Which course should I apply for university?

Disclaimer: Sorry, I couldn't find the specific forum in the University part of the site, as there wasn't anything called 'Helping to find the right course for you'.

At the moment, I seriously have no idea what to study at university. I'm currently in Year 11, and I've chosen my A Levels, but even then I'm highly likely to change one or two of them.

I have interests, but I don't think I can pursue and study them for three or four years without becoming bored because most of them are only mild (e.g. economics) because I haven't had the time to look into it fully because of my GCSE exams or too narrow (for example, history of Germany between 1949-1990) or both. Revision for my GCSEs have sapped all the time for further reading.

The subjects which I'm strongest at are the ones which I don't see any use for. There isn't a subject which I particularly enjoy over others. Finally, the subject that I consider the most important is Maths.

Here are a non-exclusive list of candidates (courses which I might consider):

Economics
Maths
Computer Science
PPE

Is it possible if somebody may PM me to give me details about these courses and not only what subjects you need but also what you should expect.

I'll PM anyone who offers help with more details (such as the A Levels I'm considering taking, my predicted grades for GCSE etc.).

http://www.ukcoursefinder.com/

You could try this website - it's free to register and it will give you lots of ideas.

I don't know about the individual entry requirements for courses however I can tell you that the best place to get primary information is from the universities website, they will tell you any entry requirements that they have. Remember there are other options apart from university e.g. apprenticeship, however i do not know your career aspirations or alevel choices. These pieces of information may help people give you better advice, so I couldn't of been a greater help.

University rankings change every year and I wouldn't trust them too much.

Disclaimer: Sorry, I couldn't find the specific forum in the University part of the site, as there wasn't anything called 'Helping to find the right course for you'.

At the moment, I seriously have no idea what to study at university. I'm currently in Year 11, and I've chosen my A Levels, but even then I'm highly likely to change one or two of them.

I have interests, but I don't think I can pursue and study them for three or four years without becoming bored because most of them are only mild (e.g. economics) because I haven't had the time to look into it fully because of my GCSE exams or too narrow (for example, history of Germany between 1949-1990) or both. Revision for my GCSEs have sapped all the time for further reading.

The subjects which I'm strongest at are the ones which I don't see any use for. There isn't a subject which I particularly enjoy over others. Finally, the subject that I consider the most important is Maths.

Here are a non-exclusive list of candidates (courses which I might consider):

Economics
Maths
Computer Science
PPE

Is it possible if somebody may PM me to give me details about these courses and not only what subjects you need but also what you should expect.

I'll PM anyone who offers help with more details (such as the A Levels I'm considering taking, my predicted grades for GCSE etc.).

I don't suggest students look too much at rankings - you need to like the course and the place you are going to live in for three years. Some RG unis have poort teaching because the lectureres are more interested in their research than in teaching students. You might find your tutorials are being taken by 3rd and 4th year students ...

Are student lecturers generally better or worse than researcher lecturers?

This is true, but the rough rank of universities remains fairly consistent year on year. Sometimes the guardian has some odd results though...

Also, i'm more than happy to answer any maths specific questions you (the original poster) has as i have studied maths, further maths and computing A levels, and currently am doing a maths degree.

In my opinion, you are paying tuition fees to be taught by someone who has an MA or a PhD not a student!

Would you want to be taught AS level by a Year 13?

Ok. I'm taking Maths and (hopefully) Further Maths next year, depending on whether I am eligible.

How do they calculate your Maths A Level grade? Is it something like they put your scores for your best 6 modules down or something?

I don't suggest students look too much at rankings - you need to like the course and the place you are going to live in for three years. Some RG unis have poort teaching because the lectureres are more interested in their research than in teaching students. You might find your tutorials are being taken by 3rd and 4th year students ...

That depends. Since Year 13s know the stuff from Year 12 and it'd be very fresh in their memories, on one hand, technically they could teach me the material quite well. However, let's say I want to learn something supercurricular or ask for supercurricular opportunities from the teacher to aid me with my application (to show top universities that I'm enthusiastic about the subject beyond the A Level specification), I'd prefer to have somebody who has experience in that stuff to be my teacher.

Year 13s won't know the stuff as well as teachers ... teachers don;t forget A level content as they will have taught it many times and done all the past papers. They also know how to teach the material which is another skill from knowing it.

Sounds good, i greatly recommend both A levels if you like maths!

You will take 6 modules for each of maths and further maths A levels, so 12 modules in total. The maths ones will be C1, C2, C3 and C4 and 2 applied modules. To get a E/D/C/B/A in maths A level you need to average 40-49/50-59/60-69/70-79/80+ respectively across all maths modules. To get he A* in maths you need 80%+ average across all modules and 90%+ average on C3 and C4.

What happens to Further Maths? How do you calculate the grade for that (given there are only 3 pure modules not 4)?

Hello there I am the year above you, and when I chose my options, I wasn't too sure on what I wanted to do either, but I didn't think I would be suited to a reputable university, so I picked options now I kind of regret, even if it has made this year a bit easier. In fact, I felt like you - I thought GCSE's even though I got good grades were boring and none of them really gripped me. In fact, now I want to study a subject I didn't even do at GCSE. The good thing about A-levels is in depth study so you don't really feel this way. I never did Business GCSE, but I do A-level and I love it so much now I want to do a business related degree, so it might be like that for you. You only really need to know for sure this time next year, but of course it would help to know.

I can only talk from personal experiences but my favourite subjects have always been the social sciences/humanities (RS & History were my highest grades with full marks in both at GCSE) so it might be worthwhile to think about what subject group you enjoy the most and go from there.

I have a friend who wants to do PPE and indeed I did want to do this earlier in school, until I realised I wasn't really up to scratch in the maths department For the best uni's like Oxford or LSE you'll need an A at A-level maths, with RS, Politics, History or a subject like that, to help you with the philosophy/politics side. You won't need an A in maths or even maths a level for good universities like Leeds or Manchester for PPE.

For Maths all the top 50 will ask for an A, possibly a B in Maths at A-level, and Economics is similar. For Economics though, it would be wise to consider a subject like History too.

And Computer Science I know nothing about