Ultimate EPQ thread

Original post by Rmharr

I have just started planning my AQA EPQ level 3 and am wondering if i have chosen a good topic.

Im planning for my title to be "will we regret the vast use of antibiotics today?" and i will discuss the antibiotic resistant super bugs and the killing of healthy bacteria in our bodies. Im applying for biology degrees so this should fit, but i dont know if it is too broad??

Im in yr 13 now so dont really have long to sort this and i want to talk about in my PS, so what do you all think??

It sounds alright :smile:

It shows that you have an interest in biology and tbh you'll probably end up narrowing it down a bit anyways because it covers so much. I started off with my title along the lines of "Haemochromatosis, alcohol and Scotlands high death total" blah blah blah and put that in my personal statement, but by the time I got an interview I'd completely changed direction from my original idea. Changing direction and narrowing down isn't a bad thing as it shows you can develop your project and stuff like that.

Good luck with it :smile:

Reply 2302

Original post by Lilbugger

Ok guys I just received my final grade for my EPQ on Aspirin and I managed to pull off an A*. Now here is how I did it:

1. I did nothing at all - I mean I literally did no research whatsoever until maybe the end of August.
2.Spend a huge amount of time researching the thing which was stupid and I ended up having way too much information.
3.Did my essay the week before the deadline - which includes staying up to 3 am the day before handing it in to finish my references. I filled out the production log in about 2 hours, also on the day before - no sweat.

So there you go, this thing is so easy I could not believe it. They even gave us a book (more than 200 pages) which was all about how to plan and structure and so on. I never read the damn thing and I still did fine - and let me tell you I am not amazing at writing and so on I literally made up the structure as I went along.

What I am trying to say is, everybody just calm down. It is really not as much work as it seems - do your research and the writing will flow easily, and I suggest filling out the production log in such a manner that it at least seems as though you started with something very broad and slowly managed to narrow it down to something specific (20 marks are awarded only on this). And in the summary write all about how you learnt organisational skills and planning and time management and all the buzz words, I guarantee this will score high marks.

Good Luck everyone!

Snap! I got an A* for my EP and did very similar to you. In classes me and my friend would sit and email each other pictures of sheep (as you do) and we still both came out with top grades :rolleyes:

I think as long as people knuckle down at some point and do the work and have a bit of luck on your side, then you should be alright :biggrin:

Once you get past the initial "OMG I DON'T KNOW WHERE TO START" phase, the ball will start rolling and you'll hit 5,000 words in no time :smile:

Reply 2303

Original post by Quackers93

Snap! I got an A* for my EP and did very similar to you. In classes me and my friend would sit and email each other pictures of sheep (as you do) and we still both came out with top grades :rolleyes:

I think as long as people knuckle down at some point and do the work and have a bit of luck on your side, then you should be alright :biggrin:

Once you get past the initial "OMG I DON'T KNOW WHERE TO START" phase, the ball will start rolling and you'll hit 5,000 words in no time :smile:

how long did it take you to complete?

Reply 2304

Original post by kiyubi

how long did it take you to complete?

Erm it's really hard to say. I went back and forth a lot - I only ever did it when I felt like it (cause when I didn't feel like it I'd sit and stare at the computer screen for hours straight doing nothing). I did spend a good few hours typing it up, and researching and stuff and the log seemed to take forever but I had about 7months to do it in, I probably could've done it in a month comfortably, in a week at a push. I know someone in the year above who fluttered around doing nothing and did it over a weekend, they were a bit of a mess afterwards haha

I do recommend getting it done sooner rather than later though. And you have to date everything in your log, so don't make it too clsoe together (or you could do what I did and just lie about a few of the dates... shhh though :wink:

)

Reply 2305

Lilbugger

Original post by Smiile

Hey how long did it take to write up your essay as my deadline is in two weeks and i havent done much. Is there any tips you could give me on writing a good essay with evaluation. Im doing my EPQ on the elimination of malaria and my teacher told me to contact doctors and get more sources, did you contact any doctors/organisations for your project and what other sources did you use?And did you evaluate the sources?
Did you do an action plan (write what you need to do and by what date etc)
My EPQ is really stressing me out and I just want to get it out of the way :mad:

Thanks for any help in advance :smile:

Hey sorry for the late reply I sort of lost interest in the thread now that I am finished. It took me about 12 hours, one weekend and another day of hard work - just sitting down and getting it done, I hated every minute of it but it paid of nicely.

Just write your essay after doing a lot of research is all I can say, it sort of just flows. Start with an Introduction and make it light reading, go into detail where necessary and make sure you qoute every single thing. Then end with a conclusion, easy. All I did was read 2 books and a HUGE amount of medicinal trials and papers on pubmed.org, that might help you. In the end I qouted a huge amount of sources which I only used about half of. You could say you saw a documentary and just make up some name. I don't agree with lying but it's unfair that the mark scheme states we have to refer to a load of ressources although for specific topics there is only a very limited amount of books and things to refer to, therefore if you don't mention other forms of media you can score lower which is just unfair - so just make something up if you think you don't have enough sources. For evaluating your sources just mention before doing your referencing that of course you are aware that sources like wikipedia arent the most reliable and I don't know you could maybe give each source a mark out of ten on reliabilty? Just make it obvious you at least thought about what sources to refer to, also mention this in your log!

I'm sure you'll be fine as said this is easy! :biggrin:

Original post by Alpha5

interns of research did you use a range of sources e.g interviews, lectures, ect.
You done it really quick, my deadlines in may, so I'm taking it slow.

