Redo gcse or continue with a levels

[oishidesne]

DD did GCSE's this year with aspirations to study maths physics and chemistry at college. Her maths grade is a 6, college says she can do statistics, economics and another subject instead. These a levels are completely different to the science based ones she envisioned. She was top in maths all her school years but something happened in the finals and she messed up.

Is it wiser to take a year out and redo her gcse to maintain maths or should we accept the a levels suggested by the college?

As she is cannot do maths, she cannot do physics.

She doesn't know what she wants to do for a degree yet.

I feel she is limiting her options by taking the subjects offered by the college. There are no other 1 year courses she can do with the 1 gcse math retake so it will be a difficult year...

What did ahe get in chemistry and physics?

Chemistry 7, physics 8

Honestly, with a 6 she may struggle with maths and physics A level, unless there was an external factor that impacted her on the exam day / period, so might be better to follow Colleges advice

Even if she retakes her gcse maths?

Have you requsted the papers to look at?
Did she actually do better on mocks?

Perhaps get her to do an old set of papers to see if she wouod do better?

However, i did bio, chem, maths and got c,d,d (before A stars). With Bs at gcse on all of them.

My dd is 16 and has just taken her GCSEs. If your dd is set on taking maths and physics, I would get her to resit maths. It is only a year at the end of the day.

Is there no other college or 6th form, which will take her for A levels for these grades? That is quite a high expectation for state college. Around here a 6 is enough.

Also, have you asked how close your dd was to getting a 7 in maths? You have a few days left to get a remark.

Maths A level with a 6 is tough as I am sure you are aware OP.

But the science grades are a lot better – was there some specific reason for the 6? Yes, have you recalled the papers to a) have them checked and maybe b) see where she went wrong?

What I mean is, if she missed out a whole section or timed it badly and didn't finish, that won't mean obvs that her mark goes up, but it might show that she could or should have done better. Does that make sense?

You say she was top at maths - what was her expected grade? If there is some simple reason (also maybe being ill on exam day, that kind of thing) that then can be avoided going forward, and in fact her maths skills are good, could you or she try talking to college and explaining? I take it the setting is not where she did her GCSEs so they don't know her ability?

Edited to add: @Mummyoflittledragon a 6 in maths at GCSE, especially if that is the top of the candidate's ability, is not a good start for A level. Same for MFL IMHO. Linear qualifications require a better grounding than a 6 suggests.

Hi thank you for ur replies. She was 30 marks away from the next level so not worth remarking. She did well at Mocs (7).

Oh wow so depending on board (I just looked at a couple) she was only just over the boundary for a 6 - just a few marks off a 5. No I wouldn't advise maths A level unless you know she did something drastic (like missing out several questions bc she didn't see them)

She’ll get funding for three years at sixth form so could start the suggested A levels while resitting maths. Then if she gets a higher grade after start A levels again with her chosen subjects.

Or look for another sixth form that will offer her her subjects with her current grades.

It is a big jump.
Don't redo it.
Chose alternative Alevels.
She can do maths additionally privately with a private tutor if she really wants to.
She may try and think not for me.

She should be capable of physics & chemistry with a 6 though. I did physics A level without maths. Is there another college she could go to?

I probably wouldn't redo GCSEs though, chemistry, statistics and economics are good options

Hmm.

Maths a level is hard. You can't really do physics a level without the maths - there is a significant overlap.

A grade 7 would be the lower end of what most sixth forms are prepared to accept and even then she'd need to work her socks off.

A grade 6 that's 30 marks away from a 7 is nowhere near what she needs. The sixth form are being sensible - that's just too much of a step up.

It's kind of up to you both whether she resits or not but if she does resit then there's a fair way to go. Ideally she'd be confident in all the grade 8 and grade 9 content before starting the maths a level.

Yes I understand this. But op said her dd was expected to get higher, was the best in the class and got a 7 in her mocks so it’s entirely feasible she could have got an 8 in the real thing, albeit op has clarified she actually got a low 6.

As for not being able to do physics without maths, we got a range of advice on this for dd from different physics teachers at different schools/ colleges as she wanted to do physics but not maths. The advice was it’s easier with maths. Maths being the theory, physics being the application. However, she was told as long as her grade in maths was good enough she could do physics. And we did understand that she wouldn’t be able to continue in STEM. In the event she’s not taken physics A level as by the time GCSE rolled round she was bored of the subject.

I would do what is suggested in the first paragraph.

We asked the colleges near us if dd can start the a levels they suggest and if she gets a higher gcse maths grade, can she swap to different a levels next year, they said no she cannot...

The options we see is she either redoes gcse or carries on for next 2 years with a levels the college suggests.

One other possibility: what about doing something like a level 3 BTEC in applied science? It will include some biology, but otherwise will cover the chemistry, phys and maths she is after.

Has she looked at AS/A level Maths in-depth? As it's very, very different to GCSE and there's a lot of unlearning. Had a friend who aced GCSE who took it dropped it because they hated it so much, couldn't get their heads around it. So may be worth looking into it first to make sure she likes it before making a decision.

Even if she retakes and get sat an 8, then she may still struggle at a more advanced level. It all depends on the reasons she didn't do as well as expected, if he reasons is transitory, such as illness or emotional trauma, then could redo. But just my opinion..

Do they offer core maths? And would they let her do chemistry (or even physics) alongside that? DS also got an unexpected 6 in GCSE maths. He did chemistry, DT, business and core maths (instead of physics, maths and business). He’headed off to Newcastle last week to study chemistry.

I also agree the BTECs are worth considering. DD did a mixture of BTEC/A-levels after disappointing (teacher assessed) GCSE grades in 2020. She’s now in her final year at Exeter doing business with law, and on course for a 1st.

What is DT? No, only maths, further maths and statistics offered

@oishidesne DT is design and technology - I imagine you need to have done the GCSE tho which presumably your DD didn't.

You haven't said (maybe bc you don't know) why she dropped from a 7 in mock to just into a 6 in the real thing. I think being top of the class if that equates to a grade 7 is fairly meaningless tbh. DS2 got. 8 in maths and was far from top of his class (I imagine); he took A level and found it a slog, finishing with a hard-worked for B, which is great of course.

Does your DD's GCSE teacher think a) she could cope with A level maths b) she should have got a significantly higher grade? If I had an MFL student (my subject) who scraped a 6 but who I have confidently expected to get grade 7/8 then I would probably be OK with them taking the A level.