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Secondary education

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Original poster

A-level course full - what to do?

63 replies

seymour · 15/08/2021 05:38

Hi there, my daughter enrolled at sixth form today but one of the A-levels she wants to do is oversubscribed and the course is full. It’s geography and there isn’t another subject she wants to do as this is what she wants to study at uni. We didn’t realise this could happen. She surpassed the entry requirements. They made her put down another subject which she doesn't want to do! I’m assuming they enrolled kids that were already at the school before external applicants. My daughter's school didn’t have a sixth form so she had to apply somewhere new. That now appears to be a disadvantage. Can anyone advise?

OP posts:
ZealAndArdour · 15/08/2021 05:42

Can she do A-Levels at college or a different sixth form instead?

Everydayisawindingroad · 15/08/2021 05:51

@ZealAndArdour

Can she do A-Levels at college or a different sixth form instead?
This. If she doesn’t want to move college perhaps she could do geography somewhere as an external candidate.
SpringSparrow · 15/08/2021 06:15

How annoying for her! I would be contacting the school and asking for her to join the class. A lot of students drop their subjects in the first few weeks of term. At my dd’s sixth form a lot of students started with four subjects and dropped one either at half term or the end of the first year so there was movement. A lot were kicked out of maths after a few weeks. It sounds really unfair to your daughter they it’s oversubscribed already.

CrunchiestCru · 15/08/2021 06:52

If there aren’t any nearby sixth forms whether due to availability or want definitely keep insisting that as soon as someone drops/leaves the course your DD has the space. In the meantime ask them if she can still study independently so she doesn’t miss out on knowledge, they’ll likely have an online platform with all the lessons so she can follow. If a space comes up she’s not lost time, if it doesn’t then she’s going to need to study independently of the school will allow her to sit the a level exam. If the school won’t allow that then she can sit the a level at an independent test centre

CrunchiestCru · 15/08/2021 06:54

Forgot to mention there is a large cross over generally between A level biology and geography, or if the college have it environmental science. Depends if she’s interested in human or physical geography really.

Flaunch · 15/08/2021 07:34

My dd is doing geography A level at our local
College as she didn’t want to stay on at 6th form due to bullying.

Original poster
seymour · 15/08/2021 09:12

Thanks so much everyone. There are other sixth forms but it's limited due to the fact she wants to do PE A-level and not many places do it. Plus two of her good friends are going to this sixth form so she wants to go there. I'm hoping someone will drop off the course at the start of term as some of you suggested. She's just told me her name is on a waiting list so will call them tomorrow and find out more info. It's good to know she could do it as an external candidate worse case scenario but not ideal.

OP posts:
Revengeofthepangolins · 15/08/2021 11:02

Perhaps worth emphasising that she plans to study it a university?

But if they can’t budge a s she really wants to take the subject further, perhaps it has to take priority over PE?

clary · 15/08/2021 11:10

I hear you on PE A level, ds2 did that and not many sixth forms offered it.

I would contact them tomorrow if possible and stress that she wants to do it at degree level; were multiple people refused a place or is it just her? How many in the class? I must say I have never come across this - not enough students to run a subject, yes for sure, but never too many. If it is only her, surely they can fit one more? It's not as tho it's about lab work or cooking practicals.

Original poster
seymour · 15/08/2021 11:25

@Revengeofthepangolins

Perhaps worth emphasising that she plans to study it a university?

But if they can’t budge a s she really wants to take the subject further, perhaps it has to take priority over PE?

Thank you, she ideally wants to go geography/PE at uni. I will definitely be taking this up with them tomorrow! I've gone from laidback mamma to tiger mum overnight! Smile
OP posts:
Original poster
seymour · 15/08/2021 11:28

@clary

I hear you on PE A level, ds2 did that and not many sixth forms offered it.

I would contact them tomorrow if possible and stress that she wants to do it at degree level; were multiple people refused a place or is it just her? How many in the class? I must say I have never come across this - not enough students to run a subject, yes for sure, but never too many. If it is only her, surely they can fit one more? It's not as tho it's about lab work or cooking practicals.

