long, long road

[woolymonkey]

Spidermonkey hasn't got an offer from Hills Road for A Levels. He's really disappointed because he loved what he saw of the place and really wanted to do Electronics as well as Maths, Maths, Chemistry and Physics.

The really strange thing is that only 4 kids in his whole school got offers. The school is so stunned they held a special assembly about it! In a normal year, about 25-30 do, which would have put Spider comfortably in. No-one knows what's going on--no-one who talks to me anyway--but the grapevine suggests that other schools are being treated more or less as usual while Monkey Academies is being set a much higher threshold for some reason. Weird.

On the plus side, he has a nice, we-really-want-you offer from Long Road to do all the same A Levels except Electronics, and Long Road is clearly going to be full of bright Scientists next year, many of them from Monkey Academies, and he'll have more dyslexia support, less pressure, and more time to carry on with all his music activities. So it may be all for the best. But it will be a heck of a bike ride from Girton.

Anyone have any tips for studying Electronics at home, clubs, evening classes, etc? He's not all that bothered about whether it gets him a qualification. He just loved the taster at Hills Rd and would like to do more so he can make an informed decision whether to consider studying it at uni later.

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

That is very bizarre indeed. And leads me to wonder what's going on.
Best wishes to him.

[woolymonkey.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

[ms-cataclysm.livejournal.com]

Sorry to hear that spidermonkey hasn't got the offer he wanted but I hear that Long Road is actually pretty good these days. If you can be arsed it might be worth writing to local companies to see if they can offer work experience for a sixth former who likes electronics. There is a small cluster of acoustic companies up towards Huntingdon which would be natural prey .

[woolymonkey.livejournal.com]

That sounds like a cunning plan. I'll pass it on. Thank you.

[dorispossum.livejournal.com]

Sad to hear he didn't get HR offer - but as other guys have said, Long is also very good, and I'm sure he'll do brilliantly there. Cambridge kids are v privileged when it comes to 6th form, as in there are no bad options.

best wishes to him

[woolymonkey.livejournal.com]

Well he'll be in very good company at Long Road this year :)

It's just a shame as he was really looking forward to Electronics (largely thanks to HR's very keen and lovely Electronics teacher and his taster day--if you ever see David M at work, do please pass on how much that was appreciated). But it sounds from comments below as though he may be better off doing his wiring on the side and having more time for guitar, violin and singing.

[bugshaw.livejournal.com]

That's a shame (and quite peculiar), but I'm sure he'll do well at Long Road.

I loved Electronics at O'Level, but hated the module I took as part of my Physics degree as it was dry as an old, dead bone, filling your mouth with chalk dust as you sink your teeth into the subject and it crumbles. Loads of Practical Electronics type sites with projects for hobbyists out there if that's what Spider is into (rather than calculating the response curves of op amps).

[woolymonkey.livejournal.com]

It's starting to look as though Electronics For Fun is the way to go. Spider is often better when allowed to do what interests him rather than what teachers tell him to ;). Hmmm.... I wonder if an electric tortoise pen would make a good starter project?

[major-clanger.livejournal.com]

Having done Electronics A-level (albeit over 25 years ago) I am not sure if I'd recommend it. If you want to learn electronics as a hobby interest, then teach yourself from a book like Make: Electronics (which I hear very good things about.) If you want to go on to study electronic engineering, universities are more likely to be interested in good results in physics and mathematics. I think I covered everything I learned in two years of A-level Electronics in the first month of my degree.

[woolymonkey.livejournal.com]

Thank you. That's interesting and good to hear. I'll point him at that link, though probably after the house move.

He's very aware that the A level as a qualification is fairly pointless--it would have been his 'extra' subject at Hills Road. But he wants to do electronics in some form or other partly because otherwise how can he know if he wants to do a degree in it, and partly just because he really really loved his one day taster (and seemed to be rather good at it too, which is always motivating).

[a-d-medievalist.livejournal.com]

Sounds like it's only going to be a mild disappointment, but still, I do hope they figure out why there was such a discrepancy.