To think universities should state separate entry criteria for Indies?

[Wacamole]

DD who is on track for 3A*s at A’level, thought she’d give Oxbridge a go after being encouraged by her teachers. All very excited, doing super curriculars etc. Only just been told she doesn’t meet minimum entry criteria that would be expected from an Indy, which is straight 9s. She doesn’t have straight 9s, she has straight 8s (couple of nines), not only that, the course she wanted to apply for at Cambridge doesn’t require Maths at all, but school has advised they won’t even look at her if she doesn’t do Maths AND Further Maths. She is doing neither. Apparently an EPQ is also mandatory even though none of this is mentioned on Cambridge website.

All this second guessing, reading between the lines has been really confusing.
I have no issue with universities asking for higher entry criteria for students from indies for obvious reasons but wish they would be more transparent and state this on their ‘Entry requirements’ same way they state contextual offers?

@mumsneedwine

Gunmen get over 40,000 a year?? Hmmmm

About the same salary as a junior doctor/ academic or senior nurse?

Might lead to a lot of equal pay claims from cleaners etc.??

However if you wish to medicine as a career are you approaching getting high
STEM A levels with the an inherent passion for the subjects or a source of personal enlightenment? I would imagine a lot of medics may want to get high grades simply to enter the profession.

I'm not sure if I understand the question. Firstly, I would make the point that I'm not approaching this in any particular way at all. It is my dd who has chosen medicine as her preferred path, and it is my dd who will choose how she approaches her A-levels.

As far as her choice of subjects is concerned, I think the desire to pursue a career in medicine has certainly played a part, but that in turn was sparked by a particular interest in the medical topics that she studied in year 9 biology. Having thought long and hard about career options, she felt that medicine was a career that would play to her academic strengths as well as her people skills and her desire to make a difference. I guess that decision has largely dictated her choice of A-levels.

Does she have a particular passion for the subjects that she is going to do at A-level? I'm not actually sure that she does tbh. She loves all of her GCSE options equally, and could very easily have gone down a different route. She does find her chosen subjects really interesting, but it is my impression that she just enjoys learning in lots of different areas tbh. Does she have a real flair for the subjects that she has chosen for A-level? Yes, absolutely, but again, she has an equal flair for some of those which she is dropping.

As for what will motivate her to work for high grades, I don't actually think she would know how to do anything else. She has never been strategic with her effort in any way. She just works incredibly hard at everything she does - both academic and extracurricular - because she wants to do the best she can. She won't be focusing on getting high grades because that's what she needs to get into medicine. She'll be focusing on performing to the very best of her ability because that is how she approaches everything - even subjects like PE that she isn't naturally that good at.

Medicine is very much a profession where academic attainment is used a filter. Also a career where possibly fulfilment may be achievable but happiness at times may be debatable.

Happiness and fulfillment are pretty subjective things, I guess. DD has determined that, in order to be happy, she needs to feel that she is fulfilling her potential and making a positive difference to others. She feels that medicine will offer her a route to do this. She understands that there will be significant challenges, but she also understands that she is the type of person who thrives when challenged. She is talking to people in the profession to get a better understanding of what those challenges might be. She is going in with her eyes as wide open as they can be.

Ultimately, none of us really know what our choices will hold for us. I went in to my absolute "dream career" a few years after graduating. I left a few years later because I absolutely hated it! It's therefore important for our kids to know that they can change direction at any time!

@mids2019 not sure how much gunmen earn but binmen earn a good wage 😊. Like tube drivers - it's a good job ! Why should it not ? Without them we'd be living in rubbish dumps so I think they do a valuable not very nice job.

Those who are binmen may actually, given the choice, prefer not to do a not very nice job. I don't see anyone can argue it's not a valuable job. That's a completely different point.

The poster @Empressofthemundane was talking about schools (in particular, a selective independent) then went on to say "life is unfair".

