The Student Room Group

I took an A Level subject early

I’m a Private Candidate who is going to take 3 subjects in Oct/Nov 2023 - English Lit, English Lang, and Islamic Studies. I am a Private Candidate whose parents convinced me to take 3 subjects in 2 sittings - they said it would be “less stress” lol. So I took Sociology in a separate sitting, and I got a B. Then I found out that unis prefer to see that you’ve done 3 subs in one sitting, so I took an extra subject (Islamic Studies) just to show that I took 3 subjects at once. The problem is that I heard some people say that unis won’t consider the A Level you did in an earlier sitting while giving you an offer, and that is worrying me, because in that case my Sociology grade would basically be useless.

My question is: should I retake Sociology alongside my other subjects in this coming session? I don’t know if I’ll still do well and get a high B like I did this time around. But if I do then at least it will be considered alongside my other subjects. I was feeling most confident about Sociology and now I found out that it may not even be considered since it was in an earlier sitting, lol… I don’t want them to just consider the 3 I’m doing in this coming session because I’m not as good at them as Sociology. Please help.

Tl;dr: took one A level in an earlier sitting, now worried that my grade won’t be considered by unis since it was taken separately from the others. Wondering if I should retake Sociology so at least my grade will be considered since it will be all in one sitting.
Original post by aleveltaker
I’m a Private Candidate who is going to take 3 subjects in Oct/Nov 2023 - English Lit, English Lang, and Islamic Studies. I am a Private Candidate whose parents convinced me to take 3 subjects in 2 sittings - they said it would be “less stress” lol. So I took Sociology in a separate sitting, and I got a B. Then I found out that unis prefer to see that you’ve done 3 subs in one sitting, so I took an extra subject (Islamic Studies) just to show that I took 3 subjects at once. The problem is that I heard some people say that unis won’t consider the A Level you did in an earlier sitting while giving you an offer, and that is worrying me, because in that case my Sociology grade would basically be useless.

My question is: should I retake Sociology alongside my other subjects in this coming session? I don’t know if I’ll still do well and get a high B like I did this time around. But if I do then at least it will be considered alongside my other subjects. I was feeling most confident about Sociology and now I found out that it may not even be considered since it was in an earlier sitting, lol… I don’t want them to just consider the 3 I’m doing in this coming session because I’m not as good at them as Sociology. Please help.

Tl;dr: took one A level in an earlier sitting, now worried that my grade won’t be considered by unis since it was taken separately from the others. Wondering if I should retake Sociology so at least my grade will be considered since it will be all in one sitting.


What course are you looking to study at university? Do you have a specific uni in mind?
Reply 2
Not sure yet. I'm from Singapore and hoping to apply to unis in Australia and America. Will most probably apply either to English, Sociology, Communications, or Journalism.

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