A Level Chemistry, German or Economics as a choice for DS who wants to study Physics?

[ShellingPeasAgain]

DS (yr 11) has to choose A level options soon. He wants to study astro physics at university so has got maths, further maths and physics as his main choices. But he has to choose another two subjects as his school only counts further maths as half an A level. He's keen on doing German as he'd like to work in Europe, but not sure about whether economics or chemistry would be a better option for the last choice. Predicted A* at GCSE at all these subjects BTW.

To me, the school's decision to not count further maths as a full A level means the workload seems like a lot and hopefully he will be able to drop one subject in year 13.

Anyone who's done this before got any ideas? DH thinks DS should take chemistry as an extra science subject but DS isn't keen on chemistry and prefers economics. I think economics gives him a broader range and more options in the long term.

My DD is doing Maths, Further Maths, Physics and Chemistry (Yr 12 currently). She started off wanting to do Maths at Uni, but is now veering more towards Physics or Nat Sci, having discovered how much she is enjoying both these subjects.

She made a last minute switch to Chemistry having originally been going to do Economics. For her, she now says Chemistry was the right choice - she is enjoying it, doing well and now thinks she would have hated the essay component of Economics and the fact that (in her opinion at least) it is more 'waffly' and less logical. So it may depend on your son's skills at essay writing. (In contrast, DDs brother in Yr 13 is doing Economics and loves it, but likes constructing a good essay).

I think that for somebody who definitely wants to do science, the chemistry will give much more flexibility for choices of university courses rather than narrowing down to physics only at this stage.
There is also overlap in some of the chemistry with physics at a higher level. He may also be basing his dislike of chemistry on a particular teacher or the rather boring lower level chemistry.
However if your DS is more likely to choose between pure physics or a non science subject at university then economics would have advantages.

If he's doing Maths, FM and Physics, I don't think it will matter what his other subjects are.

I did French for my fourth A level and not having Chemistry was a total non-issue. I read Physics at Oxford.

Don't be tempted to not do FM just because it's non-essential - that's so that people at schools which don't offer it aren't excluded. It's really, really useful.

DS is planning to take 5 A levels including FM, but it's absolutely not a requirement. So what if your DS will have spaces in his timetable because FM is only 5 periods? It's normal to have "free" periods at sixth form.

I'm a physicist, and did Maths, Physics and Biology (no FM offered at my school and it wasn't a requirement back then). My school friend did Physics, Maths and French, going on to do dual honours physics and french - and then a PhD in low temperature physics, so it didn't do her any harm.

Personally, I'd go for german as A level economics isn't really useful later, but language skills are always good

At DDs' school, those doing further maths generally take 4 (incl maths & further maths) at AS and continue with the 4 to A2. Is that an option, rather than 5 subjects at AS?

It may be worth considering your son's interest in astrophysics, rather then just physics, and which areas of that he finds most interesting. 20 years ago, my astronomy courses included a fair amount of atomic physics, which I think would have been much harder without my a-level chemistry, though I note that today's physics a-level contains more atomic and particle physics than we did. There are also areas such as planetary atmospheres and geology for which chemistry might be more useful. I think that astrochemistry has grown hugely as a field since I studied. Even organic chemistry is relevant. However, I certainly found chemistry harder than maths, FM and physics so may not have been happy studying it if I hadn't found it fascinating as a subject.

choose German and then whichever he prefers from economics and chem. Of the three German will stand out best for employability later. Chem has a small advantage if he wanted to do say natural science at Cambridge and economics a small advantage if he ever wants to work in the city later on (& quite a few physicists do go down that path). Ds did all those subjects except the language and found maths, FM and physics very little effort compared to the economics and chem but enjoyed all of them (maybe going off the economics a little towards the end), but that's a personal thing. Language a levels have a reputation for being more difficult too.

Would add that Economics would be useful if he ever thinks about doing an MBA at a later stage.

1. Definitely do Further maths. Universities may say its not necessary, and if your school does not offer it, its not. When DS got to University they covered the important bits of the further maths syllabus in the first few weeks. Revision for him and a chance to get used to the University way of teaching but tough for those doing it for the first time.

1. Further will be less work than a separate A level. As a result DS was able to carry 5 through to A2. However the caveat is that you need to find maths easy and teaching needs to be good.

1. If two are maths, starting with 5 is not a bad idea. The disadvantage is that you get very few free periods, so little chance to catch up, especially if you do something else like music or sport. It might also depend on character. DS was a bit of a minimalist when it came to homework, so all the extra subject did was deprive him of computer gaming time. It also gives you the flexibility to drop one that you don't enjoy, and economics and chemistry seem to be subjects that some students really don't enjoy. Or in DS' case scope to drop a grade in the subject he found most difficult without jeopardising his offer.

1. Physics is a competitive subject. For top courses, many applicants will be offering four A levels including the Further. Not doing so, other than if you come from a poorly performing school, may raise fears of whether you can manage a tough workload. I assume some physics degrees will have more chemistry content than others, so chemistry might help. Others though will probably welcome a contrast. Universities like Warwick, which has a big Erasmus programme, seem to like applicants with languages. Economics will show you can write essays and form arguments. If ultimately he might want to find employment which applies his science knowledge rather than use it directly: patent or commercial law, management consultancy etc, keeping up either a language or an essay subject through to A2 should help his CV.

1. Read University requirements carefully. I don't know about physics but for DS' subject not all were prepared to offer against the Further Maths. They wanted to see breadth.