I know. My point was that there is a lot of unfairness within comprehensive schools, and that the state/indie divide is only a part of the social mobility picture. I don't personally feel that my dd is at any disadvantage as a result of going to a state comp - I'd have sent her private if I did - but I do recognise the many layers of disadvantage that impact on some of her peers.

@AlexaShutUp your DD sounds a sensible young lady with a sensible mum. My DD hated maths but was v good at it so took it at A level. Wouldn't say she had a passion for either biology or chemistry but did those because she knew she had to. Loved her EPQ though, which was medically related. She got 4 medicine offers so they all saw something about her to think she can make a good doctor. She will never be top of the class in written exams but in patient contact ones she scores very highly. She likes the patients, likes diagnosing and listening to them. She'll find her niche, but for now is loving CP1.

Bold fails...sorry!

It is important children have skills for life and can adapt to whatever happens in life. That is one thin good state and private schools try to teach and one reason things like hobbies, fitness and overall education are just as important as exam grades. My suggestion to my 5 is pick work you will enjoy and is intellectual challenging, secondly pick work ideally which is high paid as you might be all pure marxist at 18 but when you have to pay the rent and keep two teenagers you might regret having no money and thirdly ideally pick work where you can set up on your own and work for yourself. My grandfather set up his own business in 1904 (surveyor, estate agent and valuer) and his brother in the 1890s in Leeds as a solicitor. I set up on my own as a solicitor in 1994 and love that feeling that I work and I keep the money and I am responsible for everything.

I would certainly not put children off doing medicine, not least because you can do exactly as I said at leat in London - set up privately and work for yourself if you want to do so. I have an NHS doctor (consultant) sibling as indeed was my father and his brother. 4 of my 5 children are lawyers or law students currently. I think law like medicine is a good recession proof career where you can do some work when times are hard such as more litigation or loan work and then in good times other parts of law thrive. We tend always to need doctors too.

I've just checked our local website and several jobs are being advertised for very little more - pennies more - than the NLW.

Jobs on the bins are very coveted round here, for the tips as much as anything else, but the basic wage is more like £17-18,000, before anyone decides to send their DC to refuse collector college.

Thank you for your kind comments @mumsneedwine. I'm glad that your dd is enjoying it so much - that's encouraging to hear.

But someone has to get low grades / they are worked out on a bell curve. If everyone got over 90% then 90% would be a 1.

There will be 4s and 5s in any class is that right

How fixed is it and what is the lowest someone needs to get to fit the bell curve?

What happens in a school which only takes very top students?

Personally I’ve had very good experience with state comp so far and no barrier to 9s if student is able. Also about to use selective. My questioning usually comes from a place of what is the added value of paying, we did a mix private / state for primary. Quite different in drivers but outcome not undermined in state.

My point is that many things in life are subjective, rules change, very few things in life are absolutely objective.

And whether your child is state, private, selective, non selective, etc. It will never be “fair.”

So it’s always best to be somewhat flexible and learn to adapt and recover from disappointments and obstacles.

Also, other people’s lives often look easy from a distance when they are anything but.

@AlexaShutUp

Seem very laudable reasons for doing medicine and possibly better than 'it s s family thing' which was an attitude at my school (years ago). I knew a guy who wanted to be an ophthalmologist at 13 as this was the parental expectation to some extent.

Good luck to your daughter and talking to people in the profession (in an honest fashion) seems entirely sensible.

Thank you @mids2019. Definitely not a family thing - I was good at science but totally uninterested, so it never occurred to me to go down that route. DH wasn't that way inclined either, though tbh, he came from the kind of background where it wouldn't have felt achievable in any case.

DD is very like me with regard to many of her interests, and so I always just assumed that she would probably go down the arts/humanities route. I think she probably did too, tbh, as she didn't show much inclination for science until around year 9 when it suddenly got interesting. I actually think medicine will be a very good fit for her, though, so I'm glad I wasn't in charge of her career options!

