I’ve received my A Level results - so what’s next?

It’s 22nd February 2019, and it is just a few more hours before 230pm when messages will be flooding in from students telling me how they did for their A Levels.

This post goes out to all who are receiving their A Level results today.

I guess the question for everyone is - so what do I do next?

If you have done well

If you have done well - then congratulations! You have options open to you and you can apply to a large number of courses.

So what courses do you apply to?

Many students will choose the courses on the basis of which course is best course that their grades can get them to.

Many others will look at the courses and say “Let’s go to the course with the best pay”

Do your research before making your decision. If you decide to go into Accountancy for example, find out from an actual accountant how’s life like – what’s the work involved and then decide whether this is your cup of tea.

Take a look at the coursework by going to any university bookshops and look at the textbooks – find out what is involved in the coursework that you wish to do, or consult a senior and ask him/her to share some materials with you to do some browsing.

Basically – don’t go in blindly just because you think it’s a ‘popular course’.

If you have done ok

Well ok here really means that you have done well enough to apply for a few courses but it is not a wide selection. There’s a good chance that the courses that are open to you are courses that you are not remotely interested in.

First of all –

Just try and apply to courses you are interested in anyway but you don’t make the cut– you never know. But be realistic, take a look at what are the courses available to you – they generally release the indicative grade profiles of the 10% percentile and 90% percentile – see if you have any chance of getting in and apply for those that you think there’s a chance.

There’s another route you can take, which is to choose a university course you think you can do reasonably well in - so that you can do a transfer to another faculty / course with good 1st semester results.

If you didn’t do well at all

For the guys –there is always the option of retaking your A Levels during your NS. I have had so many NS boys coming to me for tuition and the one thing I do see about them is that they really have the kind of perseverance to try to be focused and committed to their studies even though they do not have the kind of support that a regular student has. Most of the NS guys I know who take classes with me on the weekends - they generally do well enough after retaking A levels to get into reasonably good courses BUT this obviously requires very mature thinking & the commitment to press on and study despite having to serve NS.

For the girls - there’s the private universities route – go and take a look at the courses – and find out more information which ones are more established and recognised and if you do intend to take this route – just make sure you graduate top of your class with honours.

Otherwise I had a student who was already doing private uni – she didn’t like her course – she said “I wanna try to do re-do my A Levels”. She did – and she did well – 2 As as well – eventually she has good enough grades and she transferred to NUS with hew new A Level grades.

Bottom-line is, terrible A Level grades doesn’t bring the end of the world. What’s done is done, it is time to move and decide what is next. Take an extra year - perhaps. End of the day, what is an extra year is the grand scheme of things? If you have to take an extra year, take it and make sure you work hard enough so that it pays off!

General advice

1. Work hard - no matter what is it that you choose to do.

2. Don’t find excuses - for your mistakes. Accept and move on, do better.

3. Learn from others - talk to those who have more experience than you do, talk to people who have skills that you don’t

4. Read more - widen your perspectives, knowledge and understanding of the world

For my students - come see me, talk to me, especially if you feel like there’s any help you think I can offer. For my students who are re-taking the A Levels and need support for Economics - Economics tuition is free for you.