Third A level - Sociology or something else?

[VaccinistaToteBagChicBaristas]

DD Yr 11 has chosen Maths and History and unsure of third choice between -

Sociology - Probable favourite & she was enthusiastic about taster session at school. I know it's fine for all unis including Oxbridge but is there still any snobbery around it amongst graduate recruiters? And, given she's also doing 2 very traditional academic subjects, does it matter?

Politics - she's generally interested in subject but thinks the A level syllabus (seems to be mostly about UK & US govt structure) looks quite boring. If she ends up applying for History & Politics degree, would it look odd or would she be disadvantaged without the A level?

Economics - seems good fit with Maths/ interest in current affairs but don't know a great deal about it.

English Lit - tried and tested, safe bet. She's very good at it but I'd say she likes it rather than loves it.

She's at a selective school - Economics & Sociology most popular A levels of these 4 & v good results in all 4 subjects.

Possible degrees History/ History & Politics/ Social Science type degree but still very unsure. Possible careers - discussed Law/ civil service/ teaching/ maybe even accountancy - but again still very unsure.

Any thoughts welcome. Thanks

My DD is very academic and opted for 4 subjects in yr 12 2 traditionally difficult and psychology and sociology. I can tell you now sociology is the one she comes home and talks to me about and is clearly hugely engaged in it. She is predicted all A* at A level and when she flagged a little recently ( normally works very hard but was exhausted) it was sociology that she continued to push herself in.

She is not planning on doing sociology at uni but the subject she has chosen has a sociology vibe to it. I just think you have o do what your passion is. Psychology is surprisingly difficult and more hard work than you might imagine.

My dd took Psychology, Sociology and Economics at A Level, went on to do a Psychology Degree, then started a Masters in Health Psychology, which she has paused whilst doing PGCE Secondary Maths and will finish from September whilst doing her 1st ECT year as a teacher. Most of her degrees have been done part-time distance learning, whilst getting married, working, and having 3 children. The feedback from her University Tutors is that she is an excellent teacher and when observed last she was teaching like a teacher half way through her 1st ECT year. To teach maths she had to do a subject knowledge enhancement course over the summer as she didn't have maths A Level, but in her Psychology degree there has been a lot of statistics so she is confident teaching that. Her end goal is to become an Educational Psychologist but knows that realistically she will find it hard to get on the course and that she needs some more years teaching before she can apply, it will also mean her children will be older and her dh (also a Maths teacher) will be further up the school promotion ladder.

I am a former Russell Group admissions tutor. I am in STEM so I will defer my minimal comments on the subject choices to the end of my post. My primary point is that every university in the land will, and frequently does, offer on three A levels.

Quality trumps quantity; we want to see what candidates are capable of at their best. Schools recommending four A levels may have a variety of reasons and only some of these are in the best interests of the typical pupil (doing four). The OP and her DD are best placed to know why three A levels have been recommended to the DD and I see absolutely no cause for concern in this. I wish more selective schools would limit their pupils to three.

The Maths and History make a nice contrast. Both are demanding and doing well will show a range of talents. Therefore I doubt employers will care much about the topic of the third A level, as long as it is sufficiently academic. All of the DD’s choices are. She should do what she likes best, as this will be most likely to hold her interest and increase her chances of excelling. I agree with a PP that tasters may sometimes be misleading: she may want to investigate a bit more deeply.

'students from a badly performing private school will be in the same boat as those from a badly performing state school'

Not the case, I'm afraid, unless the private school had a weirdly large number of students on free school meals.

The contextual GCSE score at Oxford used to (roughly) compare an applicant's grades to their normal for a school. It was always punitive (ie a negative multiplier) for anyone at a very selective school who had a single B at GCSE.

The new contextual score is much more about postcode and the kinds of people who attend the school your child attends. I don't think it's very fair. Holland Park Comp is a classic example. You can live in a £5m house in Knightsbridge and go to a different school for A-levels, but if you did your GCSEs there you'll get a very slight leg-up in admissions because a fair number of other students (possibly never in your class) were disadvantaged and on free school meals.

It is always 'better' in terms of gaming the system to go to a reasonably well-performing state school. A private school with poor results in a homogenous middle-class area would be the worst choice, on the same metric.

I did Sociology A level. It’s a bit boring TBH and the syllabus is full of old mostly men, sociologists. HTH.

How long ago was that??

You didn't do feminism? It's a huge part of the spec... You didn't discuss the dominance of male ideas?

I do agree it can be a rote learning slog. But some students are good at and like that kind of learning.

@Piggywaspushed I would imagine that A levels that we parents took back in the dark ages bear no resemblance to what our young people are taking today in content and difficulty.

Even advice from parents on here whose older DC took A level before the A level reforms a few years ago is out of date.

@RampantIvy @Piggywaspushed Hear, hear! The A-levels I have taught recently are streets away from the ones I sat. (On a related note, the university application system and pressures are very different, too.) But what would MN be without well-meaning personal reminiscences?

Yes we did feminism but there’s still an awful amount of required theory, i.e. dead sociologists. I did well, I got an A, but some of it was mind numbingly boring.

Well, some sociologists are indeed dead....