish the school had organised a physical geography field trip to collect the data rather than this left to their own devices thing.

She has got a great EPQ mark (so she can write when she gets round to it) and that has helped with 3/5 uni offers (really important as no contextual).

Having a decent mark in this will help with the exams as less pressure in this subject but eating into revision time at present. Has to be in for marking before the end of the month and then revision will begin in earnest.

DS2 came home last night and is enjoying the world of work and lovely to see him happy and have a hug and a lovely family meal of DH's Lancashire hotpot.

Waiting for Durham to come back - driving me potty as their offer day in March and college allocation happening already. Wanted DD to go to Sheffield offer day next weekend knowing where she stands with Durham but not looking likely.

That doesn’t feel like a fair offer, Extremely. I’m hoping that the foundation course might be a clearing fallback for DD if everything goes badly in the summer, but perhaps your DS’s offer suggests it’s actually in quite high demand? It seems a shame that, as a kind of access course, the grade requirements might exclude students who would really benefit from the foundation year.

One of the new colleges at York is called David Kato. I looked him up. It's a sad story . Credit to York for paying respect to him.

It is a bit odd, DS's official predicted grades are B, Merit, Merit, but in fact he is likely to get B, Merit, Distinction (but in the wrong subject). All I can think is that they have looked up the specs of the BTECs and decided one of them is perhaps not as good (it is one of the ones the govt is axing after this year, still on the old spec with no exam-assessed modules just coursework). I am of half a mind to ring them, but as I said, I don't want him scraping in on a technicality and struggling.