Help! 5 or 4 A-levels..?

Hi, i've just joined after reading a few related discussions on whether its advisable to take 5 A-Levels.
Originally i was going to take:
-English Literature
-Biology
-Psychology
- Law
However now i'm only certain about English Lit and Biology the reason being that i don't know whether i should go down the medicine route (if so needing to change Law to Chemistry) or whether to just stick to what i feel am interested in (the Law teacher and content seem really nice). The thing is that I realize to go into the field of medicine requires a well-thought out decision and commitment at quite an early stage. At my college interview i was told that by taking Chemistry instead of Law would set me up nicely for a medical career and university. Also, a family friend who is a lawyer also told me not to take A-Level law as the content is the same as in the first year of a Law degree, however, my thought being that why would you choose a law degree at a university to study if you've had no prior experience to it? Also, i worry about the Maths element to the Chemistry course; if i did take it i might struggle but i was in top set in Maths at school (GCSE level) though i felt at the bottom of the class. I've also briefly considered History as an option. I've already taken 3 GSCE's in year 9 and a further GCSE in year 10 along with Core Science. I receive my year 11 results later in August. I really don't know what to do...would it be a possibility to take both Law and Chemistry? Or does that mix of subjects seem too trying? Thoughts?...

Reply 1

tommyprice5

I personally wouldn't do five with those subjects. If you want to do Law, university's really don't care if you have the A Level or not, especially as many schools don't offer it. Also, I know from experience that English Lit can be incredibly time consuming if you do OCR (or any other board that has the exam closed-book), as you have to be able to remember a lot of quotes and critical readings, as well as context and the plot of the book in good detail. Not to mention the AS requires you to have read three coursework texts, a poetry anthology (usually 15 poems IIRC) and an exam text. All of that, combined with Bio and Chem, which a few of my friends took and found very difficult and time consuming (especially as they both had coursework as well to deal with), I would personally recommend dropping Law from that list

Reply 2

>BookWorm<

Original post by tommyprice5

Thanks that's actually really helpful, I was considering doing the combined English but either way it is a subject i enjoy and am predicted to do well in, just depends on my results i guess. Also, do you mean taking Chemistry instead of Law?

Reply 3

C0balt

Drop law and take chemistry up.

Law doesn't have specific entry requirements most of the time and Law A level is even in black list sometimes.

Chemistry A level doesn't require much maths. More than GCSE but it's rather just systematic maths and you do the same thing all the time.

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Reply 4

>BookWorm<

Original post by C0balt

Okay thanks, is there anyway that A-Level Law is useful though? Just wondering why it would be set up as a viable qualification if it has no real life applications? And that's actually really good to hear about Chemistry, I've always been better at algebraic maths anyway. :smile:

Reply 5

C0balt

It's not letting me quote for some reason

Tbh I don't know :tongue:

I don't do A level law haha

Yeah if you're good at algebra you'd be fine. For AS at least you just have to know a few simple formulas and rearrange them.
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Reply 6

Kokopod

To repeat what the other users are suggesting, drop Law and take Chemistry. I don't think not taking Law A-level will put you at a disadvantage when applying for Law at university, if that's what you eventually decide to do, but not taking Chem would rule out medicine as an option. I have even heard that some universities prefer you to have NOT done A-level Law if you're applying for a Law degree, because they prefer to teach you 'from scratch' so to speak, but this could be incorrect.

As for the option of taking all 5, I personally wouldn't recommend that. Do four ASs and do them well, rather than spreading yourself too thinly. (That's the mistake I made in choosing to do IB, and therefore 6 subjects!)

Reply 7

>BookWorm<

Original post by Kokopod

Oh wow, that's actually quite interesting as I did seriously consider the IB but in the end didn't feel confident enough to go for it, thanks btw. :smile:

Reply 8

tommyprice5