My son has finally chosen his AS level subjects and handed the form in at the 11th hour. Ridiculous to think that at the age of 16 you are supposed to have a clear “plan” for your life. I suspect he’ll change his mind. He’s gone the science route for the moment but I won’t be in the least bit surprised when he announces he’d rather do the arts. I did keep quiet whilst he made his choices because I don’t want to influence his decision completely. I am in total agreement that he’s got to want to do his chosen subjects and enjoy them, I just don’t see what’s wrong with a bit of gentle guidance….I thought that was my role as a parent. Anyway, he has confirmed that he hasn’t felt pressured by me and so, we can but see.
Who knows whether he will want to do medicine eventually. Somebody slightly put him off the other day by saying that he needed to start doing some work experience NOW to prove that he was serious about the social/pastoral side of medicine and that these days it wasn’t enough simply to have loads of A*’s. She suggested that he should preferably find an old people’s home or a disabled hospice to work in and I looked at him and I was thinking: “OH NO. He’s going to have to wipe old people’s bottoms any minute and be put off for life”. Does anyone know if that is actually true? Surely you are not really expected to start work experience months before you even start your A levels and if it’s so premeditated these days anyway, what is the point?
Perhaps he should consider dentistry. I know a few dentists and they all seem to have a great life. Not too many hours and a very good salary. I appreciate that if you have to spend all day looking in to people’s mouths then you should get paid a lot of money – they do have one of the highest rates of suicide in their profession, but something has happened to the dental profession in the UK of late without anybody doing anything about it.
I recently had to have a filling. I have been with the same NHS dentist for years, but this time I was charged nearly £100.00. What is that about? How come dentists have all stopped being part of the NHS without our permission? I thought dental care was meant to be provided by our state run National Health Service, but nobody I know can find an NHS dentist these days. How has the government allowed the nations teeth to decline to the point where people are having to extract their own teeth? Or go abroad to have treatment? How are we going to be able to pay for the care of our teeth during a recession? Even going abroad will be too expensive with the exchange rate I suspect.
This is an appalling state of affairs.
March 16th, 2009 at 12:06 am
Whoever told you about work experience was right (for whatever profession)- he won’t be wiping bottoms tho, probably just going in and talking to them, they can get pretty lonely. The reason for the work experience is when you go through the University admissions system you have to write a personal statement and it helps to have some eveidence to show the Uni’s that you are serious. Saying that you are a people friendly person and proving it by the fact you go to lots of parties just won’t wash! If you’ve done it from your own initiative, then it looks even better
March 16th, 2009 at 6:20 am
Yes it is true – sadly more pressure on today’s kids. A friend of mine interviews for medical school. Even if they have 4 A* at A-level, they will not get in without a string of relevant work experience. Bummer!
March 16th, 2009 at 9:14 am
Speaking as someone who works at a secondary school I can only echo the need for work experience.Competition for places to study at medical school is fierce. Also it does make sense because there is far more to being a Dr than simply the study of medicine.
It is also true that for any degree Universities like to see evidence of other activities than school. If you want to go to the one of the ‘better’ Uni’s (by that i mean i suppose one of the one’s that are oversubscribed) you have to have a personal statement that shines.
He isnt committed to going into medicine by studying the sciences though. If that is where his interests lie then he will find many many courses to study at degree level, he will just find it hard to get onto an Arts course!
I do work in a slightly ‘hothouse’ environment as i work in a selective school, but here the students do begin to think about their Uni places soon after they begin the A/S courses
It is all a lot to take in when its the first of the bunch going through the system!
good luck
March 16th, 2009 at 3:45 pm
Many thanks for your advice – clearly we will need to start thinking about this perhaps even as soon as the summer holidays. Hopefully he could go and do some work experience with my brother….good grief it doesn’t’ get easier does it? Lx
March 17th, 2009 at 12:54 am
Anon is right about the sciences – though I’m biased since I’m doing my PhD in science research. The reason I chose them at A-level, apart from the fact that I was quite good, I also enjoyed them and had no idea what I wanted to do job wise. All I know was that doing a science degree would actually open a huge number of doors since the one thing science teaches you is an analytical and objective way of thinking which is important in a huge number of professions which aren’t even science related.