Starting Y13 (y12 support thread contd)

[AtiaoftheJulii]

Well, I filled up the other one, so here's a nice new one to get us through dropping subjects, Uni open days, personal statement writing, and UCAS applications

Plenty of and and (nicely-intentioned) s available!

My dd2 has done a very rough first draft of a personal statement. She has also read some books for her EPQ. No more university visits thankfully (unless she goes to Offer Holder Days).

Does York University mind if you apply for two courses with different grade requirements? How do you find out?

York isn't one that I've heard of as being funny about these things. If in doubt your best bet is to call/email the admissions tutor and ask. They are pretty good at responding to enquiries from prospective students and will generally be pretty open and honest in my experience.

I'm clueless as to how to help DS, when does he have to complete his personal statement by?

The deadline for Oxbridge and medicine is in October. For other courses it is in January. Really they should ensure that they get it in by mid November as offers start to be made around then.

sauvignon unless he's applying for Oxbridge, medicine (mid Oct deadline), UCAS latest submission date not until mid Jan for pretty much everything else, his school will want it a bit before that of course. If he is clear as to what he wants to do, which Uni's to apply to then getting it done and sorted a bit sooner leaves him with one less thing to worry about. Its a whole other debate as to whether there is any advantage to early applications.

Thank you boys3, DS is spectacularly bad at telling us what is going on and I'm a bit out of the game having been in and out of hospital for weeks. I was an inpatient when he got his AS results.

Thanks FuzzyWizard - that is nice to hear about York. DD2 is going to e mail to double check.

My dd1 got her UCAS application in the week after the October half term last year (she didn't apply to Oxford / Cambridge / medicine luckily). It is very comforting for them when they get the odd early offer (rather than leaving it until the January deadline, when one or two boys at her sixthform had a nail biting last week application rush!!)

Just got back from holiday and very excited to see a new thread - does that make me very sad?

Mumslife - when I was at York I knew people who changed courses after the first year and it was fine.

Dd needs to have her personal statement ready for school to do their bit by the third week in September. I don't think she has written a word yet but she is reading victorian literature and criticism like mad so that she can write all about her passion for it on her PS!

We are preparing to do battle with the school who are really pushing her to do 4 A Levels. She wants to drop French for which she got a B and I strongly think that is the right thing for her to do. Her average UMS across her other 3 is in the 90%s and I think continuing French will take time away from those and weaken her average. Numerous admissions people have said she is best to do 3 well than spread herself too thinly with 4 but school are really pushing all applicants to do 4. She has to go in and see them before school starts with a signed letter from us saying that we agree with her.

Ah - I skim read to catch up with the thread and misunderstood! Not sure about applying for 2 courses at the same university but perhaps she could apply for the course with the lower grade requirements and the drop politics after a year. Best to check it out with individual universities though in terms of how flexible they are with students changing courses, although I appreciate that could be difficult to broach.

Yes, dd is applying to Cambridge but I am not sure how much of a chance she has. She has great GCSEs but Cambridge don't really care about that. Her UMS across her top 3 AS levels put her high enough to get an interview (hopefully) so we shall see what happens. I wish she hadn't set her heart on it though as I don't want to see her get her heart broken. Needless to say, we are bigging up all other options!

Mrs B, good news about Cambridge is that they interview a high percentage of candidates so very good chance for your DD, from that, as DS1 found, anything can happen (positive outcome in his case). He had a very clear steer from Cambridge that they were only concerned with 3 A2 subjects (he's a humanities degree subject also), and that any offer would be based on 3, with the clear inference being that A*AA would get you in and, in most instances AAAA would not. Hope your DD's school see sense and don't needlessly undermine her chances.

Thanks. boys3 - that is encouraging. Dd has been to an English masterclass where the question was asked and they said that 3 A2s was absolutley fine (in fact all 3 students who spoke had only done 3). She has been to another English day where the same thing was confirmed. She spoke personally with an Oxford admissions tutor who visited her school and he said the same for them. However, the school still insist that 4 is best. We will be sticking to our guns. She came under lots of pressure to do the IB as well and we stuck it out on that one, too!

Cambridge would be amazing if she could get in but I don't want her to stress herself out in the process.

absolutely

MrsBartlet DS is going from 5 ASs to 3 A2s - his school are supportive of this. DS wants to step up the reading for his subjects (and hopefully for his Cambridge interview) and its hard to do that when doing 4 A2s. He is doing the extended project this year as well so he'll be busy enough.

Glad your ds's school are more supportive webwiz. They really do need the time for the extra reading and if they are trying for A*s it won't just happen without a lot of extra work. It seems madness to me to take on 4 A2s unnecessarily.

Well my DDs have gone back to school today. DD1 is in yr13 and DD2 is now in yr12 - so 2 6th formers and no uniforms! DD2 spent ages painting her nails (as they are allowed to wear nail varnish now) and doing her hair - not sure she has her priorities right!
DD1 has dropped physics but is not happy about this - in her heart, she would have dropped biology but her head is telling her to drop physics.
DD2 is taking maths and sciences ....and planning to use all DD1's notes.

My dd2 went back to sixth form today and has done her first draft of the personal statement. Hurrah! She is keeping History, Geography and Biology (dropping Maths) & will be doing an EPQ on an aspect of history.

Currently spending a fortune on stuff for her older sister (scarily leaving home in three weeks for university). It comes round fast folks....

Hellsbells, what happened with physics and biology? It's a hard decision to go with head over heart!

DS2 goes back tomorrow, and is really looking forward to it. And DS1 is off to uni in two weeks, not sure whether I'll be sad or delighted!!

DS1 back Thurs. No PS done yet, open days booked for Southampton, Bath, ICL and York.

Mindgone - she got an A in biology and it is more relevant (although not essential) for the degree she wants to do. She loves her physics teacher though and after a shaky start to AS, she ended up loving the subject - very odd for a child that would have dropped the subject at 14 if she was allowed to!

DS back today as well and enjoying actually having free periods - he used this afternoon's to get some reading done for his EPQ. He has done a first draft of his personal statement so that is being looked at by school. Oh and he has split something on his white shirt that looks like it won't come out

Hellsbells, am I right in remembering it's your DD who is interested in pharmacy? If so biology is much more useful I would have thought. It was my DS who started out wanting to do pharmacy, and is now about to start chemical engineering, and physics would have been really useful for him! But he loved biology too, he wishes he did physics to AS instead of economics.