Phylosophy A'Level: a soft or hard A'level?

[McCloudsextoy]

Does anyone know?

A hard one, I think. Well received as far as I understand it, by universities, as it helps to teach students how to think.

Philosophy & Ethics is respected.

Philosophy on it's own is on the Cambridge list of "A levels suitable for Arts courses" if that helps?

Yes, it helps, many thanks.

It is taught at DS1's very academic independent - in fact one of DS1's friends did Philosophy A Level and then went on to do Philosophy at Cambridge.

DH teaches philosophy as part of Ethics A Level and it is bloody hard from what I can see.

Just as an example I heard an In Our Time on the radio the other day about Thomas Aquinas and he is going to use it in a lesson as a 'stretch' - and that programme requires an extremely high level of intellect and thought IMO.

It's also part of the hallowed PPE isn't it?

Hard. I'm in mensa and I got an 'E'. Even that was a massive learning curve.

Very, very interesting subject IMO. Changed my outlook on life.

I remember in the first lesson the lecturer said he was going to turn us into 'nit-picking philosophy students', he was right.

hard

HARD especially when you can't spell it

It's a hard one, similar to RS.

My DS had a choice of Philosophy, RS or Critical Thinking. Philosophy seemed to be the hardest, and CT a bit of a joke.

Saying that, DS didn't enjoy it at all, although got an A grade.

I did Philosophy and Ethics at A-level. It was very challenging but I loved it and went on to study it at university. Out of the class of 6 of us, 3 went on to study Philosophy. It can be a very broad subject so I love certain parts (such as political philosophy and ethics) and wasn't very good at/didn't enjoy others (like formal logic).

The A-level and subsequent degree completely changed me and my outlook on life (like Meglet).

Philosophy 'A' level (by AQA - the only board that offers "Philosophy" 'A' level) is different to Philosophy and Ethics - which is often "Religious Studies". I teach both 'A' levels (and the RS course I teach is philosophy and ethics)

According to a recent study (the Durham Uni one), RS is somewhere in the middle on the difficulty of 'A' levels. It was about the same level of difficulty as English lang and lit I think. Certainly, my students do not find it an easy course. It seems to have a decent level of respectability amongst universities too.

Philosophy (the pure AQA philosophy A level) is harder than the RS philosophy course. The AQA philosophy course is much faster, its covers more topics and the epistemology elements of the course is harder too.
Both are fascinating courses though. HTH

I'm studying A Levels as a mature student and alot of the school leavers who have gone into the subject have found it difficult but interesting in the first couple of weeks.

I teach Philosophy of Religion ( half of the Philosophy and Ethics course) and the students do find it hard but also very enjoyable. Some of them say it is life changing and many go on to study Philosophy at university.

I ask mine to listen to in our time as well.

As a hijack/aside, DS1 is doing philosophy A level and is interested in doing it at university, as a joint honours with history.

Does anyone have any recommendations as to good universities for either subject?

He has just got a C at AS level, made up of an A for one exam and a D for the other - he will be re-sitting the one he got a D for, so hopefully will improve on that!

I did philosophy as my first degree at Swansea many many years ago now though. It was four years of bliss. It was an amazing department in those days. I don't know about now though.

BecauseIAmWorthIt: List of Uni's offering History/Philosophy degrees

I did it, it was bloody hard! I did English and some "ologies" and found Philosophy quite hard at A level. I did go on to study it at university though, it is very interesting.

BIWI, Cambridge should also be on that list as you can study Philosophy and History there by taking one as Part I (which will be either 1 or 2 years long) and one as Part II (either 2 or 1 year long!)

Oxford does some joint Philosophy degrees.

There are many options to put into the UCAS search - too many variations on History (Ancient, Modern, Political, Religious etc etc) so I just choose plain Modern History + Philosophy. Probably, if you do Philosophy + History you get a different set of results

Hard.

TBH A Level is seen by a lot of academic philosophers as a bit pointless as the A level marking scheme has to be really rigid (so the course boring) so there's no scope for interesting ideas. A lot of good philosophers get E's. (Have probably cheered up Meglet )

Philosophy OTOH is a great subject at university, although content of courses differs wildly.

Milliways - thanks for the link. Unfortunately it said it had timed out!

choosy - sadly I don't think DS1 is quite good enough for Oxbridge.

I was going to suggest Cambridge, one of my year 13s has been looking into courses and she chose Cambridge.

I agree about the marking scheme, but good a level teaching is not about marking schemes. My students get so much from it.

BecauseIAMWI: - Use this as it is the UCAS course selection thingy.....

BIWI maybe, but why not look at it the other way - if Oxbridge isn't good enough for him, that's fine - but why not have a look at it, if it does the course he wants? If he doesn't like it, then he needn't apply.

Parly because Oxbridge is/are so RICH and these days that really helps - shedloads of books in the library, support, bursaries, all that stuff. I was so when I found out that you have to make a special request for an interlibrary loan at my current uni, which a tutor has to sign off specially; with an arts subject i would always recommend a university with a copyright library so that everything you could want is on site.

will shut up now...

I agree choosy - but am also having to deal with teenage hormones here ....