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How important are GCSEs in your future?

I know that GCSEs play an important role in getting to choose what ib course or A levels you do (basically the next step of your school life) but how important are they actually for future job applications or college applications?

Reply 1

MindMax2000

Universities Forum Helper

Original post by reallycringename

College applications/6th form? Pretty important (and probably the only party that uses GCSEs to such extent, even though the exam boards for none of their courses specifically require you to have any specific grades or GCSEs).

For work? So long it's level 2 (above a 5 or so), then you're fine for your first role. After getting sufficient experience, I have never seen people really pay that much attention on them unless you decide to work abroad (which entails a whole lot of hoops to jump through).

For uni? So long you have the basic Maths, English Language at good grades, you're good for most courses. For STEM degrees, I have seen some asking for relatively high grades in specific STEM subjects if you haven't done some for A Level. Other than that, I haven't seen them being really stressed upon.
For competitive degree courses at uni e.g. veterinary science, medicine, and dentistry, they might look at the overall grades you have for your GCSEs to predict how likely you would actually get the grades you're predicted for A Levels/IB. If you already have your A Level/IB grades, they don't care about your GCSE grades other than for those for English Language and Maths.

In my opinion, they're not that important. It's just another set of hoops to jump through as part of your academic journey. After college, they're not really looked into. After uni, nobody really cares unless the job you're going for specifically requires GCSE for your first role.

The general scheme of things is if you have at least 5 GCSEs at level 2, you should be fine for most things in life.