So it’s always best to be somewhat flexible and learn to adapt and recover from disappointments and obstacles.

That I can wholeheartedly agree with @Empressofthemundane. Life is full of curve balls, wherever you were educated!

One thing about fairness (or lack there of) in opportunities is looking to see how (and if) it should be addressed.

I think that if you have well educated parents who have a reasonable income and willing to invest in their child's education then the odds are very much stacked in your favour (statistically).

If you have a parent who is Professor of something very clever at Oxford married to a Professor of something even cleverer at Cambridge then there is a good possibility you will have the environment/qualities to make a successful Oxbridge application yourself.

I think there is a little fear that the stated objectives of universities to recruit from disadvantaged backgrounds means that there will be those from more advantaged backgrounds losing out. The question would be is this to some small extent penalsing those parents that are well educated and have well educated children? I know this will be marginal in reality but it seems to be pertinent in the original post in that there (may) be a slightly higher bar set for university entrance for private school students.

I think everyone supports fairer access to education but I think there may be some sorry that inevitably middle class parents have a very (albeit slight) disadvantage.

@MarshaBradyo yes they will always be done 4 and 5s. Grade boundaries are set after exams have been marked so that there is a relatably stable amount of students getting each grade each year. This takes into a account differing difficulty in exams each year. There is no minimum therefore - first year of new GCSE maths history needed 70% to get a 9, because so few students scored that (lots if schools didn't manage to finish the new syllabus).

The question would be is this to some small extent penalsing those parents that are well educated and have well educated children?

I don't think it's penalising them as such. I think it's just slightly reducing the advantages that they have historically enjoyed. These are not the same thing.

Educated, aspirational parents have a huge impact on what children might achieve - far more, in my view, than the type of school that a child attends. It's very hard to adjust for this fairly in the admissions process, though.

My DH grew up (overseas) with parents who were completely illiterate. Some of his siblings are still illiterate. He is at least as intelligent as I am, but it's hard to underestimate the impact of that kind of start in life. It's an immense hurdle to climb.

We don't tend to see such extreme disadvantage in this country, but the differences are still very stark. It's difficult to know how we should begin to address this effectively, but I do think we have to try. A kid who excels despite their background has achieved far more than one who excels because of their background.

@mids2019 contextual is available for the minority of state school students. Most are judged the same as private. And I believe the massive advantages to students attending private school are no way out weighed by the disadvantage of going to a school where learning is a struggle.
Most comps can get kids achieving 9s, but will also get kids achieving 1s. Because they are comps. I think if you only mix in a selective school environment it's hard to understand why students can't get high grades. I can't draw and I'm sure for someone who can they can't understand why I can't.
Love the binmen fixation. And that people are actively looking for a job. This is for Manchester in case anyone fancies it (I don't ! But the one I know likes his job as it means he can spend lots of time with his family. And he enjoys the team camaraderie).

@AlexaShutUp your last paragraph puts it perfectly.

[quote mumsneedwine]@MarshaBradyo yes they will always be done 4 and 5s. Grade boundaries are set after exams have been marked so that there is a relatably stable amount of students getting each grade each year. This takes into a account differing difficulty in exams each year. There is no minimum therefore - first year of new GCSE maths history needed 70% to get a 9, because so few students scored that (lots if schools didn't manage to finish the new syllabus). [/quote]
Thanks Mums

One last question sorry, how does it work in a highly selective school?

Do they have to do the same? As wouldn’t that mean a very bright child could get a lower mark in a higher achieving class than they would in a mixed entry

Or is the system different
Thanks

I think the bell curve is set across the national cohort, not school by school.

Because they are comps. I think if you only mix in a selective school environment it's hard to understand why students can't get high grades. I can't draw and I'm sure for someone who can they can't understand why I can't.

I agree with this

@Empressofthemundane

I think the bell curve is set across the national cohort, not school by school.

Ok thanks makes sense