IB Retakes - a waste of time?

I really wouldn't bother, IB retakes aren't like A level retakes and are poorly regarded. Most competitive unis won't accept IB retake candidates. Besides, as much as everyone tells themselves that they'll do things differently come november, you'd need to get something like 40 points on your retakes in order to impress even a mediocre university and you're unlikely to pull that off. Did you meet the offer for your insurance uni?

Some countries use a points system that is based on the final score and doesn't discriminate against retakes. In that case it is useful. I think Ireland and Germany work like that.

IB retakes are NOT poorly regarded. I did retakes and got into 2 top 10 universities. agreed, some will disregard retakes, however not every school will do this.

i find that really hard to believe, name them? if they are actually top 10 universities, i will swallow my pride and take back everything i said in my last post.

Also, OP, carefully consider the fact that there is a high chance you will not improve your score by the 3/4 points necessary to reapply to st andrews or a uni of similar academic repute and will therefore have wasted a year. again, surely your insurance uni isn't bad enough to warrant that risk?

I got offers from

-Warwick, York, Birmingham, Liverpool and Exeter.

They're only useful for people who are absolutely desperate to get into better universities and were thinking of taking a gap year anyway. But remember that retakes are still a LOT of work and that it's still easy to mess up. I really think you're better off sticking to your score, lowering your standards and not spending a ******** of time studying for some of the hardest exams you'll do in your entire life. (For example, uni level physics exams are a tad easier than HL physics exams...)

They're only useful for people who are absolutely desperate to get into better universities and were thinking of taking a gap year anyway. But remember that retakes are still a LOT of work and that it's still easy to mess up. I really think you're better off sticking to your score, lowering your standards and not spending a ******** of time studying for some of the hardest exams you'll do in your entire life. (For example, uni level physics exams are a tad easier than HL physics exams...)

That has to be one very simple uni. They've stripped out all difficult quantitative content from IB Physics and they aren't even allowed to include derivatives so that Math Studies students can take it. Then there's the gems like these two questions I got in May 09:

- Name 2 fossil fuels
- CO2 is a green house gas, name another one

on that note, it's probably also good to remember that IB retakes aren't like A levels where you can just pick your best score, your retake score does end up becoming your final score (i'm 99% sure about that) so if you get sick or **** up in any other way, you might well be stuck with a lower score

It's not a simple uni - in fact, I've compared Leicester's examination papers to other universities and it's either similar or very slightly harder difficulty (of course, Oxbridge and Imperial are harder, but hey, that's expected ).

The two things that make IB Physics exams harder are

a) The fact it's an IB exam, which is full of stupid tricks (MCQs anyone?)and is full of very wishywashy definitions with strict markschemes. At university, you are marked purely for what you know and not for giving exactly what the markscheme wants. Our department also drilled it into us that there really aren't any tricks to the exam papers. It is purely about knowledge, whereas IB exams are a big test of examination skill.

b) The fact that the maths is stripped down, as you describe. Having come to uni, everything I have learned that I learned at IB is significantly easier to understand with the extra mathematical rigour. It makes it much easier to understand, derive and explain equations. Even if IB physicists derive Snell's Law or the path difference formulae etc., at uni you are doing maths every day and you just get used to it really.

Although wtf, those are crazy easy questions! Lucky ! Was that a Paper 2 question!? I do hear the syllabus includes Environmental Physics to keep up with the whole 'global warming trend'

EDIT: Although I have just realised, I have significantly improved at physics since I did IB Physics, so it could be that I'm just way way way better at the subject now. But I dunno, I still feel like IB HL Physics is 'harder'

I've spoken to quite a few unis (mainly the ones I want to go to next year so Exeter etc) and they've got no problem with the retakes that I'm planning on doing in November.

I do have extenuating (I cannot spell this word to save my life) circs though...

If you have serious extenuating (hey you spelt it right!) circumstances (death of a relative, serious illness, etc.), and i'm not talking about you saying something about how you were stranded cause of the icelandic volcano and couldn't revise, then yes, retakes are ALWAYS an option and even accepted by the likes of oxbridge.

On the otherhand if you got a mediocre score with no extenuating circumstances and proceeded to retake, not even leicester will accept you let alone anything in the top 30. all unis might not expressly forbid retakes but given the competition for places nowadays the admissions tutor is likely to trash your application upon reading the words IB and retake in the same application.

EDIT: just to be clear, this response is aimed at the OP, not attempting to belittle suicidallemming's circumstances or anything!