Access to healthcare - how to achieve distinctions?

Any tips from former access students on how to consistently achieve distinctions?

I've moved your thread to the Mature Students forum and amended the title so that it will be seen by other students also taking Access courses.

Any tips from former access students on how to consistently achieve distinctions?

Hi there 😊
I completed an Access course myself before university, although mine was in Social Sciences so heavily essay based.
My biggest tip would be to reach out to your tutor/s as much as possible for their advice on this, to ask questions about your own assignments as you are working on them, and then to get as much feedback as you can on any work you've completed so you can learn what's going right and where to improve.
For my course, our first round of assignments were ungraded and didn't count towards our final mark. I found these invaluable as a chance to practice my skills and then to get that important feedback on where I need to improve. Remember this is just your first go at this point and you are just trying to learn. I also really took advantage of 1:1 meetings with my tutor to go over in detail where I was at with my work and to get guidance on what they wanted to see more of - whilst marking is and should be as objective as possible, they will be able to give you an idea of how you should be approaching your assignments to achieve the best grades. Your course may be different to my own, but if anything like this is available I really recommend utilising it 😊
I also really utilised the mark schemes we were given to make sure I covered all the bases to achieve the higher marks. This could include sections like referencing, description, critical analysis, theory, or many other things dependent on your specific assignment expectations. By checking I had covered what was asked in the mark scheme I could be more confident I wasn't missing anything and holding my mark back. Again, if you need help with this just ask your tutor for more guidance.
Lastly, I'd say try not to be too critical of yourself while you are learning and getting into the swing of things. I had quite a big break from education before I started on my Access course and found it hard to get back into academic writing, particularly in the initial stages of studying. It was a steep learning curve, but by taking on as much feedback as I could and asking lots of questions when needed the difference between my first and next assignments was pretty significant and things got easier. Be patient with yourself, try your best and be open to keep learning more 😊
All the best!
Becky
University of Salford Student Rep