A-level computing

I know someone who picked A-level computer science without having done the GCSE, he got an A* (and many others who had done the GCSE didn't).

As for medicine/dentistry, no, it just won't matter. If you've got chemistry and biology A-level then you can apply anywhere.

Thank you. what are your doing?

I'm at uni now but I did maths, further maths, physics and history

i'm doing computer science atm (im in year 12) and a few of my classmates are taking it without doing it at gcse. he's been getting high marks in all his tests so far another one of my friends who didn't take it at gcse is doing great at theory, but is struggling with the practical stuff. so i'd recommend over the holidays learning python or any coding language on codeacademy so that it'll be easier to start with at a level! good luck!

i'm doing computer science atm (im in year 12) and a few of my classmates are taking it without doing it at gcse. he's been getting high marks in all his tests so far another one of my friends who didn't take it at gcse is doing great at theory, but is struggling with the practical stuff. so i'd recommend over the holidays learning python or any coding language on codeacademy so that it'll be easier to start with at a level! good luck!

Hi, I'm currently in year 12 and I'm doing computer science a-level without the GCSE. It can be a bit difficult at first if your teacher assumes that everyone has done the GCSE and has the background knowledge but I found it easy to catch up. My college set us summer work to make notes and do the quiz questions on Bitesize for GCSE computer science so you could do that. It did take forever but it was useful. In a recent test, I got the highest mark in my class so you can definitely do well in computer science a-level without any previous knowledge (although I haven't actually done any exams yet).

I would say that computer science is easier if you're good at maths. There's quite a lot of binary maths involved. Unfortunately, it's not one of my strong points but most of it's fairly simple so far.

I don't know if it improves your application for medicine or dentistry but I don't think it would negatively affect it either. It's a science subject so I think it would be reasonably well-respected for those courses.

A-Level computer science had been around for several decades before the GCSE existed, so the syllabus has always been designed with the assumption that nobody taking the subject would have ever touched anything related to Computer Science or programming before starting. (They only introduced the subject to GCSE very recently about 3-4 years ago)