The Student Room Group

A level options

Hi everyone - I am struggling at the moment with choosing my a level options. I would like to do history at oxbridge/top tier Unis. At the moment my options are English lit, history, biology and politics but I am not sure if having biology is a disadvantage. I was thinking of possible swapping it out for French or latin. Pls help !!
Original post by Mayataylor
Hi everyone - I am struggling at the moment with choosing my a level options. I would like to do history at oxbridge/top tier Unis. At the moment my options are English lit, history, biology and politics but I am not sure if having biology is a disadvantage. I was thinking of possible swapping it out for French or latin. Pls help !!

I can't imagine Oxford would have anything against you taking A Level Biology if you want to do History. It's a difficult subject so it would demonstrate a good level of intelligence. To be honest, as long as you have A Level History, you'll probably be fine.

If you check out the entry requirements for History on Oxford's website, you'll see they don't actually require any specific subjects, not even history. The only thing it says is that it RECOMMENDS you take History. So you can probably just take literally whichever subjects you enjoy the most. All of the choices you listed are respectable A Levels so you should be okay with any of them.
Reply 2
Original post by Mayataylor
Hi everyone - I am struggling at the moment with choosing my a level options. I would like to do history at oxbridge/top tier Unis. At the moment my options are English lit, history, biology and politics but I am not sure if having biology is a disadvantage. I was thinking of possible swapping it out for French or latin. Pls help !!

if i was you i will avoid biology as it is not really related with or will help you with history
Reply 3
Since there aren't specific subject requirements for your course, choose the subjects you enjoy most. A Levels are a bit of a slog by the end, but it's always easier if you enjoy what you're studying, and the more you enjoy it, the more you can stay motivated to achieve those top grades.

Hope this helps xx
Original post by alihus07
if i was you i will avoid biology as it is not really related with or will help you with history

I disagree. Oxford doesn't actually require any specific subjects for their History course so I don't think there would be any harm in doing Biology. Also, good grades in science levels are pretty valuable because they're tough.
Reply 5
Original post by 123vet
Since there aren't specific subject requirements for your course, choose the subjects you enjoy most. A Levels are a bit of a slog by the end, but it's always easier if you enjoy what you're studying, and the more you enjoy it, the more you can stay motivated to achieve those top grades.

Hope this helps xx


Thank you that’s really helpful
Reply 6
[QUOTE="alihus07;87398946"]if i was you i will avoid biology as it is not really related with or will help you with history[/QUOTE
I’m relatively confident I can get good grades in biology or Latin/ french but I really love biology I’m just sure I don’t want to pursue science. Do you think it would hurt my application if I did 4 a levels?
Reply 7
Original post by Mayataylor
Original post by alihus07
if i was you i will avoid biology as it is not really related with or will help you with history[/QUOTE
I’m relatively confident I can get good grades in biology or Latin/ french but I really love biology I’m just sure I don’t want to pursue science. Do you think it would hurt my application if I did 4 a levels?


The only way doing 4 A levels will harm your application is if your grades drop because of the strain of doing 4 subjects. If you are concerned about this you could always start off on 4 subjects but drop one after a year?

You should prioritise getting good grades over taking a higher number of subjects. Oxbridge will prefer you to have 3 grades if they're top ones - if you do 4 subjects, they will ask you to get an A/A* in that subject too, so do bear that in mind.
Reply 8
Original post by EmShez01
I disagree. Oxford doesn't actually require any specific subjects for their History course so I don't think there would be any harm in doing Biology. Also, good grades in science levels are pretty valuable because they're tough.

they are very tough indeed i do them :frown:

Quick Reply