STEP Prep Thread 2018

Could someone please tell me what C1 and C2 are? Basically a professor said that you must ensure you know the content of these two modules inside out. Being an international applicant I do not know what they are.

So ive got my results now. I got a merit in the AEA this year with 86 in D2. will these not stellar results impact the chance of an offer?
my modules so far are C1 97 C2 87 C3 100 C4 97 FP1 95 M1 98 S1 100 D1 90 and D2 86. Not too bad but i would imagine marginal for Cambridge. any thoughts?

They used to though, which is why DFranklin said what he did

I figured as much.

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As I said in the AEA thread, high boundaries; find out your raw mark and get it clearly stated if it's high (ask your school's Exams Officer). Cam may even ask for it.

Also your 87 in C2 is the most obv 'blip', albeit barely. They'll care little for D2/86. And well done btw.

I got the impression Cambridge don't give a rat's arse about decision from the open day, pity the head of year insists on it in the grounds of 'higher results' lol.

I might have missed a post but what does the open day have to do with it? Was this a Cambridge open day?

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I got the impression Cambridge don't give a rat's arse about decision from the open day, pity the head of year insists on it in the grounds of 'higher results' lol. Anyway I've arranged with my more cooperative maths teacher to do m2 M3 and fp3 for as further additional to get me step 3 ready with content while also improving a* further maths chances. Thanks for the encouragement mate.

If you want to do extra topics (outside the ones you'd be doing anyway for M/FM) to get "STEP 3" ready I really would advise specifically aiming at the content of the STEP 3 syllabus (or a subset thereof), rather than following the A-level specifications.

There's a lot of dross (particularly on the stats side) that you're never going to get asked about in STEP, and conversely there are topics that come up regularly in STEP that are barely mentioned (or not mentioned!) in the A-level specs.

Unfortunately the stats is the mandatory modules of the school for further maths in the second year, with decision in the first year. I take physics also so I figured that m2 M3 would be relatively little work and would improve my physics too. I understand that step 3 mechanics is edecxel M3 plus a couple of things. I have checked the Siklos' spec Vs the edecxel spec and while it's not perfect it's not too bad, so I may as well get a qualification from it.

It's up to you, but being honest, I don't think anyone is going to be very interested in an AFM AS qualification if you have full M/FM, so I wouldn't put much weight on getting the extra qualification. On the other hand, M2 + M3 are certainly worth doing in their own right. (It's the fact you've done the essentially useless D1+D2 modules that leaves you needing to do "extra" modules, really).

What is the difference between taking P1, P2 and P3 or C1,C2,C3 and C4?

What is the difference between taking P1, P2 and P3 or C1,C2,C3 and C4?

P1-P3 was similar to C1-C4, but you had a few proofs e.g.) diff by 1st principles, irrationality, summations + 1-2 extra chapters. Exams were a bit harder. Main change was ditching M3/S3 in A-Level Maths.

It was pre-reform to core in 06/07, can't do it anymore. There was P1-P6, M1-M6, S1-S5. Further Maths had topics like group theory, ricatti eqns, extra conics etc. Exams were a bit harder too.

Makes me wonder why the hell it changed, A level maths is more or less the pure we do now in up to further. Sounds like it covers step far better than it does now

No. You don't get any kind of formula sheet etc either.