GCSEs and beyond - advice please?

[SuzieHomemaker]

DD1 is now entering her GCSE years. She is doing mainstream academic topics including modern languages. She wants to go to university to study sciences but not sure what exactly yet which is fine.

What I need help with is how the whole AS, A2 thing works. How many AS levels should someone be aiming to take? How many A2s? I have seen so many stories of young people with bucket loads of qualifications failing to get in to university that I just dont know what is normal anymore.

Does anyone know of any good guides for parents on the next stages (AS, A2 and university application) please?

IME (selective grammar) they generally take 4 subjects at AS & drop 1 of them at A2. They also do General Studies, but that doesn't count towards admission.

Those doing maths/science often take more.

Probably not much help, sorry!

The usual path is to take four AS Levels, then drop one subject and carry on the remaining three to A2 level. It is possible to take more AS levels but schools can't always timetable to allow for a student to take more than 4. Many schools also run courses in AS/A2 Critical Thinking or General Studies - but neither of these would count as far as university offers are concerned and you can do General Studies AS without any preparation whatsoever.
Quite a lot of students carry on all 4 subjects for A2, particularly the most academic students but the standard university offer will be based on three A2s.

More schools are offering the extended project as an 'extra' as opposed to General Studies, which AFAIK counts towards UCAS points (equivalent to half an A-level).

Many thanks for the answers. Why do schools offer General Studies/Critical thinking for A level if universities arent interested? In my day (sabre toothed tigers were roaming the earth back then) A levels really were to do with getting ready for and applying to universities.

Look at the UCAS website, which has a list of all University courses and the entry requirements. I have yet to see a course asking for more than 3 A Levels.

The best guide for GCSE and beyond? MN of course.
One of the worst guides? Unless you are lucky, your school.

There seems to be a lot of confusion about General studies - lots of universities say they won't consider it but some use it as an extra factor if you just miss your offer (Birmingham have this on their website). DD1, who is about to start her second year at university, took the whole of General Studies A level in year 12 and got an A. Her sixth form just entered them with no teaching. She applied for Biological sciences and one of her offers was from Sheffield and instead of the standard ABB offer she was offered BB because she already had an A. I was quite surprised, in fact I think DD1 emailed the admissions tutor to check that it wasn't a mistake!

DD2 is two years younger than DD1 and has just started year 13 and now General studies isn't offered any more. I think maybe they thought the cost of entering the everyone for the exam wasn't worth it for a subject that isn't universally accepted.

There are two (?three) sides to the 'how many A Levels' question.
The student (and Universities) want enough to get on Uni courses. This means three good A Levels. Quality, not quantity.
Schools want to appear well in the league tables, where they are listed by UCAS tariff points (eg an A grade A Level is worth 120 points). So extra qualifications, like Critical Thinking, are quite useful to schools to bump them up the lists.

Thank you all. I shall read and inwardly digest the UCAS site (another change, it was UCCA in my day).

I guess that the school wont be offering assistance beyond GCSE as they dont have their own 6th form. If the advice for GCSEs was anything to go by then it wouldnt have amounted to a hill of beans anyway.

Are there any useful guides on personal statements please?

useful guide on personal statements = MN again

there are quite a few admissions tutors/partners of admissions tutors on here & their input is invaluable

Re Personal statements: when does your DD do work experience? has she got something science-y lined up?

Ponders I guess I am going to have to stop hanging around in the travel section and come up to the mark here in secondary education.

Senua - good thought about work experience. I am going to need to use some contacts and see if I can get some things lined up.

It is all so intensive these days! It's amazing that teenagers havent gone grey and bald before they enter sixth form.

Any road up, I am going to have to steel myself for a couple of years of intensive study just so that I have some inkling what the heck is going on.

At our High School the standard is to do 4 Ass and usually drop one for A2s. Its a very well respected and highly performing comprehensive. They don't seem to do much around General Studies or Critical thinking but they do offer langiuages tuition for those who want to add an extra, and some students do an additional GCS eg in a new langauge.

My DD did the Advanced Extension exams in 2 languages and these seemed to work in her favour with Cambridge when she missed out by one grade in her music A2. She is now studying languages.

If your DD needs to move to do sixth form, do start looking at sixth form colleges or other sixth form options. Do start asking them questions.

Which science does she want to study? Is she studying triple science now or double? How good is her maths?

Has she been on any Smallpiece Engineering courses, or other outside courses? Has she visited your local university? Is she looking at Oxbridge, if so has she visited? Does her school normally send to Oxbridge?

Good luck.

