DD - A level choices

[kathyseldon]

Hi. I'm trying to persuade my DD but failing. Should I just give up?
Details…
DD is autistic, but copes pretty well in general.
She wants to be an actress. Always has done. Dh and I work(ed) in theatre and sadly don't think she has the 'presence' and is quite wooden on stage. She loves it though and we have always encouraged her.
She is adamant she wants to go to a local drama school and do a BTEC in acting. I want her to stay at school and do A levels.
She has always struggled to attend school, except at where she goes now (she weekly boards, so can't school refuse!!). She is happy at school. She would do Drama, Photography and Chemistry at school. I think photog would be a good option to keep going with, to compliment an acting career.
DD just wants to do the drama BTEC.
Do I give up and just let her try the drama school? What if she doesn't like it? what if she refuses to go? is she limiting her options?
Oh - she is funded at her boarding school, so if we decline her 6th form place, we are unlikely to be able to go back in the future.

Sorry for the long post, but I'm trying not to drip feed relevant info.

Will she get into the drama school? Likelihood is if she’s not great at it, they won’t take her.

Could she do other things alongside the acting? Perhaps lighting, stage management, running a theatre, artwork for shows? Just encourage her to keep her options open?

I don't know if you should force her to do A Levels that she's not interested in. Chemistry seems a bit pointless if she's interested in artistic subjects.

She has a place at both school and the drama course. (The drama course is under subscribed…) she told them we work in the West End and apparently he gave her a thumbs up and told her not to worry about getting a place .
The A level choices are her choice. She is basically creative, but as always liked chemistry, so I think the A levels would work for her.

I can't make her understand the importance of having options. She thinks she'll walk into a full time acting career and never have to supplement her acting.

Well, you can’t force her, but what I would say is that to act you need to be able to draw on a range of experiences and ideas. So the opportunity to stretch your mind at A level is a great one. While she’s doing A levels she could do national youth theatre? Then she can follow school with drama school, most of which I imagine would be more enthusiastic about interesting and varied A levels than a pointless (sorry) Btec.

Can you sell it to her that way ? She’s more likely to get into Rada etc via A levels than Btec?

Reality is if she isn’t any good she won’t get into drama school, but you can get her to apply to universities alongside it.

See if you can keep her in school. If you really can’t you can’t, but I would be pretty hard about making her get a job alongside the Btec as it feels like a pretty pointless course.