Moving with a 16 year old

[MumoffourLiv]

Hi, we are moving to Scotland from Liverpool next spring / summer (2024) and our eldest will then be 16 years old and completed his GCSE’s and his last year of high school. He his hoping to go to university and so will need Scottish Highers / Advanced highers. But I’m starting to realise that kids his age would’ve already started studying for these and he would possibly be a year behind? Is this right? Does anyone have any clue how this would work and what we could do to help with the transition?

No he’ll be starting highers with his peers. We don’t do them a year earlier here. Nationals are gcse equivalents taken in s4 (5th year high school in England) and then when he’d be doing AS/A1 (aS5 here) he’ll start highers.

Ah right that makes sense! I think I got confused as he started high school at 11 so this is his fifth year. Thanks so much for clearing that up!

That advice above is a bit misleading. I'm a careers adviser.
Whilst you can do Highers in either S5 or S6, if you wanted to do Advanced Highers, many schools won't allow this unless you've done Highers first.
Also, if he's planning on going to a university in Scotland, the number of Highers that university asks for may only be achieved over 2 years.
In other words, if they ask for 5 A grades and someone only achieves 5 B grades in S5, they would be able to study more highers in S6 to increase their prospects.
Someone who only studies Highers in S6, and doesn't get the 5 As, may have to look for an alternative course.
If a Scottish based student is applying to an English university, many of these universities ask for Advanced Highers, which again normally require you to have done the Highers first.
So you need to think about his future career plans, what university he will go to, what they ask for from Scottish students etc.
Oh and in terms of funding for university, you might want to check if you need to have lived in Scotland for more than a year to be eligible for free tuition fees. I haven't looked recently (as we've always lived in Scotland) but you should check.

If he's just done GCSEs he won't go into his last year of school. He will go into S5 to do highers and then S6 the year after to do Advanced highers/more highers. It just means he'll be at the older end age-wise for his year.

2 other things to be aware of. The higher courses start in June, after the Nat 5 exams which are April/May. Most higher courses are fine after GCSEs but not all of them dovetail well with the gcse course. There was a poster on here a couple of years ago who's son had done GCSEs and was now doing highers. 2 of them had a lot of unfamiliar content he hadn't started at GCSE so check that out .

The other option, if you could afford it, is that some of the independent schools offer A-levels and International Baccalaureate. I think he'll find highers less of a jump from GSCE than A-level although the syllabuses could be quite different. I know someone who's gone from the scottish school exams to an english university and found a number of modules built on topics from A-level which he'd never covered.

Although the new course usually starts in June, lots of students do switch over subjects in August. Important thing to remember is that the school go back in the middle of August - if you're expecting it to be September he will miss even more!

Thank you! Yeah I think he will probably be fine. We knew about the August intake, (my sis lives there but only has a wee one, so we spend a lot of time there, but wasn’t fully aware of the school situation for the older ones) so we’re planning on getting up there by June / July as soon as he’s finished his exams.