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Capital letters for subjects in personal statement

Hi there,

My UCAS tutor told me that I should be consistent with all the capital letters used to refer to subjects, she suggested that I should use lower case letters instead. However, at one point, I mentioned A-level Psychology, surely this one will have to be capitalised? What shall I do?

Reply 1

Knav

Original post by cat1234!

Yes you would be correct haha. Just keep it capitalised? Your UCAS tutor is not going to be right about everything :smile:

Reply 2

McGinger

If its an academic subject, exam title or course, convention is that its History.
However, 'the history of..' etc is lower case.

Reply 3

cat1234!

Original post by Knav

Yes you would be correct haha. Just keep it capitalised? Your UCAS tutor is not going to be right about everything :smile:

So just to check for other subjects, if I don't put A-level in front, I should use lower cases for all of them?(of course except for language subjects)

Reply 4

cat1234!

Original post by McGinger

If its an academic subject, exam title or course, convention is that its History.
However, 'the history of..' etc is lower case.

Ah okay, so even when I mention other subjects such as Maths without A-level in front. I still need it to be capitalised?

Reply 5

McGinger

Original post by cat1234!

So just to check for other subjects, if I don't put A-level in front, I should use lower cases for all of them?(of course except for language subjects)

"Whilst studying history ..." but "Within my History course".

Reply 6

cat1234!

Original post by McGinger

"Whilst studying history ..." but "Within my History course".

If it's my study of history, it's lower case as well right?

Reply 7

McGinger

Original post by cat1234!

If it's my study of history, it's lower case as well right?

Yes.

Reply 8

cat1234!

Original post by McGinger

Yes.

Would they reject my application because I've used capital letters for all the a level subjects I'm doing?

Reply 9

Clearing and Applications Advisor

Original post by McGinger

If its an academic subject, exam title or course, convention is that its History.
However, 'the history of..' etc is lower case.

An academic subject isn’t a proper noun (nor is a group of courses “history degrees”) :rofl:

Lots of academic staff capitalise their subjects but that’s not correct - it’s fascinating to compare editorial style guides for universities with their formal documentation like programme specs. University staff are almost universally terrible at understanding and following standard grammar rules.

Either way capitalisation of subjects isn’t going to be a deal breaker in getting an offer or not.

Reply 10

Clearing and Applications Advisor

Original post by cat1234!

Would they reject my application because I've used capital letters for all the a level subjects I'm doing?

OP read
https://www.ox.ac.uk/sites/files/oxford/Style%20Guide%20HT2016.pdf And show it to your teacher and then stick with what you were doing in the first place (or rephrase your sentence so that you’re talking about your current studies instead of specifically A level x)