Unfair bias against private schools

Chemistry is a very bad example because it lab orientated, so without a decent amount of lab time you'll struggle to pass. Also it's a very hard A-Level, and people tend to be very good at it, or very bad at it.

I don't believe teaching has that great an influence, at my school most of the "teachers" (most were Professors or IBers in earlier life) were fairly crap; also many didn't have any formal qualifications and were merely very clever people who wanted to do something charitable. Yet they're always in the top 5 for A-Level and GCSE. Other factors play a far greater role, in my opinion.

Are you so insecure that you have to spew this out to people on an internet forum?
TBH, that post seems to be just so that you can eventually blow your own trumpet. You have no proof that AHs are better than A-levels, as you haven't taken A-levels only AHs. From what I understand AH is more about breadth than depth (correct me if I'm wrong), but if AHs are THAT good, then there would have been suggestions to replace A-levels with AHs. Instead people want to replace alevels with an IB system, so AHs can't be that good. Also, if they were quite as hard as you make them out to be, then AH exam takers would receive significantly lower offers than A-level exam takers, whereas from what I gather, they still have AAAAAA offers, rather than lower ones.
Scottish Univs, seem to have 4 year Bachelors courses, rather than the English 3 year ones. This include the top univs, which I find rather strange, because you would assume a reasonable amount of the scottish students attending the best scottish univs would have done AHs, if there were that valuable, and yet the courses are 4 years long, the first year being done to make-up for what Scotish students missed, not doing A-level. I wonder, would AH takers get to skip the first year?
Anyway, don't belittle the other types of exams, not everyone has the chance to do a certain type of exam, the decision is often made for them and it's pretty pathetic of you to tell people after they have worked so hard that you have more valuable exam qualifications. You can't comment properly on them because you haven't taken them anyway.
Oh yeah, and we do differentiation in P1 and P2 and P3 ie all the pure modules of Alevel maths. We don't do complex numbers, but I'm sure there are other topics we do instead that you guys don't do, a couple of examples doesn't prove your point, we just have a different syllabus.

Here here! Though it infuiates me when people want to replace AL with the IB- the grass isn't always greener, and the IB has loads of disadvantages.

I don't believe teaching has that great an influence, at my school most of the "teachers" (most were Professors or IBers in earlier life) were fairly crap; also many didn't have any formal qualifications and were merely very clever people who wanted to do something charitable. Yet they're always in the top 5 for A-Level and GCSE. Other factors play a far greater role, in my opinion.

To refer to chemistry as lab orientated is a bit rich! I think the lab-orientated aspect is of minimal concern. I have done hardly any lab work in Chemistry (seriously, no more than 10 hours in the AS course, including 2 hours for coursework).

Which other factors do you consider to play a greater role? Would you not however concede that- beside student ambition/dedication- all of them are better provided at the top public schools etc.?

Scottish Univs, seem to have 4 year Bachelors courses, rather than the English 3 year ones. This include the top univs, which I find rather strange, because you would assume a reasonable amount of the scottish students attending the best scottish univs would have done AHs, if there were that valuable, and yet the courses are 4 years long, the first year being done to make-up for what Scotish students missed, not doing A-level. I wonder, would AH takers get to skip the first year?

Are you so insecure that you have to spew this out to people on an internet forum?
TBH, that post seems to be just so that you can eventually blow your own trumpet. You have no proof that AHs are better than A-levels, as you haven't taken A-levels only AHs. From what I understand AH is more about breadth than depth (correct me if I'm wrong), but if AHs are THAT good, then there would have been suggestions to replace A-levels with AHs. Instead people want to replace alevels with an IB system, so AHs can't be that good. Also, if they were quite as hard as you make them out to be, then AH exam takers would receive significantly lower offers than A-level exam takers, whereas from what I gather, they still have AAAAAA offers, rather than lower ones.
Scottish Univs, seem to have 4 year Bachelors courses, rather than the English 3 year ones. This include the top univs, which I find rather strange, because you would assume a reasonable amount of the scottish students attending the best scottish univs would have done AHs, if there were that valuable, and yet the courses are 4 years long, the first year being done to make-up for what Scotish students missed, not doing A-level. I wonder, would AH takers get to skip the first year?
Anyway, don't belittle the other types of exams, not everyone has the chance to do a certain type of exam, the decision is often made for them and it's pretty pathetic of you to tell people after they have worked so hard that you have more valuable exam qualifications. You can't comment properly on them because you haven't taken them anyway.
Oh yeah, and we do differentiation in P1 and P2 and P3 ie all the pure modules of Alevel maths. We don't do complex numbers, but I'm sure there are other topics we do instead that you guys don't do, a couple of examples doesn't prove your point, we just have a different syllabus.

Well, I've never studied Chemistry A-Level. that's just the impression I've been given.

