Thread 36 - Covid Cohort from GCSE 2020 - The Final Countdown to Results Day for Some?

[CinnamonOrangeCremeBrulee]

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. It's all relative!
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 continue down various pathways ( employment, apprenticeships, higher ed) We have decided for anyone interested they will find a thread within the Further Ed board.
Possibly a move to Parent of Adult Children Board in future? Post Results?

Previous Thread

@CinnamonOrangeCremeBrulee lesson learned- energy drinks help to keep you ‘awake’ but suppress concentration! 😊

Seems to imply some BTECs have early results.

I’m outing myself now but I’m following that thread. I can’t contact Ds thigh as he’s away this week and currently half way through playing in a show. Not what we need tonight. If he has had any communication tonight whether good or bad I hope he doesn’t see it.

The thread has gone!

Oof not what you want. Hopefully too busy doing nice musically stuff 🤞

@NCTDN Cambridge International (CIE) release their results tomorrow, they also started their exams 3 weeks before the other boards

yes, I knew about international results being tomorrow. It’s mostly private schools who do those isn’t it?

Some non private also do Cambridge but not many. DD has been at Interhigh for a number of years on an EHCP due to complex health needs so hopes to attend a local Uni from home.

DSA have been brilliant in putting a package in place and the Uni in question have also been excellent. No fingers crossed for tomorrow… and next week again

It’s strange to think that the papers have been marked and the results are known (to some people now) - or I assume they are if they go to unis at the end of the week?

I seem to be the only one who has exam dreams in this family. I just know I don’t sleep before both Thursdays, whereas ds and dd will have to be woken..

Fingers crossed for your DD @Tomnooktoldmeto ! 🍀

Trying to organise student Finance without the prospective student here is very very difficult. I emailed her a draft letter for Student finance with INSERT REFERENCE NUMBER HERE on it, and expected that she would wait for the other 2 parts of the evidence we need, and send it all together with a covering letter, but no she sent it off just as it was. Student Finance have not been helpful, but I can imagine some poor civil servant looking at this thinking WTF. It just makes no sense, it’s supplementary . The only reason I’m laughing and not screaming is because I can remember being that age, and without a doubt, I was worse.
If she takes anything at all from her time with me , I hope that it will be READ IT TWICE.

Hello from gorgeous sunny Cornwall!
Thanks for the new thread. I wonder how fast we can fill it over the next 8 days…? 🤔😳

We’ve been here on holiday since the weekend. It’s been a great distraction from waiting for exam results, but at the same time, given us chance to muse on how DD feels about everything and what she might do if she hasn’t done as well as hoped.

I have tried to stay away from social media but happened to spot the WIWIK post about some students receiving emails from UCAS today, which resulted in DD checking her emails and UCAS portal…nothing new to report.

Hope everyone’s feeling ok about next week. I’ll try to catch up with all the recent news.

@ProggyMat thanks, our dreams were never big for this DC, at 12 she was suicidal and unable to stay in school any longer. To reach the end of the road she has already won many battles and has made many friends at the school who are also vulnerable. They’re all in my mind as we’ve met many and shared their dreams

DH drove 2k miles from home to the exam centre and back as centres are limited

DS is at boardmasters until Monday, I doubt there’s any signal so won’t be able to check any emails. I don’t have access to them.

@crazycrofter i’m having the same with DS2, he has 4 A level subjects chosen but can only take 3 and can’t decide and he also hasn’t decided between his school 6th form and the local 6th form college where DS1 went

@Fiddlersgreen i noticed that the college application deadline is 20th Aug so I’m going to have to force him to have a conversation with me. I guess if they choose one place/subject and regret it, they can always switch within the first few weeks.

@Tomnooktoldmeto that sounds like a really tough journey but brilliant that she’s got to this point and has sat her A Levels. Good luck to her! I looked into Interhigh quite extensively a few years back as we were home edding ds in upper primary and I wasn’t sure if he’d be going to secondary or not. Would you recommend it? Not that it’s relevant to me now but I do know people whose kids aren’t coping with school.

Welcome @Spacerace ! Golly those are tough offers. She is obviously a clever kid though, so fingers tightly crossed for her. Gin… anytime, no? 😁

@mummyinbeds - 2 has my vote…

@crazycrofter Interhigh has changed over the years and is a really big school now. When we joined it was small and intimate, very personal support and DD has been lucky to have some of the older staff in her support setup

As they run their own exam centre they were able to provide very tailored facilities as DD is quite unusual in her exam concessions

would I recommend going forward, maybe, they pulled out every stop for DD but personally we feel they’re too big and have lost the special thing that made them unique and a good fit for square pegs. The original Welsh staff are awesome however we owe them much love

Checking in.

Lovely to see people coming back to support each other through the next week.

Yes to updates on our cabin crew high flyer and Caspar must surely be appreciating pureed asparagus by now.

Had a chat with DD earlier. She was in a good mood so I chanced an enquiry into her expectation of Thursday next week. She said ‘ I might have got AAA.’ Then she remembered her history papers and said, ‘ Oh but could be a D in there somewhere.’ So we’re no further on really.

DS got an email from Cardiff which is his insurance to say don’t worry if you miss your grades, we have lots of spaces. He didn’t look hugely enthusiastic it must be said.

Cardiff is Dd insurance too. I wonder if she has one? We also had a nice postcard from RHU through the door.

I can't see Dd wanting to go to Cardiff if she misses her offer for Southampton tbh. She likes the course but thinks it's too far.

Dd2 just messaged me in the middle of the night from Canada to say she got an A for As Geography. I presume it's an international one. She's doing Geo without doing the GCSE first, so she's very pleased. Those of you that may remember she's repeating the year after much upset last year & dropped Bio ( as school insist on A's). It's been very much the right decision as she's had a fab. year & regained all her old confidence. Plus she's learnt to self-manage her ADHD after a surprise diagnosis.

Hello peeps. Thanks for the tag.

Feeling nervous for you all as you await A Level results. DD was very lucky to get her IB results at the start of July and secured her Oxford Medicine place with a max score of 45. Absolutely delighted for her.

She's been in Europe for the last 3 weeks interrailing and is now n Germany working for the next 3 weeks. We're heading there for a holiday and will bring her back with us at the end of August - and then it's only a month until she starts at Oxford. How time flies...,

@Volterra @Spacerace Ds1’s Bath offer in 2019 was A* AA. He got nowhere near that on results day but they still took him. Obviously this was pre-Covid & his course was possibly undersubscribed but there is always hope!
I’m glad you found us @Spacerace !

@CinnamonOrangeCremeBrulee & @Volterra dd's friends who went to Cardiff loved their time there. They said it was a fab place to be a student.