Theatre studies / drama A level - is it an enabling subject?

[CherryBlossomFestival]

Is theatre studies (drama) A level seen as being as academic as English or another more standard subject? I had assumed it was like music, but then saw that music was listed on the ‘enabling for humanities’ degree list on the Cambridge website, and drama wasn’t. In practice, is there a big difference between the two in terms of how universities would rate them?

Dd has narrowed her A level choices down to four, of which two are music and drama/theatre studies.

If two of your DD's A level choices are what I'd call "hard-core enabling" subjects, i.e. History, English Literature, Modern Languages, Maths, Physics etc, then she should be fine. Interestingly, my DD switched her A-level choice from Music to Drama at the beginning of term (she didn't like the Music course), and continued her music studies on a Saturday. Tbh, I was worried about the switch, as I thought that Music was highly regarded as a rigorous subject, but Drama less so. She was happy with that decision, and in the end, it didn't prevent her from getting into Cambridge.
Best of luck to her.

Thanks @cingolimama! She can start four and then drop one. Sounds like as long as she drops either drama or
music, and not one of her other two subjects (which are both on your list), then that should be fine.

She’ll do plenty of practical music and drama even if she doesn’t do the A level, but she likes the analysis side as well.

My hunch is that it’s not seen as a ‘core’ subject in the same way as Music or English.

I did Drama GCSE and it was the only subject I found difficult to get good marks in – practical was fine but the essays were very challenging. You have to be very sensitive to the nuances of acting and theatre/drama production.

I thought that might be the case. It’s odd, because the essays and analysis she has to do for drama GCSE seem a lot harder than the music GCSE equivalent. Maybe it’s just that Oxbridge offer music degrees and not drama degrees for historical reasons, so they see drama as a less serious subject, and that feeds through into what counts as an enabling A level?

Better an A in Theatre Studies than a B in Music if your DD's offer at Cambridge or other competitive entry uni down the line were to be AstarAA or AAA. Ultimately it is all about what subject best suits your DD (and so more likely to do best at) and what degree subject she is likely to want to take at uni. There is not some kind of prevailing view about subjects.

Cambridge's The Subject Matters pdf does say Theatre Studies is suitable preparation for courses such as English (in the sub-section about Other Subjects). LSE, with its often cited preferred subjects list, flags in the three asterisk footnote that Theatre Studies makes it to the preferred subject list for a number of its humanities courses; so the devil is in the detail.

Hi OP I agree with @PerpetualOptimist, she should take the subjects she will do best in. If it is about a Cambs offer, A star in any subject is better than B in history or maths.

The enabling or facilitating subjects list came about, I believe, because these were the subjects you needed to take to do some degrees, if that makes sense. In other words, you don’t need sociology A level to take sociology at uni; but you do (pretty much! before anyone calls me out on this) need Eng lit for Eng lit degree, or French (or at least an MFL) for French degree or maths for maths degree. The list then got picked up and run with as being a list of good subjects to take – and in a sense that is true – as in, if you might want to take a history degree, you are better to take history A level than politics A level (politics not required for anything).

But even with the Cambridge and LSE lists mentioned here, there is nothing to say that drama is an A level to avoid. If your DD will do better at drama than history, and wants to do a degree in music or drama rather than history, then that is what she would be best advised to take.

Thanks @clary! I’ve no idea which A level she’ll do better at, she’s predicted 8/9 across the board at GCSE (her school doesn’t predict 9s) and she’s very strong in both music and drama, and in the other more traditional essay subjects. Sounds like she should start all 4 as planned, and see which ones are going the best. I’m also curious that politics A level isn’t required even for politics degrees, is that because a lot of schools don’t offer it?

Yep exactly that. Also it’s about skills - essay writing and analysis which can come from lots of other subjects.

DD was interested in classical civ at uni and no specific A levels are required, just evidence of interest and appropriate skills. There are masses of uni courses of which that’s true tbh. Psychology, sociology, any kind of media or journalism course…

Which four is she planning btw? Music is a lot of work. Well I mean they all are. Four is a big ask imho.

English and History are the other two. Her school gets them all to start four and then they drop one, so it’s really about which one she’ll drop.

My daughter did chemistry, biology and drama. Had several offers for medical school.l and is now a doctor.

it was never an issue and probably helped with communication skills development.

DD does drama for A-Level. It is quite an intense course, 3 practical exams and the written ones.

They had to research a lot for their first exams (her school does it at the end of Y12), write their own piece in a prescribed style and now have to write a complex essay on top of it.

Definitely more challenging than GCSE drama.

The only issue we found, if the group work includes people who aren't reliable it does add stress to the whole experience. And it is time consumming with extra rehearsals under the week and on weekends.

A friend of ours is a lawyer and she said several lawyers she knows did drama for A-level.