Biological Sciences - worth applying?

I have 10 A grades at GCSE due to stupidly procrastinating away my time and leaving revision to the night before for my exams. I know in comparison to the national average, these grades are ok but I am concerned about university applications and extremely regret not trying hard enough and know they will hinder me.

I am hoping to get AAAB or worst case AABB in biology, psychology, mathematics and chemistry respectively at AS this year. if I perform as well as I did in my mock examinations and class tests, then I should be on track to to do well. Hypothetically if I were to receive these grades would a good russell group university (such as biological sciences at imperial) be out of reach? Would I be hindered too much, when applying to a university, please be extremely honest.

I have some work experience, peer mentoring I've been involved in, competitions I've been in and won and hope to do some more charity fundraising events etc. How do I improve this side of my application such as extra-curricules etc... How important are they?

Your GCSEs are fine - I know plenty of people who did a lot worse than you and are happily studying at Imperial now. The most important thing is your AS grades to be honest. Obviously, the more As the better, but AABB is still a very good set of results and it would definitely be worth applying.

And I honestly think people put way too much emphasis on things like work experience. My personal statement was pretty bare in terms of achievements. I had some care home voluntary work and violin, but other than that it was all about the subject. I'd say to just focus on getting the best AS results you can.

Yes those grades are fine for Biological Sciences. It's definitely worth an application to Imperial College! You'd have a good chance.

Thanks are you speaking from personal experience or do you know people who have similar grades to me that got an offer? I'm just curious

Well I've just left Imperial college but I was in the department of Earth Sciences. I knew many people at Imperial on a range of courses (including Biology) who got in with grades similar or worse than yours. I've also watched this forum for the last few years and have seen the sort of grades people get into the university with. Fortunately for you, the competition for Biology at Imperial is slightly lower than it is for some of the engineering subjects.

Your grades are still good though, and provided it looks likely that you will achieve AAA at A2 you meet the requirements. Achieving AABB or similar at AS is fine as it's a solid set of results and puts you in a decent position for achieving AAA at A2.

Also worth noting that you apply to 5 universities on your ucas application, so it's fine to have one or two more ambitious choices.