Which 3rd A-Level should I pick?

I'm an external student and doing Maths and Further Maths. I am not going to do any A-Levels with practicals or coursework in them.

Here are my options for a third a level.

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Business Studies

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Economics

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Government & Politics

•

Philosophy

•

Psychology

I am asking you to rate the 5 A-Levels above and help me decide which one I should do as my 3rd a level alongside the 2x Maths.

•

How 'respected' they are

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How 'easy' they are

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Your overall opinion which 1-2 I should consider most

•

[40 marks] :tongue:

Btw I am going to work in the IT field, as cybersecurity or cloud comptuing or that sort of stuff.

Will it hurt me if I just choose the one I want to do even if its 100% unrelated to my future career? Will employers care that my 3rd a level is unrelated?

Reply 1

ChicKevin

Original post by nrevenco

I'm an external student and doing Maths and Further Maths. I am not going to do any A-Levels with practicals or coursework in them.

Here are my options for a third a level.

•

Business Studies

•

Economics

•

Government & Politics

•

Philosophy

•

Psychology

I am asking you to rate the 5 A-Levels above and help me decide which one I should do as my 3rd a level alongside the 2x Maths.

•

How 'respected' they are

•

How 'easy' they are

•

Your overall opinion which 1-2 I should consider most

•

[40 marks] :tongue:

I don't think choosing an unrelated subject will be a problem. I did product design, maths and business for A-Levels, and the subjects (apart from product design) merely relates to the course I applied for (industrial design)

If you are going to work in IT field wouldn't computer science (basically half IT knowledge half coding) be something to consider? Or your school do not provide this course?

Reply 2

nrevenco

Original post by ChicKevin

Thing is I might not end up going to college and doing A-Levels by myself, rendering Computer Science to be almost impossible to finish as id have to find someone to grade my work, etc. coursework, total pain.

Reply 3

Idk131

I would say business and economics are more relevant to your career than the other A levels but computer science would probably be better even if it involved coursework, it would be better suited to your career

Reply 4

ran-dumb

Your employer isn't going to care about your 3rd A level if you have a degree. If you're not going to uni and can't possibly do CS, then it doesn't matter which of those you do. You'll just need to convince them you're good enough with programming.

'Respected' A levels matter more for uni, and usually the more competitive ones. Economics is the 'hard' subject that's very slightly more relevant. I think the rest are tied for being a filler subject and not being quantitative. It's up to you to decide which is the easiest, although some people find business studies the easiest to get by.

Reply 5

juicygcse

First of all, forget what people here are saying about Computer Science A-level, it has little to no relevance to computer science at a degree level and I have never seen a (UK) uni require it for a degree, so don't think you will be disadvantaged by not taking it. No, unis will not care that your third A-level is unrelated as long as your meet their requirements

I'll first comment on the one I have experience taking, which is economics. It is a well respected A-level, and a very relevant one in the times we are living in (inflation should not ideally be in the double digits but here we are). It was essay writing in, but nothing like what you would get in history or English - you basically do chains of analysis (A leads to B which leads to C which leads to D...), which does not require much creativity or amazing writing skills. The content itself is alright, some year 2 stuff can be kind of hard to wrap your head around but for the most part it is fairly easy to grasp - the hard part is applying your knowledge to the question at hand. I would recommend it, I like it and (for me) it doesn't take up too much of my time compared to my other subjects.

Business studies is less respected than economics, in fact it's probably the only one there that I've seen a university not accept (Imperial College London doesn't, at least for Computing https://www.imperial.ac.uk/study/ug/courses/computing-department/computing-beng/#entry-requirements). Therefore, it's probably the one I least recommend - although the content is very easy according to my friend who does it so maybe you could have more free time? Although, tbh if your other two are maths and FM then it isn't really that necessary, I do four A-levels including maths and FM and it's manageable so the workload should not be a problem as long as you manage your time well.

When you say government and politics, that would depend in the exam board - the old government and politics A-level was not that well respected I don't think, but the new politics A-level is seen in the same way is pretty much any other A-level.

Psychology I know very little about - not that relevant to your course (other than maybe ethics of computers taking over jobs and that sort of thing, but that's a bit of a stretch) - my school doesn't offer psychology so I know nothing about it sorry

Philosophy is obviously a very essay based subject so it really depends if you like writing essays or not.

Overall, I would recommend economics if essays are not really your thing, as it is the least essay-based of the ones you've listed. If you do like essays, then probably either politics or philosophy, doesn't really matter tbh just pick the one you like more. As for psychology, you will just have to do your own research on that one because I have not idea lol