Great advice, thanks. I'll hopefully find out more tomorrow. In the offer letter it listed three or four subjects that were usually oversubscribed, Btecs mainly - but geography wasn't on the list!
OP posts:
NotQuiteHere · 15/08/2021 11:40

It is a complete shambles with the choice of A level for students everywhere. Our children finally have an option to do what they really want to do, it might be the choice for life, and the provision is terribly poor.

To start with the option blocks where, for example, you have to choose either Biology or Computing but not both, then the course might be offered but not enough students or too many of them so have to switch to something else. If there are so many constraints then the 6th forms should not claim that they offer such and such courses. The situation is appalling and must change.

TeenMinusTests · 15/08/2021 12:01

No help to the OP but this is one of the reasons I think the Hants system is good with its large 6th form colleges. So big that they have multiple classes of most A levels and can timetable pretty much anything.

averythinline · 15/08/2021 12:03

We had this but dc school don't publish the timetable in advance so two of his subjects were in the same band and his other options were full....fucking nightmare day...he had to choose between his best subjects and is now doing sociology instead of geography!.....if she like human geography maybe worth a look....he's quite keen now looked through syllabus better....

MadameMinimes · 15/08/2021 12:04

I’d definitely try to speak to someone next week. I’m Head of Sixth Form at my school and would be happy to have a conversation with a family about this.

There are certain subjects at my school that would be full if someone wanted to enrol for them today. We apply oversubscription criteria at the end of the day on GCSE results day if courses are full the and that’s done by highest grades first effectively. After that, we give spaces to those who meet the entry criteria on a first-come-first-served basis until it is full. I can’t call back someone who I gave a place to on Thursday who just met the entry criteria and tell them that I’m giving their spot to someone who is enrolling today with higher grades. The person with the highest grades would be top of the waiting list if a space opened up on the first day of term though. Sometimes people just don’t turn up on the first day, or change course, or start with four and then drop down to three. The school should be able to give you an idea of how likely it is that a spot will open up. We aren’t an oversubscribed Sixth Form (in fact it’s a struggle to fill all our places) but there are always a couple of coursed that end up full within the first two days of enrolment.

UserStillatLarge · 15/08/2021 12:05

I suspect your DD needs to have a long hard think about whether it's more important to do her chosen subjects or be with her friends (and unless her friends are doing the same subjects as her, she may find she doesn't see much of them at sixth form anyway).

Geography has a fieldwork element and I actually suspect it would be very hard to do this as an external candidate. Plus the sixth form would want her to take 3 other subjects so that will increase her workload. I know that isn't your ideal situation but I'd personally cross it off your list as an option altogether.

UserStillatLarge · 15/08/2021 12:09

@TeenMinusTests

No help to the OP but this is one of the reasons I think the Hants system is good with its large 6th form colleges. So big that they have multiple classes of most A levels and can timetable pretty much anything.
I'm actually really surprised that OP's scenario has arisen if it's a school sixth form (i.e. presumably they already have multiple geography teachers in place to teach lower years).

DS's school are actually teaching A Level geography as a group of 9 and a group of 8, rather than 1 larger group of 17, which would be rather more usual (and is the case in his other subjects) because they have plenty of teachers who love teaching A Level!

Oblomov21 · 15/08/2021 12:09

I had this. They don't publish their timetable till the last minute and Ds1 couldn't do his 3 subjects.

I too would email HoY tomorrow, and ask for her to be allowed. Many schools do 4, and then drop one, so it's highly likely there'll be big drop outs later in the year.

Lowther · 15/08/2021 12:10

My DD had this, phone call to say she had the grades but they were oversubscribed for biology could she take her forth subject instead. After rechecking biology was a must so she sent an email to decline. I didn't think about waiting lists etc.
Luckily I had encouraged her to have a plan B (& c &d!). She is happy with her choice but it has been an added stress that she didn't need. Incidentally another school she had applied to her email went into their junk account so they phoned us the next day to apologise and again we had the rush of resending results just as she was being called into the dentist! Applying and accessing 6th form places and subjects can be a minefield.
Hope it all works out well for your DD in the coming days.

