Negative references

I'm currently in my second year of sixth form and have achieved high grades throughout my education with 11 A*s at GCSE and 4 As in my AS levels. My predicted grades for A2 will hopefully be A* A* A judging by what my teachers have told me and so I was hoping to apply to some tops universities for law. However, this year my sixth form has introduced a new policy so that everyone with less than 95% attendance (which I do) now has 'unsatisfactory attendance' written into their reference. I'm scared that this will completely ruin my chances for university, and it just seems completely idiotic and unfair. Does anyone know whether this will seriously affect where I should apply and the chances of me getting in? Also, is there anything I can do to stop them or make them be a bit nicer?
Many thanks.

Reply 1

ChloeJM

Wow, I can't believe your school would do that! Our sixth form makes sure that we have 100% amazing references no matter what. I'm sorry to hear that...
Maybe you could talk to your tutor/close teacher about it, but other then that, there's not much else to do about it. I would recommend that you STRESS in your personal statement that when ever you're off attendance, you're still completing assignments and working hard etc. My friend has good grades like yours, but has a low attendance record. But she still has a high chance of getting into her Universities because our school is stressing how hard she has worked despite low attendance. Maybe your reference teacher would consider writing something like that?
Don't worry too much about it, I'm sure that you'll still get plenty of offers as long as you keep those excellent grades and write an amazing personal statement which contradicts the school's 'unsatisfactory' claims.