Opposing views on A-Level choices

[lyraa]

My DS is making his A-Level choices and has provisionally picked Business, Geography and Psychology.

He doesn't have a strong interest in any of his GCSE subjects and doesn't work hard. He also has mild ADHD and has difficulty focusing and applying himself.

His school have given him target grades of 8/9 across the board, but he says they're unachievable and he'd be happy with 7/8s. He does want to go to uni and likes the idea of a degree apprenticeship, but doesn't have much idea about what he'd like to study. In the nicest possible way, he's quite immature.

My DH thinks his chosen subjects are too soft and won't be respected by unis or potential, future employers. He thinks the "pick what you're good at and will enjoy" advice from schools is intended to boost the schools results, rather than being in the interest of the student's long term outcomes.

I've bought into the school advice, and think pushing DS down a more difficult path that he's not interested in will result in an unhappy 6th form experience (for us all!) and poor grades. I'm not convinced that they will limit his future opportunities, but I'm not sure on this

DH and I need to align our views before we speak to DS. Any thoughts or advice from anyone who's been in a similar situation??

A levels should ultimately be your DS”s choice. Particularly with ADHD it’s important not to push him into a subject he has no interest in.

Nothing wrong with the ones he’s provisionally picked, anyway, assuming he’s not targeting a subject requiring maths or sciences at university.

Has he studied either Business or Psychology for gcse? Does he know he does not need to study either subject to do so at uni. Both will involve maths and could be substitued by that.

Your DH is wrong. Lack of interest is the biggest problem I face as an A level teacher (although lack of ability runs it a close second).

Although does the school offer Business BTEC? That can work better for students who have learning challenges, as there's lots of continuous assessment in it.

Is he Y11? It's a long time from now until GCSE results day and next September when he starts sixth form. Things will change as there will be a lot of career discussions in class over the next 9 months. It's hard to make the right choice of A-Levels when you don't know what you want to do after.

The important thing now is to put what he wants to do as A-levels are a slog and it's no good getting 3 Cs in subjects your husband approves of when he could have got 3 As in ones he enjoys and are relevant to his interests. I've lost count of the number of people i know who were pressured into doing what their parents want to do and ended up either dropping out or refusing to engage with the subject ever again.

Your husband's advice is quite out of date by the way. All those subjects are accepted by the big universities.

I did those same A Levels - and did find it restricted my choice of subjects to apply for at Uni, so it does depend on what he might want to do at Uni - would recommend swapping one for a science if he thinks there is any chance he would want to study anything STEM related at uni. Otherwise, its up to him really, there's no point in choosing subjects he isn't interested in.

The advice from schools is because a levels are a lot of work and students generally only put the work in for stuff they are interested in.

this goes both ways - parents saying to students we want you to be a doctor so you have to do science to a teen who wants to do languages and as well as teens choosing stuff they don’t really like.

is there no gcse at all he has interest in?

the a levels he’s chosen are generally seen as “soft” and a psychology degree might want maths.

Both psychology and geography can be counted as science a levels for certain degrees.
I would consider that range of subjects as fairly diverse. If he hasn't chosen a pure science/maths I would think it unlikely that he would opt for a STEM degree.

My DD2 is in yr12 and doing this exact combination, with the addition of core maths. She did business and geography at GCSE but psychology is a new subject for her. She is enjoying all subjects and thinks they go well together. Core maths, if available at your DS's school, is great - lots of useful 'real life' stuff like mortgages, VAT, tax etc.

the a levels he’s chosen are generally seen as “soft” and a psychology degree might want maths.

There's nothing 'soft' about psychology or geography A levels!
I know Business is looked down on but it covers a lot - essays, data analysis, stats and maths.

Many psychology degrees don't require maths, or even a science.

My DH thinks his chosen subjects are too soft and won't be respected by unis or potential, future employers.

Unless he ends up doing something very specific that requires math/science/computing etc, employers really won't care which GCSEs/A Levels he's done.

Unless it's Media Studies 😅

Psychology IS a science
DD needed 2 sciences for her chosen STEM Degree and Psychology was on of them.

Have you looked at T-Levels?
The more regular assignments may help from a motivation aspect.
And yes you can go on to university from them.

Shame really that this attitude persists when so many of the world's problems come from a lack of media literacy.

Does it still exist? I was just kidding...when I did mine in the early 00s it was seen as a 'doss' subject like art, food tech or similar that you picked as your 4th A Level.

