Missed Out on Uni Place – Advice on Resits, Gap Year & Moving Forward

[RainWarning]

Hi everyone, I’m hoping for some advice or perspective as we’re a bit lost at the moment.

My DS received his A-Level results, A, A, and B in History (A in their EPQ). Unfortunately, he missed his offer to study Law at a great university by one grade. Understandably, he’s devastated as this was a course and university he’d worked hard for.

He decided not to go through clearing for Law, and with his current grades, he wouldn't get into other universities like Warwick, Nottingham etc as they all need AAA. His original backup plan was to take a gap year and reapply for History, but with a B in History, that doesn’t seem viable for competitive courses either.

So now he’s taking a year out, but his confidence and motivation have taken a big knock, and we’re struggling to figure out the best next steps. Options we’ve considered:

Resitting History to try for an A and reapply for Law
Retake the LNAT - again no guarantee of sucess and don't find out your scores until after you've applied...
Taking a new A Level (though this would be as a private candidate, with little teaching support and we have no idea about the issue of predicted grades).
Looking into alternative courses he could access with his current grades.

One concern is the uncertainty and pressure of resits and whether universities would consider a new A-Level taken in one year. Another concern is whether it’s better to move forward with the grades he has and explore different subjects/courses that interest him, even if it's not Law.

We’re also trying to make the most of the gap year. He has been offered part-time work 2 days a week, remote by a relative but this won't get him out of the house. I'd like to encourage him to volunteer too but he’s feeling so low right now that it’s hard to help him see this year positively. Also if he wants Law he should probably be trying to get some Law related work experience.

If anyone has experience with resits, reapplying, or making the most of a gap year after disappointment, I’d really appreciate your insights. Has anyone's DC, or themselves, been in a similar situation and come out the other side?

Thank you in advance — any advice or ideas would be very welcome.

I think he could do the part time job with relative and resit History. With only one subject to focus on he should accept it. He could get a tutor for 3 months to sharpen exam skills before resit. He can reapply next year. I understand why he wants the best unis for law because top law firms recruit from the best unis.

His local council will have a legal dept. Apply to do work experience or even an admin job there.

If he had received a C grade in History it would have made sense for him to resit

I just don’t think it is worth investing another year to do an A Level where he has already achieved a B. What happens if he gets another B? Will be even more demoralising for him
He appears to have missed the clearing for decent law courses this year
At this point his best bet is to apply to other universities with grades in hand .
Meanwhile , he should get a part time job and also get some work experience ( local solicitors would be a good idea.)

@RainWarning Hi, which university was he keen to go to? As (from memory, but I may be wrong) seem to remember that Oxford wants all the A-levels to be sat in the same year??. And may be same with Cambridge??

If that is the case, then a re-sit might not be worth it, in order to apply to that one again. But other universities do accept re-sits, so I suppose that would open up others (at AAA), so maybe worth it in that case :)

Your first paragraph makes no sense. Bristol had law in clearing. No one is suggesting a law degree from Bristol is second rate.
Law was also at Southampton, Sheffield and Cardiff. None of which I’d turn my nose up at

Magic Circle firms offer apprenticeships. Some are degree are degree apprenticeships and some are paralegal apprenticeships. All give you the framework to sit professional exams. Going to uni is only one route.

He needs to ring up and chat with universities for next year. Maybe do some short courses, apply for work experience. Reapply with those great grades in hand. Things don’t always go as we want them too. He is an adult now and it is up to him.

@bumbaloo Bristol didn’t have law in clearing. It’s LNAT and very oversubscribed. The other 3 are not LNAT and want AAA. I think I posted this earlier. He didn’t want clearing so it’s a moot point anyway.

My DD resat two Alevels this year for medicine having missed her offer first time. she went from ABB to AAA. It was a lot of work and a tough year. We initially thought about a gap year and then just studying later on and being an external candidate. School advised she attend lessons she negotiated 3 days in. Their advice was that it is hard to get up to A/A*and it’s easy to miss the grade again without attending classes. She would have gone to a clearing place like a shot last year,if your DS can go this year I would encourage him. Medicine had a lot of limits on whether you can do any resits. There’s a lot of evidence that there is no difference in performance of doctors who go to Oxford or a new med school like Lancaster. One of the most successful lawyers I know ( a partner in a huge firm) did Law at a uni that had been a poly a few years before

@bumbaloo You have no idea about the numbers of apprenticeships at magic circle do you? They are like hens teeth. Plus anecdotally used to bolster employment stats in under represented employees. Freshfields take 6 apprentices for solicitor roles in London but 100 graduates. Both routes probably have horrendous odds of success. The aim was to have 100 solicitor apprentices in the whole of London by 25/26. I don’t know if this happened but it’s nowhere near equivalent to the numbers of TCs offered in London to grads.

The Aberdeen course is English law. As I said.

<There’s a lot of evidence that there is no difference in performance of doctors who go to Oxford or a new med school like Lancaster.>
Actually the evidence that is out there points the other way as might be expected. For example success in medical postgraduate exams appears to correlate directly with universities associated with higher academic attainment (photo of some study data shown below). I would be very surprised if it were different for law.

Does he want to be a lawyer? My DD originally applied for law but clanged her mind to criminology because she was interested in the law and crime but didn’t actually want to practise law.

@flightissue It’s not near ANY networking for English students and would be a very left field choice. Difficult to get to and not easy to go to mini pupilages or interviews.

If I was him I’d go to the university I would do Law in if they let me today, to do a course, if possible in history and then ace the first year in that. If I liked the history still I’d keep going with that if not I’d transfer at that point to law. I wouldn’t advise sitting at home for a year or retaking. Onward is always easier.

Local government legal are absolutely inundated for entry level legal admin or paralegal. Legal admin roles attract young people with law degrees, sometimes masters often from decent universities as legal is such an over saturated market.
I know Op wasn’t interested in law clearing 2025 but there were some good options. If aiming for top 10 ranked/RG Queens Belfast was AAB for English students. I personally really rated their law offering. Cardiff was in clearing no grades advertised, Southampton BBB. None RG but well regarded for law Lancaster and Leicester were BBB.

You can’t transfer into law yr2. There’s compulsory modules for a qualifying law degree and yr 1 usually is intro to English legal system plus contract, tort sometimes criminal.

There were no LNAT universities in clearing 2025 for home English students, I looked at all law clearing again this year. 2024 only LNAT university I saw for English home students was Glasgow common law (English law)

I wasn’t suggesting he transferred to y2. Although I do know someone who did so it may be possible. No, I would repeat y1 so take 4 years at uni rather than a gap or retake year followed by three years.

I don’t know how recent your source is - the last time I saw that sort of data was about 15 years ago
the research I saw was recent and published in the US. I stand by the point though that the medical degree is absolutely equivalent and it doesn’t matter where you train. But I accept the uni ranking might be of more importance in Law

@Cakeandusername Southampton is Russell Group.

I think @Cakeandusername means Leicester and Lancaster are not RG.

Anywsy @RainWarning clearing’s brief moment has passed; hopefully your ds has a clearer plan now.

Southampton is RG, didn’t say it wasn’t. My comment about none RG just mentioned Leicester and Lancaster.
Southampton was lowest RG for law in clearing this year at BBB.

[edited by MNHQ at poster's request]

Sorry @Cakeandusername didn't see the full stop!

No problem 😊