I'm not sure honestly; the general school and home environment, I suppose; which is no doubt is better at a public school than a comprehensive. Other than that, it's down to the students and how motivated and dedicated they are. It's not something I've really thought about, and I don't have anything to compare to anyway.

No, I'm not insecure, I was stating a fact which shows the small numbers involved. 365 people out of the thousands sitting exams is not a lot.

I havn't taken A-levels, but I have seen plenty of A-level material (with places like this forum it's virtually impossible to escape from) as there is very little material actually written for Advanced Highers, again due to the small numbers. AH isn't just about depth or breadth, it's both, like any other qualification.

We don't get AAAAAA offers, that would be ridiculous. I only got one conditional offer, and that was an AAA from Oxford (who are hardly going to give a low offer), the rest were unconditional on my Highers. It has been said that universities are more accomodating to slipped grades from AH candidates, but thankfully I won't need to find this out.

Now you show you don't have a clue. Scottish universities have degrees a year longer because most people leave school in 5th year having sat Highers (1 year) and not AH. People who sit AH can skip the first year for exactly this reason - I was offered second year entry to all the Scottish institutions I applied for based on a low AH offer (around BBB if I recall correctly). I sat AH because I wanted to apply to universities in England, and got an unconditional offer from Newcastle because of my Highers and a conditional from Oxford. I wonder if I would have got an unconditional based on AS levels - I doubt it.

You do differentiation but you don't do differential equations. AH maths covers first/second order homogeneous and non-homogeneous differential equations which from what I've gathered are only in A level further maths. You do not do any of complex numbers, matrices, and the associated de Moivre's theorem, transformations and proofs for example unless you do further maths, but we do them as part of "ordinary" AH maths, which it appears to me to contain all of A level maths and a considerable amount of further maths aswell.

p.s. I think Scot Unis do 4 years because students enter with less 'specialisation'. A-level students have two years 'pre-specialism' already.

Ahhh again with how many people took the exam, just to make you feel special, and to add to that, you throw in your offers and grade requirements. No of course you're not insecure, it just helps bolster your arguments right?
It's easy to take a peek at someone else's syllabus and claim that what they're doing is much more basic than you, but without doing the syllabus in ful you have absolutely no idea. I'm sure I wouldn't mind flipping through an AH maths book and finding some of the questions as easy as pie, of course I'll choose my topics, just as you have.
Btw, I have no idea what you're babbling about with regards to unconditional offers with AS levels...we're talking about A-levels as a whole, rather than AS levels, because AS levels are only half the course. I know you can take the grades and technically "run", but it's a sort of half course imo.
Ah yes, and we do differential equations in P3, which is part of the A level maths course. Not terribly advanced mind you, but then there is limited time. We also do proofs. I very much doubt there is time in your timetable to do what we do in the maths syllabus and all of what Further Maths people do. Perhaps it would be better to list all the topics that you do, and I can point out what we do, that you don't. As I said before, it's easy for you to pick topics not covered in normal maths A level, they are two different syllabuses. I'm sure the maths IB also contains different topics also, it doesn't prove it to be any better/worse. I notice, there is no mention of Mechanics, Stats or decision maths...am I to undertand that AH maths involves solely pure maths then? Well if that's the case then AH maths should be compared to a pure maths a level qualification rather than general maths a level qualification, as we are forced to take 3 non-pure maths modules for alevel maths.
Anyway, hope you are enjoying your ego boost, but it's tedious, so get over it.

Hang on, is there any applied maths in straight AH maths?

Hi,
I went to a private school - not a very good one - because I won a scholarship and I needed to board for (serious) family (medical) reasons. I got all A* at GCSE and AAAAA at A-level last year. I applied to Cambridge, LSE, Durham, etc and got none!
The Cambridge admissions people were very nice. I was told, almost one year later when the admission tutor visited the hospital I work in, that I had done well at interview, but their quota for private schools was "over-filled". Can this be fair? My total family income is less than £35k p.a. and we struggle to keep me in private education. My folks haven't had a hol in 5 years, don't drink or smoke, and we have sold our car to reduce our weekly spend.
Please can we have some fair recognition that not all private school students are useless toffs. Why do we not have anonymous, needs-blind admissions?

I have applied again this year; here's hoping.

toni

No, that would be in (oddly enough) AH applied maths. Since I also did AH physics which was at least 1/3 mechanics there was little point in me doing this.

I guess you could say AH maths is more in depth, but A level is broader. Personally I would say the former is harder - hence you do more GCSEs than A level (more depth but less breadth).

Indeed an Alevel in pure maths cover more than an AH in pure maths.

Perhaps, but in less depth, which is generally far easier - doing 8 standard grades/GCSE is a lot easier than 3 AH/A-level.