Durham and GCSEs

there's been a lot said about Bristol's admissions policy and no-one seems to be able to agree how they pick their candidates.

Seeing as this is my first post I figure it'd be polite to introduce myself first, so hi, I'm Nick.

Anyway, stumbled across this thread, and Durham WAS one of my top 6 on my form BUT I only have 3 A* and am applying for History and English, so is there realistically any point whatsoever or am I just wasting a space? And do Durham take into account extra-curricular stuff like being Head Boy etc?

how much do you want to go to durham? if the answer is A LOT! then do it, you will regret it otherwise.. but i applied last year with 4A*s and was rejected. i ignored the warnings as i had my heart set on durham (it rivaled cambridge). my advice would be that if you have less than 6A*s, even if you have 5A grades at AS and are predicted 5A grades at A2 , its too much of a risk to apply, they place a great deal of emphasis on gcses and even a superb range of extra cirricular activities probably wont help you much.

I'm tempted to leave it I think as I'm not 100% set on Durham or anything, I quite like it but I wouldn't set my heart completely on it, and I'll probably go for somewhere like Cardiff or Lancaster as a replacement as there's no point in putting a Uni on there that's pretty much a solid rejection. I'm applying for Oxford aswell which means the other 5 are even more important to be pretty reliable, and from what I've heard from my tutors they don't seem to pay too much attention to GCSE's, indeed someone from my school went there last year having got 2 D's at GCSE level and 'just the one A*'. I think I'll be giving Durham a miss, maybe not such a bad thing as accomodation does seem VERY expensive there to me...

^^^ 'remainder all As'??! wow that's a bit steep!

I agree. I've already said in other topics that i think Durham's GCSE entry requirements are ridiculous.

How they can possibly rubbish so many candidates at the first hurdle on the basis that by the age of 16 these candidates didn't necessarily excel academically in all subjects (including subjects like Science, Maths and Languages which require additional capacities which the historian doesn't nescessarily need) before even considering a candidate's development at A-Level, their natural capacity, flair and talent for history or their passion for the subject? To me, it is boarders on absurdity.

But it's Durham's bed - they lie on it after all.

I've just started AS levels and I already know that I would really, really like to do History and Politics at Durham, but the problem is I also want to take a gap year. They say on the website that they don't have a problem with deferred entry, and I have 8A*s 3As at GCSE in the following subjects

A* - English, English Lit, History, Maths, Biology, French, Music, Rel Studies
A - Chemistry, Physics, Additional Maths

I expect you would need to be really exceptional for them to reserve you a deferred place, and with Durham's ridiculously high demands for GCSE grades, do I honestly have a hope? This is assuming I get 4 As this year of course (History, Eng Lit, Music and French.) I also have a lot of extracurricular stuff (Grade 8 Piano, Violin & Singing, Ulster Youth Choir, Community Service etc etc)

Please be honest....is it a really bad idea to go for deferred entry?

OH MY GOD! ! ! will someone tell me durham dont need 6A*s or more! *shattered* Ive applied to durham and i only got 3A*s and the rest A's.
And durhams my first preference uni!!!

note to self: ive just wasted one place in my ucas uni choices options

I've just noticed something....Durham now states on its website that:



Thats somewhat better than their previous complete silence on the issue.



Really? Because I've heard that Stalin and Boyles' Law go hand in hand!



Though it may have been Durham who informed me of that.