No teacher for A-level - need an advice

[JTro]

Hope someone can advise me what to do in this situation. My DS is in Year 13, one of his A-levels is Further Maths (FM). At the beginning of this school year, students doing FM chose what to do: 2 majors or 4 minors. My DS chose 4 minors and on the first week of doing his 4 minors he found out he has no maths teacher who will teach them ( it's 4 of them). Since then, Maths Subject Leader said that they need to teach themselves on Google Classroom, where she put some study materials while she try to sort it out very soon. Later on "very soon" transformed to "by the end of the half-term". When end of half-term happened, she said "at the beginning next half term it will be sort it out". Yesterday was first day of new half-term and of course the issue is still there. Now she says "it will be sorted out soon". At the same time, his Head of Year approached him and stronly advised to drom FM A-level and do AS-level instead, my DS refused. After that Head of Sixths Form approached him and again "strongly advised" to drop FM A-level. As his predicted grade for FM is B, I suspect this is their attempt to solve the issue by less painful way for them, but not taking into ccount his best interest. As all this happens through talking with his Maths subject leader, it looks like they will push him and few others to study FM themselves as long as they could and they are really missing out on proper studying and they do the same level on tests as other, who do have a techer. I need an advise how to approach school regarding this issue and finally make them to teach these 4 students properly. Should I contact Head teacher, or go straight to Governors? Just for reference - I am not familiar with A-level system at all, he is our first who is doing A-levels, and probably it's a norm when students learn themselves?

OCR Mei, the hardest one. AQA is a bit easier as I understand. Don't know why his school decided to do OCR Mei.

I hope so too! Thanks once again for your support🤗

I would revisit their insistence on doing four A levels. This is the grammar school being extra if he doesn't need/benefit from FM for his intended degree (what is he wanting to study?). Ask that they note in his ucas reference that he had to drop FM due to a timetable clash. Most universities will offer on just three A levels. Unless the university is offering on a points basis a B in an AS level is going to be of limited value.

Another Further Maths teacher here.

I would echo @FluffyWhiteCloudsFloatBy in terms of swapping to a taught option or dropping down to AS.

If he definitely wants to continue with three minors:

• Jack Brown, a maths subject lead, has a complete set of videos covering the three minors here: https://sites.google.com/view/tlmaths/home/a-level-further-maths

• Integral maths https://integralmaths.org/ offers a subscription service including notes, revision materials, exercises, worked solutions and videos aligned to the course. Your son may be able to get access to this at a reduced rate via this scheme: https://amsp.org.uk/teachers/a-level-further-mathematics/resources/

I better not to disclose more info about his inteded degree, as there were already some nasty people here, don't want to give them additional information to be more nastier. If he would allowed to do 3 A level at the beginning , he would be happy and he would have much better predicted grades than he has now and would apply to his favourite Uni. In current situation with his current predicted grades(which he can't change) he is not able to apply to his favourite Uni, but he can apply to others who offered similar degree, so he need this B in FM A-level ( not AS level), as it coud help him for certain Universities. If he drops FM A-level, there is no point for him to apply to these Unis. Hope it makes sence for you:)

A huge thank you for the link! It is appreciated!👏

I would like to thank everyone who was kind and helpful here! I do really appreciate it! You're wonderful peope!

It is bizarre to me that the school won't tell you the email addresses of the maths HoD or the Academic Deputy (sometimes called Director of Studies or something similar). If the email format is predictable (eg initial and surname) then could you guess that from looking at the staff list, which should be on their website? Or could you phone the Head of Year? Good luck!

Students can generally get the email addresses of teachers from their email address book so it might be worth looking there.

Lots of schoolsdon't give out personal emails – neither my kids' school nor the one I work at. They encourage use of a general mailbox which will be forwarded promptly to the correct person on request. It's just easier to keep track of what's coming in this way. (I guess if there was something very confidential, you could explain this and maybe get a direct email).

some schools have a policy of allowing parents direct emails, some schools have a policy of all emails going through a central admin email to be forwarded. Neither is right or wrong, it is just a decision by the school how they want emails organised

There is a shortage of maths teachers, particularly at A level so teachers are used where the largest numbers can be taught. Sounds like your DS needs to change to a school which can offer a FM timetable or change subjects.

Well, I've learned something today! I haven't personally encountered a school where individual staff email addresses are withheld, but obviously I have limited experience here.