Sadness of Open Days

[Gemauve]

So on the stand this morning at 0905, I was approached by a charming woman and her keen, enthusiastic daughter. It's the first university they're visiting, in fact the first university that either of them has ever been to, but they're really looking forward to ... and they reel off a list of good places. Daughter really wants to do our subject, and has clearly checked out the top places.

And what A Levels are you doing?

Ah.

Well, you can't come here, and for what it's worth, we're slightly more relaxed than the other places you've named and I know that you won't be able to go to any of them to do our subject or anything even vaguely related. I didn't say "and on past experience from when we were even more relaxed to the point that we might have admitted you, you would almost certainly fail, and the last cohort where we did that less than 5% of them made it to finals". Sorry.

"My school said these subjects would be ideal".

They're catastrophically wrong. Did you look at any prospectuses before choosing your subjects? No. And off they went, their hopes destroyed by 0915.

What the fuck are schools playing at? Why do they let children who don't have middle class parents get into this situation?

I thought it might be. It beats me why so few people grasp that traditional academic subjects are traditional for a reason.

Does your university have a route in through an access course?

In theory. In practice, we'd recommend a foundation year, but of course there are serious funding issues there.

TheHH, if your son wants to progress in nursing, he will need a degree and it will do him a lot of good to have a Master's in due course. A good foundation of academic and study skills gained through A levels will be a big help. I've seen a lot of very bright, capable nurses do really well at Master's level but for a lot of them it was a very steep learning curve at first, having previously got a diploma rather than a degree.

Hormonal DS1 has no clue what he wants to do at University or even if he wants to go at all. He has chosen subjects he is good at for A Level for now. If bridges have been burnt then it can't be helped at this stage.

He is doing a degree Gasp and he'd have still been doing a degree after a BTech. It would have been easier for him to get practical work experience with the BTech because it's part of the course. With A levels he's had to go to school full time and do volunteering outside school hours, as well as homework and a weekend job.

Exactly Sparkling I think that's what a lot of teens do, tbh.

The Russell Group advice on facilitating subjects should be given to everyone choosing A level subjects.

Choosing what you like the sound of and are good at is obviously important, but just as a 5yo can't say 'I don't enjoy writing so I will do painting instead' a 16yo is not going to be well advised to say 'Well, I don't like Maths and I find it quite hard so I'll do something easier instead but then I still expect to be able to get onto the kind of degree course that leads to a good job'.

I don't think many 16 year olds have decided which university course they want to do.

I think most choose what they are good at.

I agree, which is why the choice of subjects needs to keep as many doors open as possible. If you decide to give up Maths or Chemistry or all languages, you should know which doors you're closing by doing that.

I think most choose what they are good at.

If you're at an academic school, and choose your A Levels at random based on what you did well in at GCSE and what you fancy, you'll end up with the admission requirements of a bunch of decent degrees, because given the menu, it's hard to choose a bad meal. They just don't offer the weak qualifications.

They essentially "bake in" the RG Informed Choices guide.

If you're not at a school like that, the choosing "what [you] are good at" strategy should come with a health warning, that you may end up doing A Levels which are not acceptable for many/most/any degrees.

I don't know what history A levels are like today, but mine, in the dim and distant past, didn't only teach me about history. It taught me to read a text and extract relevant information; to construct an argument and back it up with relevant evidence and examples; to write an essay in clear grammatical English which actually answered the question that was asked, and in an exam to do it within a time limit. Those are all transferable skills which will be useful in any walk of life.

This makes me so angry!

My Dniece is in Y8 and spent Wednesday at a university, being shown around, given a couple of lectures and were given a talk on A level options.

IMO this kind of thing should be compulsory for Y8 children who might be university material.

My DS is in Year 8 but don't think he would be up for a trawl of a University just yet. he is very excited that he will be able to drop subjects for Year 9 though and has already chosen.

Because of the way league tables are so "important" to govt and many parents, it's in the schools interest to push their students to take the subjects will do best in.

A relative of mine with aspirations of studying law studied unsuitable A levels, she wouldn't take advice from me or the school. Her parents insisted they knew better. It will be interesting to see how she gets on with her applications next year.

What do you need for Law human?

What do you need for Law human?

The usual problem is that university departments are about A Level Law (at one point, a couple of departments would accept it as an A Level), and actually want top-quality humanities A Levels. History is probably the #1 A level in their eyes.

Wouldn't accept it as an A level

I would rely on a school to tell me.

If that school is Eton, you'd be OK.

If it's your local FE college, not so much.

Sadly.

"Why wouldn't you do some research with your children?"

It's the 'unknown unknowns' problem. If you left school at 15 with no qualifications, how could you be expected to know that, for example, an Economics degree would require maths A level. Or even to know that you need to ask the question 'which subjects will I need'.

A friend's son is doing law and the only A level I can remember that he did was drama. Can't remember the others.

I went with what the school advised, which was luckily good advice. My parents had no idea about universities. I only knew that Oxford and Cambridge were good unis, I had never heard of The Russell Group unis until I actually started at university.
I don't think many people realise how difficult it is when you know nothing about a subject. How could I have known to find out about the Russell Group Unis when I didn't even know the concept existed?
I found out what university was rated good for my course. Oxford and Cambridge were not. So I went to a non RG University instead.

I was astonished at the poor A-level subject advise my DS received at what was considered an academically excellent state school.

Fortunately although I'm not MC I was capable enough to use Google as was he, so able steer him away from Critical Thinking and Advanced Maths (as already selected Maths), these 2 extra unsuitable AS options would have prevented him securing a place at Medical School.

It is a bit issue for some youngsters though, unfortunately many teachers and careers advisors are very out of date with the resources they use to advice pupils.

Out of interest OP what stops your institution offering integrated year 0s? There shouldn't be any funding barriers to either institution or student.