From Scottish high schools to university
Aug. 17th, 2018 06:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mtbcI grew up in England: for my last two years in
My children are in Scotland for the corresponding period of their lives; education here works differently. Assuming that one does not choose to leave school after the S4 year (tenth grade), one typically takes Highers at the end of one's penultimate year, known as S5, and at the end of S6 one (re)takes Highers and Advanced Highers. In general, good Higher grades will get one into Year 1 of university courses and good Advanced Higher grades even get one straight into Year 2.
For Year 1 entry it seems that Higher grades are key. An Advanced Higher may count usefully, even being considered to bump up one's grade in the corresponding Higher, but it is the Highers that matter. So, for S6 it can make a lot of sense to repeat or take new Highers rather than study for Advanced Highers only. Though, universities tend to ask for higher grades among a set of Highers if one spreads them across S5 and S6 instead of taking them all in one of those years.
It has all been a bit of a surprise to me. I had thought that universities might just ignore Highers for which one had also taken the Advanced Higher and look at one's S5 and S6 results as a set, giving extra points for Advanced or more relevance or higher grade or whatever, then make a conditional offer on the basis of that combination. In practice, although many students do take Advanced Highers in S6 then go onto Year 1 of university, this does not much match what universities ask for.
There are other wrinkles too. For examples, while good Highers suffice, my employer also looks to let one into Year 1 Mathematics with a couple of Advanced Highers combined with the Scottish Baccalaureate which is another thing again.
In short, conditional offers based on A-levels feel much easier to plan for than what my children will be facing here. By comparison, even my admission to postgraduate study in the US was easy: I mostly just had to do well in the Graduate Record Examination General Test which turned out to be fun.
sixth formbefore university I studied for A-levels. I applied for undergraduate courses, I visited campuses, attended interviews, universities made me offers conditional on my A-level grades, then I actually took those examinations at the end of my last school year.
My children are in Scotland for the corresponding period of their lives; education here works differently. Assuming that one does not choose to leave school after the S4 year (tenth grade), one typically takes Highers at the end of one's penultimate year, known as S5, and at the end of S6 one (re)takes Highers and Advanced Highers. In general, good Higher grades will get one into Year 1 of university courses and good Advanced Higher grades even get one straight into Year 2.
For Year 1 entry it seems that Higher grades are key. An Advanced Higher may count usefully, even being considered to bump up one's grade in the corresponding Higher, but it is the Highers that matter. So, for S6 it can make a lot of sense to repeat or take new Highers rather than study for Advanced Highers only. Though, universities tend to ask for higher grades among a set of Highers if one spreads them across S5 and S6 instead of taking them all in one of those years.
It has all been a bit of a surprise to me. I had thought that universities might just ignore Highers for which one had also taken the Advanced Higher and look at one's S5 and S6 results as a set, giving extra points for Advanced or more relevance or higher grade or whatever, then make a conditional offer on the basis of that combination. In practice, although many students do take Advanced Highers in S6 then go onto Year 1 of university, this does not much match what universities ask for.
There are other wrinkles too. For examples, while good Highers suffice, my employer also looks to let one into Year 1 Mathematics with a couple of Advanced Highers combined with the Scottish Baccalaureate which is another thing again.
In short, conditional offers based on A-levels feel much easier to plan for than what my children will be facing here. By comparison, even my admission to postgraduate study in the US was easy: I mostly just had to do well in the Graduate Record Examination General Test which turned out to be fun.
no subject
Date: 2018-08-18 07:29 am (UTC)The difference is that the standard Scottish honours degree was (presumably still is?) traditionally four years long. As you say, direct entry into year 2 was/is possible with a good crop of CSYS(*)/AH grades. Whether you'd want to, due to having to join an established cohort in their second year of the course, is another question. That said, skipping a year has more of an attraction than it used to, in these days of tuition fees and student loans.
For my Cambridge application, CSYS was mandatory; the offer was AAA. My other applications - to Scottish universities - all made unconditional offers for Year 1 entry based solely on my Higher passes.
(*) Certificate of Sixth Year Studies. Now replaced by Advanced Higher. They always had the feel of a bit of a bolt-on.
no subject
Date: 2018-08-18 08:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-08-19 08:53 pm (UTC)