As mentioned above I only really used a few books and websites. However I said that I had listened to the radio and watched documentaries, which I in fact did but then forgot the names of and just came up with one in my reference. You can mention the most ridiculous sources in your log, that is what that section is for! Just come up with any random source and write it down - you are only saying you are 'planning' on refering to them, you don't actually have to. In fact you can mention in your evaluation that it was 'interesting to see how little ressources there were and how you needed to look for ages for very specific stuff'. Also talk about selecting certain bits of your research and discarding others, this shows you thought before writing. If it is not until may you can literally do a 100 words a day and you will be done by christmas, but I'm not the one to tell you as I did it in like 3 days.

Original post by jmillslittle

Could you name some of these buzzwords?

As said, planning, organisation and time management are the big three I can come up with of the top of my head. Look think about it, what is that whole log about? Planning and researching so just use their vocabulary. 'This project has show me the significance of planning before doing my research and how important it is to evaluate the reliabilty of sources. In order to complete the project in good time I planned the structure beforehand and then wrote up each bit in different time slots which I had organised to fit around my research.' It is really simple just give them what they want to hear haha!

Good luck everyone! :wink:

Reply 2306

Original post by Quackers93

Erm it's really hard to say. I went back and forth a lot - I only ever did it when I felt like it (cause when I didn't feel like it I'd sit and stare at the computer screen for hours straight doing nothing). I did spend a good few hours typing it up, and researching and stuff and the log seemed to take forever but I had about 7months to do it in, I probably could've done it in a month comfortably, in a week at a push. I know someone in the year above who fluttered around doing nothing and did it over a weekend, they were a bit of a mess afterwards haha

I do recommend getting it done sooner rather than later though. And you have to date everything in your log, so don't make it too clsoe together (or you could do what I did and just lie about a few of the dates... shhh though :wink:

)

i do biology, chemistry and maths AS , and i bet you know how much attention these subjects need heh!
so what do you advise me to do cause iam all messed up right now heh!

Reply 2307

Original post by kiyubi

i do biology, chemistry and maths AS , and i bet you know how much attention these subjects need heh!
so what do you advise me to do cause iam all messed up right now heh!

Haha yeh. I was doing A-level Maths, Biolog and Chemistry and an extra (a stupid extra :frown:

) AS in Science in Society when I was doing my EP and I managed... And I'm unorganised too! lol

Sorry I'm a little confused about what you're asking :redface:

Are you asking about when to do what? Like time management? If so I advise try and get as much done as possible before say december so that you can revise for Jan exams. Then have a complete break for revision and then by the time they're over you'll have had a good break and may even have had some inspiration from your time off :smile:

(This all depends on your deadline though)

Btw if anyone is worried about writting "I have bad time management skills" in their log, don't be cause it's not a bad idea - as long as at the end you say that the EP has helped and what not :smile:

Reply 2308

Lilbugger

Original post by kiyubi

i do biology, chemistry and maths AS , and i bet you know how much attention these subjects need heh!
so what do you advise me to do cause iam all messed up right now heh!

I do Chemistry, Physics, Maths, Economics and German I still managed to do it in a week.

A start would be to get of TSR and just go for it, as soon as you start it will easily flow and you will have 5000 words in no time I promise.

Get working, you can do it ! :tongue:

Reply 2309

Original post by Lilbugger

I do Chemistry, Physics, Maths, Economics and German I still managed to do it in a week.

A start would be to get of TSR and just go for it, as soon as you start it will easily flow and you will have 5000 words in no time I promise.

Get working, you can do it ! :tongue:

thanks for you support heh!
but one last thing i have reserched and everything but do i not need some evidence of my rserch for example biblioghrapy or something?

Reply 2310

Original post by kiyubi

thanks for you support heh!
but one last thing i have reserched and everything but do i not need some evidence of my rserch for example biblioghrapy or something?

I used to have a website that told you how to reference properly and stuff, but what I did was as I typed stuff out I'd put a footnote with the website/book/etc and the date. It made my reference and bibliography sections so much easier to do whereas other people would have to back track the whole however many months to find things they just glanced at. It really does help to keep an ongoing word doc with websites and stuff :smile:

Reply 2311

Original post by Quackers93

I used to have a website that told you how to reference properly and stuff, but what I did was as I typed stuff out I'd put a footnote with the website/book/etc and the date. It made my reference and bibliography sections so much easier to do whereas other people would have to back track the whole however many months to find things they just glanced at. It really does help to keep an ongoing word doc with websites and stuff :smile:

yeah i think this is the best way to keep on track heh!
are u in AS?

Reply 2312

Original post by kiyubi

yeah i think this is the best way to keep on track heh!
are u in AS?

Nope (

Only joking I actually miss college) I finished my A-levels in the summer and am now on a gap year and reapplying for Medicine :cool:

Reply 2313

Original post by Quackers93

Nope (

Only joking I actually miss college) I finished my A-levels in the summer and am now on a gap year and reapplying for Medicine :cool:

oh!
good luck huh!
hope your applications go well!
and you play a good advisor mate!
is there anyway in which we can be TSR friends heh!

Reply 2314

Original post by kiyubi

oh!
good luck huh!
hope your applications go well!
and you play a good advisor mate!
is there anyway in which we can be TSR friends heh!

Thanks

haha yeah sure, need any more advice feel free to ask... all I do is spend my time on a combination of this, fb and twitter lol

Reply 2315