Needmoresleep -YY to your point number 1. I was one of those that didn't do FM, and I got lost somewhere in the first term when we did most of the FM syllabus in a few weeks, and never quite caught up again. If I had done it at A level speed I am sure I would have been fine.

Physics admissions have got more competitive in the past few years, however 3 A-levels (including Maths and Physics) with very good (i.e. A) predicted grades is sufficient to get you offers from pretty much everywhere (apart from Oxbridge, Imperial and possibly Manchester).

And as I mentioned before, while Further Maths is really useful, the reality is that the majority of Physics students at good universities haven't done it.

Thanks for further input everyone. It's all very helpful.

DS is a maths whizz - he sat his maths GCSE a year early and is doing additional maths this year. Having read PP comments I think he will find the combo of maths, further maths and physics relatively easy (insofar as A levels are ever 'easy') so perhaps starting with 5 A levels is more do-able than I had thought.

His german course is, according to DS, more language based than literature, although there is some literature at A2, which would suit as he's not remotely interested in literature be it English or German! I think we've decided on German as a definite number 4.

DS writes a good essay, despite being someone who reads very little, so economics would be okay I think. The ability to work in the City in the future is appealing (to me anyway) as DH is an engineer and the pay is crap and job security rubbish.

Needmoresleep - my DS is also a minimalist wrt to homework. As far as I can tell he does bugger all at the moment but still manages to achieve incredibly well. He plays guitar for a hobby (not exam orientated) and does athletics twice a week but neither are particularly time consuming. If 5 A levels will keep him off his XBox a bit more I have no issue with that!

Made appointments to talk to the head of sixth form, plus DS's german, economics and chemistry teachers early next week. In the middle of mocks atm so hopefully will have a better idea of things once the results are in.

Wish I'd become a reservoir or petroluem engineer rather than a civil engineer - civil engineer = crap pay, reservoir or petroleum engineer = £££££££.

Thinking a bit further though, I don't know what the impact of the changes to AS will be. DS started with 5, with the intention of dropping one at the first sign of trouble, and re-evaluating after AS. He managed to last the distance as did some of his friends, but others either had one subject they really wanted to drop or found the work load too much. My impression is that five is only really possible with the double maths, though obviously there are exceptions. It might be different if everything has to be taken in the final year.

Though five were not needed, his offer did not include Further Maths, so he had to do well in 3 out of the remaining 4. When it came to the actual A2 exams it was nice for him to have that extra wiggle room. Plus it looked as if those taking double maths were far more likely to get an A* in Maths than those taking Maths alone, simply because they had learn so much more.

I don't disagree with dapoxen. However from the OP I assumed OP's son might be a candidate for Oxbridge/Imperial. In which case the competition is tough. If you look at the UCAS points on entry the average applicant is offering more than A A A*.

www.thecompleteuniversityguide.co.uk/league-tables/rankings?s=Physics+%26+Astronomy

Engineering is such a wide ranging thing though - I know chemical engineers in the oil industry (v secure and £££), software engineers, electronic engineers (we have a variety of ex navy ones in the company who are now field service engineers), software engineers (working on firmware), mechanical engineers, human factors engineers - and those are just people I work with apart from the chem eng.

Its like physicists - I'm a medical physicist where there are good employment and pay prospects, but astronomy isn't exactly a job thats frequently found

DH is an engineer and the pay is crap and job security rubbish

There are engineers and engineers.

Maintenance engineers on casino gaming machines drive all over the country at stupid o'clock for under £25k a year

Yacht design engineers have to work where the ship is being sea trialled - which can include the Caribbean

And a chap a couple of years ahead of me at Uni has done rather well out of his engineering obsession
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adrian_Newey

The term "engineer" is used very widely in the UK and interchangeably for things like mechanic and technician. Degree qualified engineers are not the same as the guy who fixes your washing machine. I know plenty of well paid engineers. And it looks like quite a nice life too.

The bulk of a Institute of Physics accredited physics degree (which most are) will cover the same topics where ever you do it. Typical astrophysics modules (e.g. stars, galaxies, cosmology, relativistic astrophysics, interstellar medium) don't include any more chemistry than the core physics modules (i.e. not much). Some institutions may offer option modules with significant chemistry content (for instance soft condensed matter), but students don't have to do those if they don't want to.

As a degree qualified and chartered engineer, I worked long hours, often outside in miserable weather, travelled away from home a lot staying in manky B and Bs, and spent far too much time grubbing around in cold, wet, muddy holes. It was neither a particularly nice life nor well paid. And I did that for 15 years (before I came to my senses). Obviously I was the wrong sort of engineer.

And one of these was a classmate of mine for years - so now I know where I went wrong.

Civil engineer by any chance SquirelledAway?

Worse than that -geotechnical. At least civil engineers got to sit in a warm portakabin with a coffee machine.

OP my DN did,rather predictably, math, further math, physics, Latin to A2 he got offers from Oxbridge IC and all the other he put down in his UCAS form he's now a second yr so this info is up tpo date.
He would don't do physics unless you absolutely love math.

My DH is Fellow of Civil, Highway and Structural Engineers. He only spent 2 years on site immediately after leaving university and then joined his future partner in a very small consulting business. Now has a very successful medium sized Consultancy and has not been near a cold portacabin since. Made mega bucks too! It can be done, but not everyone is cut out to run their own business successfully.