We've been advised that for science courses at university, tutors prefer you to do lots of science and maths A levels, rather than having a more diverse selection. I think the trend this days is often to go for a bit of a mix of sciences/humanities/languages at A level, but interesting that while arts subjects are quite happy for some science etc in the A level mix, many science courses actually prefer a narrower range.

So for AS choices maths + 2 sciences + either f. maths or another science would be a very strong combination. You could replace the f. maths or last science with something else though and it would still be good.

Is she doing separate sciences for GCSE? It's not essential, but it might help.

DD is studying all three sciences (separately) she is also strong in maths and languages. So far she already has an AS in a language and is planning to take it A2 next year before she takes the bulk of her GCSEs.

At the moment she isnt entirely certain which science/sciences to take after GCSE the next two years will sort that out. What she wants to do at university veers between maths & physics and chemistry depending on who she last spoke to (my brother is a physicist, her language tutor is a toxicologist).

She hasnt yet been on any outside courses other than the extra language. I will explore the Smallpiece engineering courses

Our problem with sixth form is that the local provision is a consortium which means that different subjects are offered in different schools in different towns. Students are bussed between the different sites which is less than ideal. The nearest sixth form college is about 45 minutes away and offers mostly vocational courses to feed the local university which is one of the new sort offering degrees in nail technology or something. We seem to be in an educational black hole.

It's useful to know about the university preferences for A levels. Another option for DD is to go to university in the Netherlands (she is a fluent Dutch speaker). She is also interested in the Erasmus scheme if it hasnt run out of funds by the time she ges to it.

All useful suggestions here, many thanks. I will explore further.

DD is going into 6th form and is doing 4 AS and dropping one subject so 3 A2. Opted to replace general studies for work experience.

Did ask as we'd heard of others doing 5 AS and 4 A2's to be told that the more academic pupils won't need to do anymore than 3 at A level. The ones who are only going to scrap C-E's might be better doing one more to clock up Ucas points. Most redbrick unis only want 3 A Level grades.

If you take an A-level out of year (like Suzi's dd will), does this count? I mean, if a university wants ABB and Suzie's dd got an A in yr11 will that mean they will accept two Bs from her A-levels taken at the 'proper' time 2 years hence?

Thanks. Dd2's school does AS Business Studies in yr10 and the A2 in yr11 (for the more able). I wondered if it was a sneaky way to get more students good grades as in the sixth form they could get away with only studying 2 subjects and thus get better grades.

A few universities discount AS/A levels levels in a native langiage as well as those done early. They still look on them favourably, but exclude them from offers they make if you see what I mean.

On doing 5 subjects, some children do and most often it is children who do further maths and maths as two of their choices. Apparently for able mathematicians this combination isn't really as much work as two subjects and also they often need more other choices to keep a good range. Some schools even timetable maths+ f. maths as just one option choice. F. maths is a very good choice for a would be physicist or engineer.

DS1 has just finished his A levels, and is going through the universithy application process for the 2nd time (he did better than expected, so is re-applying).

Most seem to do three A2s, but start with 4 AS levels, and then drop one - as has already been said on this thread. However, the more intellectually able at DS's college did 4 A2s. This obviously means they have a full timetable and a lot of revision to do, so you have to be sure your child is up to it - doing a 4th could potentially detract from the other 3.

But there is an advantage to doing 4 A2s if the university you apply to makes their offer in points - as you have an automatic chance of gaining more points. A2s command more points than ASs.

Critical thinking/General Studies - IME of the universities DS has been looking at - are rarely considered/included in the points offer.

Nor, sadly, is the Extended Project. Although this is supposed to count as an AS level, and commands the same number of points, some universities will also not accept this (a shame for DS as he got an A*/70 points for his!).

Other things to beware of/look out for:

• some universities (Exeter is one) specify that they as well as specific A2 grades - usually AAA/AAB - they expect GCSEs to be excellent - meaning As and A*s
• some also dictate what AS results they expect - York says that every completed AS level (by which I assume they mean ones that are dropped in Yr12), must be at level B or above
• some also dictate what grades must have been achieved in Maths/English GCSE. DS is going to philosophy & history, but for some universities has to get a B in Maths GCSE.

Writing a good personal statement will also be important - if you Google 'personal statement' you will find various sites that give you examples on how to do this. There are also a load of books about the PS too (although personally I think you don't need to spend your money on these - there's enough help online/from the UCAS site and, hopefully, from your school).

It's a minefield, but hopefully some of this is helpful!

- some also dictate what AS results they expect - York says that every completed AS level (by which I assume they mean ones that are dropped in Yr12), must be at level B or above

really, BIWI? Damn. York is one of DS2's likely choices but the AS he's dropped was a D. His other 3 were As, & in 3 of the 6 modules he scored 100% - would they definitely not even consider him because of the D???