Should I study an access course? (Very important question pls answer ASAP)

Hi

I’m 19 years old and I’ve been out of education for a while because I was abroad. In 2021 I got my GCSE exams predicted and I didn’t get the grades I wanted. Now I’m back in the UK looking to return to education but I don’t know what to do. I was planning on redoing my GCSEs first getting good grades then doing whatever I do next whether it be an access course or something else. But when I came back most of my family members and my friends are all telling me to do an access course and I didnt even know what that was up until now. I only planned on retaking my GCSEs and doing whatever I did next next. I only passed English GCSE and I don’t know what to do. I went to go enroll at a college and they said that I could also do English gcse along with my access.

But I forgot to mention the most important part. I’m looking to do engineering because I’m really interested in it specifically mechanical engineering. The access course I’ve found are all science access courses and I don’t know if I could study mechanical engineering with that. I’m really confused and I need to make my decision on Monday which is the day in supposed to start.

Please help me and reply asap cos I’m honestly so confused on what I should do

What grade did you get in GCSE maths?

I failed I got a grade 2

ok - so in reality your first step is to improve your level of maths. Diving into an access course which is maths heavy for engineering is likely too large a step at this point.