My old man told me there was no way he was paying for me to sit around watching movies for two years...I talked him around but my school dropped it before we got to pick. Ended up doing Food Tech as my 'doss' which involved a lot less dossing in the kitchen and a lot more science than I'd expected 😭

Those A levels are fine in themselves but I agree with @lizs – does he realise that neither business nor psych is needed for a degree in either of those? And has he done either at GCSE? Business is quite commonly offered.

The key things with A level choices IMHO are:

• Will the student enjoy studying them?
• Will their choices close any doors they want to keep open?

The first is more important really. If you won’t enjoy bio or chem then it feels all kinds of wrong to go on to say “but I want to be a doctor”. You really don’t. Similarly for French/French teacher. Or whatever. All A levels close doors but the question is, are they doors you might want to go through?

If unsure of a uni direction, then it makes sense IMHO (other things, by which I mean which subjects you enjoy, which are offered at your school, being equal) to take subjects that will keep the most doors open – in other words subjects needed for certain degrees. So in your DS’s case, he might (might) be better off subbing business and psych for (say) maths and biology, or history and English lit. But not if those are subjects he hates, and he loves business from GCSE and is sure he will love psych.

Psychology is a science btw as a PP points out, but it is not needed as such for a psych degree; and if he wants to later study biology or chem or physics or maths he will need to have done that A level – whereas for psych at uni most sciences are acceptable. Geog is also often counted as a second science – and geog has the advantage that it is also needed for a geography degree and associated subjects. No A level subject today is a doss btw. Especially not art mentioned by a PP!

No employer will mind what subjects he took at A level.

I completely agree that he should be doing subjects he wants to do and is interested in, rather than thinking about what will look “good” to future employers. However - what does he like the look of or what interests him about psychology? My son found that quite a few of his friends who chose that ended up moving to another subject quite quickly once they realised it was actually going to be hard work.

Yeh psych is the most commonly dropped A level at my dcs’ school. It’s less exciting than it sounds!

Psychology is popular with teens because they are in the middle of puberty so a subject that sounds like it will tell them how the human mind works is appealing.

Plus it's new so they don't already hate it. And they think it will be a doss.

When they start and discover just how much maths content there is, alot of them get a nasty shock.

Thanks everyone, to anser a few questions:

He hasn't studied Business or Psychology for GCSE, but thought that they sounded interesting at the 6th Form Open Evening, and for Business in the taster session he had at school.

His current school doesn't offer Business BTEC and, so far, he wants to stay there.

He is Y11, and his school have asked him to pick now - I'm sure he'll be able to change later though (surely!).

He's not interested in STEM subjects, but I guess the fear is that, at 15, he's too young to be sure on that...

Good to hear that both Psychology and Geography can be considered as science subjects. Really interesting to hear that Psychology is the most frequently dropped A-Level - definitely one to do some more exploring on.

@milkandblackspiders - do you mind me asking what you did end up doing after those A-Levels?

@Land0r - I've not heard of core maths (so presumably his school doesn't do it), but I will look in to it! Is it an A-Level?

I should say @lyraa that the ”most frequently dropped” anecdote re psych is just that – anecdata from my DCs’ school. I think as a pp says tho, YP think it sounds interesting and they have not done it before so they take it – but it can be quite dry with a good deal of maths and a lot of case studies.

I would be wary about taking two unknown subjects for A level. Is there nothing else in his GCSE choices that he wants to keep doing? Someone shifting to 2 out of 3 totally new subjects feels a bit like “I don’t like the ones I’ve done so let’s pick something new”.

You say he doesn’t want to do STEM but then you are glad that psych and geog are both sciences? If he is not interested in STEM, does that matter? And tbh the science factor for those two is more that if you want to do (say) bio or chem at uni, you are often asked for a second science – and for some unis geog or psych are acceptable. But your DS is not going in that direction so tbh the “considered a science” aspect is a bit of a red herring. Not that there is anything wrong with either subject as such.

What else does he do for GSCE? Any of these a possibility instead of psych or business – maths, history, DT, an MFL? Worth consideration at least I would say (not bc current choices are in any way dubious, more from the PoV of what he knows and likes).

What does your DH actually want him to study?

I mean, business is going to be decimated by AI, but I don't think psychology and geography will be going away.

I think a degree apprenticeship is a great idea but I’ve heard it’s getting more and more competitive as graduates are discovering it’s hard to get a job and many of them stuck in non-graduate jobs regretting their degree.

So - best to form a plan; take a look at the kind of degree apprenticeships out there in the real world and see what appeals; then work backwards.

Studying what sounds interesting and easy has to be balanced with real world - I actually think business, psychology and geography sounds pretty good

Maths in the form of Statistics will be needed for Business and Psychology and other subjects.