Year 12 - 2024/25 - Support, Discussion and Looking After Each Other

[BlackBean2023]

A survival thread for Y12 parents (24/25) now that GCSEs are over and our young people move onto KS5

Best of luck to all those with exams coming up, whether they’re mocks or AS or even early A levels. Can’t believe it’s a whole year since GCSEs.

DD has provisional predictions of Astar Astar B - she did underperform in the economics mock, though it wasn’t quite as awful as she feared. But they are letting her retake the economics in September before the predictions have to be finalised.

Having thought her favourites were Edinburgh and Exeter, she’s now found a very interesting-sounding niche course at Manchester to look into.

UCAS goes live tomorrow!

@JustHereWithMyPopcorn well done to your DS on his maths and physics results what is the third ALevel he is doing? 52 pages what is his dissertation on ?

Good luck @Muchtoomuchtodo 7 that is a lot thankfully DS only has 2 1 this week and 1 next week.

@Waspie hope all the uni visits go well

@JessyCarr well done on the 2astars

@JessyCarr those are fab grades, hopefully she can get that grade up in September if she needs it for her chosen course.

@Tebheag (I always try and read your name in my head and never know how to say it! 😄) third subject is Chemistry but they haven't had a test on that in ages. He has some Chemistry competition this week but it's a national thing, I didn't quite listen hard enough for exactly what it is. The dissertation is a law one on juries, it's interesting but I don't want to read that with my coffee, I'm more of a trashy novel girl! 😂 Good luck with the exams this week and next!

I've just seen an email to DS2 saying they should already be writing their PSs but how do they do that without knowing what they are applying for??

Tricky one! But perhaps they could start writing something on Question 3?

Online character-counter tools are helpful to gauge how much text is needed for each of the questions. Max 4,000 characters (including spaces) for the whole statement, and min 350 per question. Content should not be repeated across the 3 questions, but if it could fit more than one it doesn’t matter where it goes as the whole statement will be read holistically.

The UCAS form will have an inbuilt character counter, so a separate tool is only needed if drafting outside that.

@JessyCarr I thought that but even that section wants you to relate it back to your course. If he could settle on a course he could easily crack on. DS1 knew what he wanted to do by yr11 so that was easy. Do you have a link for the character count that you could share please?

This one works for us:

https://charactercounter.com/

I know what you mean about relating it back, but for many young people there will be a finite list of work experience, volunteering, leadership etc stuff that they have done so may as well put it down and work out how to spin it to be relevant to the course later!

E.g. lots of these things will have provided skills like time management or ability to work under pressure, which will be useful whichever courses they apply for.

Thank you for that link. Oh yes, I agree with spinning what they do have, poor DS has very little but will have to word that to be useful!

Other skills to be exemplified in Q3 might include task planning and prioritisation, working to a deadline, resilience, empathy, problem-solving, communication, adaptability etc. Lots of stuff that will make them a good student, whatever the subject.

@JustHereWithMyPopcorn 😂 it's pronounced Che Vake. Means little one. I am either a trashy or thriller story person, but tonight it's maths papers as agreed to mark DS paat papers. Would rather read about Jury's 🤔

Has anyone else's kid not sorted work experience ?

I’m very impressed with DD’s revision efforts, it makes such a difference doing subjects she likes!

She has to have her PS done by the end of the summer term but hasn’t started on it yet - after exams I expect.

She’s decided not to take driving lessons until after uni. She isn’t 17 til August and the combination of lessons/y13/oxford application is too much pressure, and even though we live in the sticks she doesn’t really want to learn to drive. Big relief for me financially! I have said I will pay for her lessons after uni but at least then she should be able to pay the insurance and it will be that much cheaper too with her being older. And my car will be about 18 years old so by then I’ll be happy to hand it on - if I can save enough to replace it .

She’s also handed in her notice at work for similar reasons. I can provide her with pocket money again as I’m not paying for driving lessons. Great selfcare and balancing going on although she will miss the money as I’ll only be giving her a third of what she was earning - she is hoping to pick up seasonal summer work after her a levels to provide a bit of a float for uni.

Morning,

Wow @JessyCarr well done to your DD on those grades, it may be better for her now she can concentrate on the B knowing she can get A*s in the others already.

@Waspie are you looking forward to the open days? I am actually, I enjoyed going with DD1 but that was years ago. Even when I went to uni as a mature student I took my own mum to Leeds uni and she loved learning about all the courses she'd never heard of before!

@Countrylife2002 DD has not started to think about PS yet either but they have a week dedicated to it at school from 16 June so I'm not mentioning it atm. She is into mock revision and has her driving theory next week so I am treading carefully around her for now 😂. She did say what a bad time her theory test is, which I am aware of but she wants to pass her practical by the end of the year and with a 6 month wait for practical tests she could do with getting it out of the way. She also has work experience, a trip to Paris and UCAT prep coming up so feels like there will never be a good time.

DD has reduced her p/t job hours for now but will not give up (I think the change of scenery does her good too). I have work colleague with one doing GCSEs and the other A levels this year and she was talking to me about it yesterday. Brought back the stress I used to have waiting for DD to message me on how each exam went! Not sure how stressed DD will get in a couple of weeks doing her mocks, but my guess is ridiculously, so got that to look forward to!

