Did your DC drop an A level grade but still get accepted by the uni they firmed?

[WonkyTree25]

Did anyone’s DC miss a grade or two from their predictions and still get their firm? If so would you be willing to share which course and grades they still got accepted on?

Youngest DC applying to unis and weighing up choices. Her brothers did not achieve their predictions and lost their places in '21 and '22. DS1 dropped two grades AAA to ABB (Notts Psych) and DS2 one grade AAA to AAB (Bristol history). DS1 applied the year after the cohort given teacher assessed grades so there was very little in clearing - he did an unrelated subject with lower req’ts at Notts. DS2 in 2022 went to his insurance. Read that 2025 was a bit easier due to reduced int’l students and Covid pressures easing and I don’t see why this would change for the 2026 cohort but you never know! UCAS historical grades haven’t been updated for 2025 so there is no updated info for comfort! Remembering the stress of sorting DSs and it’s impacting our advice for DD, her school want her to be more ambitious but DH and I are stressing realism (and we have one of each in her choices but its the last three)! I fully appreciate things could change again this year but just curious about a general trend as in 21 and 22 unis were very, very inflexible and oh so easy to miss a grade by one or two marks. Thanks!

As someone has already said you still need high predicted grades to get an offer in the first place. I think this is what makes it hard to apply with grades in hand because if these are lower than the required grades for an offer then you don't even get an offer despite the grades potentially being what would have been accepted through clearing.

That's a fair point @AuntyBulgaria.

Clearing's such a lottery and I wouldn't want to rely on it, but the same logic applies with unis who do accept lower grades than their standard offers from firm offer holders in practice. I gave a couple of examples upthread of unis who'd be mad to reject someone who's already holding A levels a grade or two below their standard offer. I don't know how strict they are with grades of grades-in-hand applicants.

Yes. Ds last year missed his second A star last year and got an A but still got his A star in maths and was accepted into Warwick for Economics. He did 4 A levels including Econ and further maths.

His predicted grades were based on homework grades, end of topic tests marks, end of year 12 grades, attitude to learning so joining in in class, homework handed in on time etc, not on the average for what you achieved for GCSEs.

However, his teacher was surprised he didn't get the A star and they requested his script as he was only a couple of marks off. They could see that whoever was marking had missed a few correct answers so a remark would see him with the A star. But on a "remark" review his mark didn't change. Very frustrating and I trust the incredible teacher who has been teaching it for 20 years not the person marking it who maybe isn't teaching it. Ds did get full marks on the NEA component of that subject.