Home Ed/online school for sixth form?

[Pleasedontdothat]

Any experience? DD’s doing her GCSEs this summer and has found school increasingly difficult due to anxiety and possible ASD (no formal diagnosis but she displays lots of traits - we have two older boys with ASD).

She’s currently at an academically selective school and should get good grades this summer - as long as we can keep her in school for the rest of the year which isn’t 100% guaranteed...

She’s been asking if she can leave school and do A-levels at home - she wants to do chemistry, biology and psychology and currently wants to be a vet although I’m not sure she’s cut out for it as she gets very stressed very easily.

The only people I know who’ve home schooled their children did so at primary school age and they went back into mainstream school for secondary.

Is it possible to do mostly science A-levels not at school or college? How does it work? Online schooling? I’m feeling quite at sea but having had my middle child drop out of school halfway through sixth form because of severe depression I don’t want to risk that happening to dd too

How would your DD do the practical elements of the science A Levels st home?

I understand that it can be done, but isn't easy. Have a look at this wiki relating to home educating science A-levels: he-exams.wikia.com/wiki/Science_A-levels

It may be worth looking at alternative qualifications such as Open University courses as a stepping stone to a bricks-and-mortar university.

Also have a browse round that entire home ed exams wiki site. On the main page you will find links to forums where you can discuss the details further.

Try Interhigh.

She'll need physics or maths for vet science.
Also, she needs to think about how she'd cope at university and in her chosen profession.

Thanks - I’m going to have a ‘look’ at Interhigh as that might work

There seem to be quite a few places that offer ‘crash’ practical courses so while I suspect it’s not as good as having science labs on tap that element of the A-level is possible

She’s doesn’t enjoy maths although she doesn’t find it that difficult (on course to get an 8) so she didn’t want to spend a third/quarter of her A-level time on it and thinks physics would probably be too hard without maths.

We’ve checked and it’s only Glasgow and Cambridge that insist on maths or physics - all the others just specify biology and chemistry and a couple specifically say that having maths or physics doesn’t confer any advantage.

However, I have strong reservations about how she’ll cope with the stresses of university let alone the reality of being a vet but that might be something she has to work out for herself over the next couple of years

I’d be keen to talk to other parents whose teenagers have done/are doing this if there are any on here?

I’d be keen to talk to other parents whose teenagers have done/are doing this if there are any on here?
If you join your local home ed group on Facebook you should be able to get first hand advice there.

Join the Facebook group that I assume is linked from the exam wiki Saracen linked. If it isn't it is called something like Home Education Exams and Alternatives. I know several people on that group who are doing/planning on foing Science A'levels at home. It is difficult but doable. However you need to expect to have to travel some distance to do the practical element and budget that it will not be cheap.
Psychology I don't know if it has any practical element if so it might not be doable, the Facebook group is the better place to ask.

I know of a girl locally, home educated from day 1 so no school, who did A Levels at home in one year and is now doing Medicine at Cambridge/Oxford. A friend of mine plans to do the same with her daughter although they’re not yet at GCSE stage.

I suggest you spend the rest of the year researching exam centres. I assume you’d need to find centres willing to help with the practical elements too but I’m not sure. It’s certainly possible anyway!

As a vet those who take the course without maths a-level struggle there is a huge amount of mathematical calculation in veterinary medicine. That would be my first concern.
Secondly to survive as a vet you need to hugely resilient to complete the course and even more resilient cope with the pressures of practice. Sadly on a daily basis you are accused of only being interested in money and not caring about the animals. A really hard thing deal with when all of us are here to improve the health of animals. 25% of graduates leave the profession in the first five years.
It would be really worth her looking at animal behaviour or animal science.

I would encourage her to write to practices now to book work experience after GCSEs to see the reality of practice life.

Thanks

@lonecat - our own vet has said she can come and do work experience with him whenever she wants. I definitely have my doubts about whether she’s resilient enough and it’s interesting that so many new graduates drop out. She really wants to work with horses and I think she’s fastened on the idea of being a vet as that’s one of the jobs she knows exist iyswim.