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What is AQA Science?

My friend is doing AQA Science.. He was saying something like "AQA Science P2" .. Can anyone please link me to it..

I have done CIE O Level biology, physics and chemistry.. But he's just saying science..

I am just curious to know that how its different than what I've done?
Any link to AQA Science p2 would be great.
Original post by TechnoKid
My friend is doing AQA Science.. He was saying something like "AQA Science P2" .. Can anyone please link me to it..

I have done CIE O Level biology, physics and chemistry.. But he's just saying science..

I am just curious to know that how its different than what I've done?
Any link to AQA Science p2 would be great.


If he is doing Science P2 then he is studying Additional Science. This is a qualification which is combined with Core Science. Core Science is 3 exams (Physics 1, Chemistry 1 and Biology 1) and 1 Controlled Assessment, and Additional Science is another 3 exams (Physics 2 etc...) and 1 Controlled Assessment. You got 3 qualifications for Science but your friend will have 2. If he chose Triple Science then he would have to do another 3 exams to get a qualification in each science, hope this make sense!
Reply 2
He might be talking about double science, there are 6 courses, b1 c1 p1 and b2 c2 p2. For biology chem and physics. It is considered harder than triple science which is why colleges prefer it sometimes

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Original post by TechnoKid
My friend is doing AQA Science.. He was saying something like "AQA Science P2" .. Can anyone please link me to it..

I have done CIE O Level biology, physics and chemistry.. But he's just saying science..

I am just curious to know that how its different than what I've done?
Any link to AQA Science p2 would be great.


Your friend seems to be doing additional science whereby at the end of it he/she will only have two GCSE's in science. The exam board 'AQA' provides a GCSE called additional science. In this GCSE, students study P2- Which stands for physics unit 2, along with B2 (biology unit 2) and C2 (Chemistry unit 2). They would have previously studied core science which contains all the unit 1's (B1, C1 and P1). It appears that you did 'O levels' and gained three separate O levels for biology, chemistry and physics. This means that you would have specialised more into each science compared to your friend. Since we don't have O levels any more, GCSE's are provided to students by various different exam boards like 'Edexcel', 'AQA', 'WJEC', 'OCR', etc... and they roughly hold the same value as O levels, although O levels were always considered to be harder- hence the Government is considering whether to bring them back or not so that achieving good grades is made to be more difficult.
In AQA, each science is split into three modules- P1, P2, P3; B1, B2, B3; and C1, C2, C3. The number of modules that you do depends on which qualification that you study- Core Science, Additional Science or Triple Science.

For Core Science, you study P1, B1 and C1, taking three exams at the end of two years. At the end you attain one grade in core science.

For Additional Science, you study the Core Science modules (P1, B1, C1) as well as three more: P2, B2 and C2. In this qualification, six exams are taken. You obtain two GCSEs through this: core science & additional science.

In triple science, all three modules are studied: P1, P2, P3; B1, B2, B3; and C1, C2, C3, with nine exams taken at the end of two years. Each science is treated individually, so three separate science GCSEs are obtained: Physics, Biology and Chemistry.

Triple science is treated the hardest out of the three options, as three modules are taken in each science, getting progressively harder.

*The letter at the start of the module name (e.g. P1) refers to the name of the science: Physics, Biology or Chemistry.

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