MadameMinimes · 15/08/2021 12:17

@NotQuiteHere I know that the blocks can seem confusing and frustrating but it is just part of running a school sixth form. There really isn’t a way around it.

We have 4 academic blocks on our timetable and most students choose three subjects. We actually have some of our sciences in more than one block, which helps, but back when we only had one class for each science then the starting point for our timetable would be that Chemistry, Biology, Physics and Maths are all in different blocks. If you then put computing in, it has to clash with one of those. It can’t clash with Maths or Physics, so that leaves you with a choice between Chemistry or Biology.

When you’re a small, school Sixth Form it’s just a fact of life that some things will clash. We only have one class of history on our timetable and it causes a clash for someone every year, no matter where we put it. If you’re a big college with a thousand students in a year group you can have every subject in multiple blocks and people can do any combination that they want. Most school Sixth Forms are teetering on the brink of financial viability as it is. If they only have enough students for one class of each subject, then that will mean that not every combination will work. Likewise, if you offer a subject and you have one teacher timetabled in a room with 24 desks and 24 chairs and 35 students sign up, then 11 students are going to be disappointed. We run subjects with some very small classes (2-3 in some cases) but we won’t run a subject for one student for various reasons. That means we’ve had to withdraw one subject this year. Last year that subject had 10 students, so we would not have expected not to be running it this year. The subject that we were worried nobody would take has had 7 sign up so far. We do our best, but we don’t have crystal balls.

CarrieBlue · 15/08/2021 12:48

DS's school are actually teaching A Level geography as a group of 9 and a group of 8, rather than 1 larger group of 17, which would be rather more usual (and is the case in his other subjects) because they have plenty of teachers who love teaching A Level!

It will have absolutely nothing to do with how many teachers who work there who love teaching A-level, they are probably over staffed if they are running two classes instead of one for such low numbers and you may very well find that there’ll be only one yr13 class, combining the two yr12 classes. I’d be very worried about budget issues at that school. Teachers get no (or very very little) say about which classes they teach, however much they ‘love’ teaching that particular key stage.

MadameMinimes · 15/08/2021 13:00

@CarrieBlue Spot on! Schools don’t run classes of 7 or 8 just for fun. If a department has “slack” in their timetable then they might run a subject in two blocks like that to help overall retention by solving clashes, but school sixth forms are constantly walking a financial tightrope. We don’t just put on an extra class because teachers like teaching A Level, we just can’t afford it.

UserStillatLarge · 15/08/2021 14:08

@CarrieBlue

DS's school are actually teaching A Level geography as a group of 9 and a group of 8, rather than 1 larger group of 17, which would be rather more usual (and is the case in his other subjects) because they have plenty of teachers who love teaching A Level!

It will have absolutely nothing to do with how many teachers who work there who love teaching A-level, they are probably over staffed if they are running two classes instead of one for such low numbers and you may very well find that there’ll be only one yr13 class, combining the two yr12 classes. I’d be very worried about budget issues at that school. Teachers get no (or very very little) say about which classes they teach, however much they ‘love’ teaching that particular key stage.

Only repeating what DS was told! I don't know of any other A Level subjects running in such small groups so I imagine the geography department have chosen to do this (maybe there were fewer students than normal taking GCSE?). Maths A Level for example is run as a class of 22 and a class of 23. You may well be right about merging so only one class in Year 13 though.
Phineyj · 15/08/2021 14:15

She could consider Economics (if it's not full as well). There's considerable crossover with human Geography. I've had a couple of students do that in similar circumstances. They both did very well and one to her surprise fell in love with it!

54321nought · 15/08/2021 14:22

How did you not realise this could happen? Of course there are only a certain number of spaces in each subject. All sixth forms are the same, no one can possibly have unlimited spaces in any one class....

Your sixth form options are limited by the timetables of the school you are applying at, the entry requirements and the spaces available - most people will get their first choice of topics but a very sizeable minority won't.

You can ask if they will consider going one over, as it is something she has set her heart on, and there is a good choice someone will drop out in the first few months...

But you are asking a massive favour, so I suggest you forget that "tiger mum" attitude, because that will not work in your favour at all.

Good luck