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How beneficial is 4 A2’s?

Hello, I’m just going into Year 13 so deciding on what subject to drop. My AS results were AAAAC in maths, further maths, physics, chemistry and citizenship respectively. Citizenship stops at AS and I am considering dropping chemistry. At university I want to study maths and all of the courses I am looking at are very competitive, so I was wondering if doing 4 A2 would make that much difference. I think that my predicted A2 grades would be A*A*AA, with the *’s in maths and physics. Any advice would be helpful.
Thanks

Reply 1

gsugar

Universities can only, by law, look at your 3 highest A levels.
The fourth one will not be taken into account.
I personally, would not study 4 A levels, and just stick to having 3 A levels and 2 AS's.
Obviously, you will have more time to study for 3 subjects than you would for 4, which will help you attain higher grades.

Reply 2

cazzy-joe

10

gsugar

Universities can only, by law, look at your 3 highest A levels.
The fourth one will not be taken into account.
I personally, would not study 4 A levels, and just stick to having 3 A levels and 2 AS's.
Obviously, you will have more time to study for 3 subjects than you would for 4, which will help you attain higher grades.

Where did you get this???
atm i'm considering dropping my fifth subject....but i'm still deciding so hard

Reply 3

Lil' Flo

9

gsugar

Universities can only, by law, look at your 3 highest A levels.
The fourth one will not be taken into account.
I personally, would not study 4 A levels, and just stick to having 3 A levels and 2 AS's.
Obviously, you will have more time to study for 3 subjects than you would for 4, which will help you attain higher grades.

But don't Cambridge for example, give AAAA offers?

Reply 4

cazzy-joe

10

Jederrs

Hello, I’m just going into Year 13 so deciding on what subject to drop. My AS results were AAAAC in maths, further maths, physics, chemistry and citizenship respectively. Citizenship stops at AS and I am considering dropping chemistry. At university I want to study maths and all of the courses I am looking at are very competitive, so I was wondering if doing 4 A2 would make that much difference. I think that my predicted A2 grades would be A*A*AA, with the *’s in maths and physics. Any advice would be helpful.
Thanks

My condition : AS-Maths,chem,physics,bio-AAAB resp
Now I'm taking up one year full further maths and I want to study maths too.....I'm so unsure of dropping Biology incase my FM wasnt that great :frown:

Reply 5

chaz1992

15

gsugar

Universities can only, by law, look at your 3 highest A levels.

Where did you get this from? Some unis give you offers for 4 A-Levels.

If you're planning on doing maths at uni, you should be doing 4 A-Levels as it shows unis you can cope with a lot of work and still cope.

Reply 6

thepomster

2

I did four A2's and i would say dont do it, for me it just meant each subject had less time and my uni offer was for three subjects

Reply 7

Ray_Han

11

I would say in most cases, a 4th subject wouldn't advantage you. Your proposed A2 subject combination, double maths and physics can be seen as very narrow for some subjects, e.g. economics. As you are applying for maths, you could get away with this combination. However, if you are not completely convinced you want to apply for maths, keeping chemistry may be a good idea.

Reply 8

username392640

14

gsugar

Universities can only, by law, look at your 3 highest A levels.
The fourth one will not be taken into account.
I personally, would not study 4 A levels, and just stick to having 3 A levels and 2 AS's.
Obviously, you will have more time to study for 3 subjects than you would for 4, which will help you attain higher grades.

That is not true, why are you talking if you don't know?
I know people that do 4 A2's and have been given offers of for example A*AAA.

Reply 9

Jakko247

2

gsugar

Universities can only, by law, look at your 3 highest A levels.
The fourth one will not be taken into account.
I personally, would not study 4 A levels, and just stick to having 3 A levels and 2 AS's.
Obviously, you will have more time to study for 3 subjects than you would for 4, which will help you attain higher grades.

Just to put another nail in the coffin, this is not true :p:

I asked my university last year what would happen if I missed my AAA offer, they said they would consider my other subject grades!

Reply 10

ldewar1

I think it's a waste of time to be honest. I tried it (and ended up with A*A*A and then a C in the subject I should have dropped). People from my school who applied to Oxbridge got in with only 3 A-levels at A* so I think your interview and GCSE's might also count...

Reply 11

IKnowSoMuch!!

1

Well there is nothing in A-Levels that will benefit you, they are not like salad or fish. However, if you do 4 A2's and make good progress then a potential university or employer will find that impressive although keep in mind if you apply to a top uni with 4 relevent subjects (which it seems you are going to) you will have to face an offer of AAAA up to A*A*A*A* which would be scary!

Reply 12

gsugar

Well that's a good sign!
The teachers in my school and the lady from Careers Wales lied to us...
It's such a relief that you can trust the people who are supposed to help you to provide you with correct information.
Fortunately, being lied to didn't affect me!

Reply 13

Jederrs

OP

Thank you very much for the help,
I’m not really a fan of chemistry and didn’t enjoy the AS very much, also my lowest A. I was thinking about doing the extended project on a maths related topic instead of the 4th A2? I got 6 A*s and 7 A’s at GCSE and with high predicted grades surely they will be able to see that I can cope with the work load?

Reply 14

skipp

17

In your case OP don't think 4A2's will benefit you too much, if you enjoyed chemistry, or if your other subjects weren't as relevant it might be worth it, or if you were applying for a different subject at uni...but as things stand that's not the case, never did the extended project and as a result not sure how valuable it is, but if you find yourself underchallenged another relevant qualification isn't going to do you any harm & seeing as maths is what you enjoy you'll probably get more out of it on a personal level as opposed to another year of chemistry

gsugar

Well that's a good sign!
The teachers in my school and the lady from Careers Wales lied to us...
It's such a relief that you can trust the people who are supposed to help you to provide you with correct information.
Fortunately, being lied to didn't affect me!

It's a worryingly common problem :sadnod:

How beneficial is 4 A2’s?

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