Good luck for those sitting exams this week.

I am getting very nervous about mocks. DS seems to be fine.

It is so interesting to hear you all going to so many open days. DS flat-out refuses to miss any school days, so it is pretty limited where we can go.
There is one open day DS wants to go to alone becausewe are busy. Hmm. Not sure about that.

DH does not want to go to any open days until we know DS's predicted grades.

We had a long school presentation on UCAS, which was very useful.

@Tebheag I would never in a million years have guess at that pronunciation so thank you! Do you pronounce the 'e' at the end of vake or is it like take? Hope the maths marking was fun!

@Wehaditsogood DS has booked with his friend to go to Bath, I have offered to take him but I think they want to do it on their own by train. So far we have taken him to the other ones.

Oh goodness, personal statements already. Time really is flying by. DS' school haven't mentioned PS yet - I suspect that it will be closer to the end of term before they look at this.

Congratulations @JustHereWithMyPopcorn and @JessyCarr on your DC's wonderful mock results! I'm pleased to hear that your daughter's economics exam results were not as bad as she had feared JessyCarr. The Manchester course sounds interesting. The university will have a very different vibe from Edinburgh or Exeter.

Most of the open days we are going to are on Saturdays @Wehaditsogood . The reason we are going to so many is because DS insists that he wants to go to University in London and I (well DH and I) want him to consider campus/smaller city options too. He likes team sports and he just wouldn't have the same opportunities for these in London. I think it's the "safety blanket" option for him of being close, but not too close, to home that attracts him to London. I've also spoken to friends with older children who regret delaying open days until the Autumn and/or going to too few. I don't think we can be accused of going to too few!

I am looking forward to them @bluefineliner - DH and I are splitting the joy and only one of us will accompany DS each time. I missed out on Open Days - I just applied blindly from prospectuses and went where I was accepted! I hope you enjoy your trips with your daughter I'm sure your daughter will be fine with her theory test. DS told me afterwards that, despite my nagging, he only began looking at the practice tests in the 4 in 1 app the morning of his test. He said it's mostly common sense.

Is sounds like a good decision by your daughter to not worry about driving lessons until after university @Countrylife2002. DS has had a few, and he has a driving test booked in October, but I can see him dropping the lessons and cancelling the test if he is set on London for university as he will want to save as much money as he can.

@JustHereWithMyPopcorn DS would go alone. My main problem is that it is one of the London unis. Hardly affordable for us anyway. DH convinced DS not to choose LSE, but he found another he likes.

DH and I cannot cancel the family event we go on that open day. It is OK if DS doesn't come, but we need to be there.

@waspie I would love to go to a lot of open days, too. But most of them are on the same three Saturdays in June 🤷‍♀️

I just chose the local LSE-type uni (abroad), so I haven't been to an open day either.

I think driving lost its priority here as well.

DD has decided she wants to go to a Manchester open day with a friend in June. Both so keen to be independent, they have gone ahead and registered for the event and were just about to book train tickets when I pointed out that they’d get 50% off with a 16-17 railcard. Seems I still have my uses!

@Wehaditsogood Could he go with a friend to the London one? Alternatively they all do online tours now which is useful if you can't make the real thing. We also have multiple open days on the same weekend, we will need to decide which ones to go to but it is very annoying that there isn't some sort of co-ordination with these things, maybe unis close to each other could do the same day so you could at least get two in. I think we have Birmingham and Notts on the same day, and Bath and Bristol on the same day? He'll only do the Bristol if I take them, no way he can do both. We're only going to do Notts if Birmingham is quickish, his brother is at Notts so he's very familiar with the campus and town.

@JessyCarr DS has a railcard, it does make a significant difference on train costs.

You don't sound the e same as when you say take but with the v instead of the t.
Maths marking definitely not fun as he had a bad score 🙈

Did he do the past paper at home? DS always used to do worse at home than in actual exams, I think he would get distracted. Perhaps the same for your DS?

@JustHereWithMyPopcorn DS did say he does better in class on past papers time will tell.

We have had to juggle open day bookings too. DS is going to Birmingham rather than Nottingham. I think KCL was 28th too, so we've booked the September date. Luckily UCL also has an open day on Friday 27th so DS will go to that (the school allow a maximum of 3 days off for open days).

Bristol offer 20% off rail fares for open days if you book via their link. I've booked tickets for DS (with his railcard) and me for less than £60 return in total. Durham clashes with Bristol and Bath. Luckily (?) for DS Bath don't do his subject and he's ruled out Durham as too far away.

LSE's was during the Easter break. I'm a little surprised more universities don't offer an open day during the Easter holidays.

Cambridge have sent out online sessions to prepare for their open day and two of these sessions are on the same dates as the Oxford open days, which I'm sure they are very aware of!

Edited to clarify that the Cambridge online prep. sessions begin at 5pm so, technically, no overlap with Oxford open day timings but, in reality, students are likely to be travelling.

Might see you at Brum then @Waspie! 😀 Interesting about the Bristol discount will look at that.

I think the Cambridge Oxford thing is probably deliberate, you're only allowed to apply for one and they rudely want you to make up your mind before attending!