Ahem.  An embarrassing topic.  Daddy wants you to be a lawyer.  Mummy has always dreamed of you fulfilling her thwarted desires.  Rushing to the gym, having competitive coffee mornings where she drones on and on about your achievements until you wish the ground would open up and swallow either her or you.  You only took History to please your father.  Your much prefer English, but spend all your spare time either playing the guitar or practising spoken Spanish with that lovely boy from Madrid.

Back in your world, you'd like to study music, after maybe a gap year travelling in South America, perfecting your Spanish.  Music and Spanish maybe?  Spanish with Music on the side?  

It can be hard to tell your parents where to get off.  Maybe the whole issue of student funding might help you: remind them that though you are grateful for any support they may be prepared to give you, the tuition fees you are likely to be paying if you are UK resident are taken off your tax bill, not theirs.  It's your life, and your job prospects are much better if you get a first class honours degree in Art or Music because you love the subject, than if you get a 3rd or drop out from Law because you hate every minute of it.  

What's more, some of the best lawyers took a first degree in something completely different anyway.  

We trail round the country going to careers conferences, listening to what employers actually want.  Creativity, design ability, enthusiasm, excellent communication skills are highly prized.  Office drones, the merely mindlessly industrious are not going to cut it any more.   

Do what you love, what you're good at and if you're being berated by anxious parents about 'doing something with good job prospects', point them in the direction of Chapter 3 of our book, How to Get Into University, available free on iTunes.  

And do remember, your parents only want the best for you really.  All kinds of funny things go through parents' heads: they try to live through you; they subconsciously do the same things to you that their parents did to them, even though they always swore not to; they worry about finance and try to protect you from the struggles they have faced, but in the end, it's your life and you have to live it.  Go for it.  

Have you started writing it yet??  If not, why not?  

Make sure you sign up on our home page for free advice and get: 

GET ME INTO UNI - The Book, on iTunes or pdf - free.  And me holding your hand through every stage of the writing process for a week.  

What are you waiting for?  

SIGN UP HERE!

Students in Scotland already know their fate after the Highers results last week.  Now it's the turn of students taking A levels to find out what the future holds.  Results day is tomorrow!!!  Stand by with champagne and a box of kleenex!  Be prepared!  

Seriously, if you've taken our advice and worked hard enough to get the grades your teachers predicted, you should be OK tomorrow, into your first choice or at worst a decent insurance.  

If you've got serious concerns that something went badly wrong in the exams, then do some preparation NOW!

1.  Check the phone numbers of the Admissions Tutors of your Firm and Insurance choices.  Near misses are often allowed in anyway, but be prepared to get on the phone and schmooze - persuade them that you totally love their university, and that is was just because your guinea-pig died on the morning of the C4 exam that you slipped a bit.  

2.  If you are REALLY worried, get familiar with the Clearing Process now: http://www.ucas.com/clearing
Watch the video a couple of times, and do a preliminary search for courses you might be able to get on if all else fails.  

3.  If your results are not what you hoped for, and you can't find anything suitable in Clearing, there's always the option of a 'forced' gap year.  You can always pretend you were planning one all along.  Get a job, get some experience, learn a language, do something for other people, and reapply from a position of strength (you know your results) and maturity.  Get some help - get in touch.  

Yes, it's that time of year again: UCAS 2014 applications will go live before the end of June, and most schools worth their salt will be getting candidates registered and planning their personal statements as soon as the AS exams are over.  

Give yourself a few days to recover and celebrate when you're done with exams, but then start thinking seriously about your application: 

• open days - where can you go before the end of term?
• check the UCAS and university websites for grade requirements and course descriptions
• talk to your teachers - what's their best guess at a predicted grade for A2 or whatever exam you are taking?  You need this information if you are going to make informed decisions about your target unis.
• plan your Personal Statement - make sure you've downloaded our free planning guide boy registering on our home page and contact us for help sooner rather than later!  September is our busiest time of year, so get to us in August if you can.  
• Register online for admissions tests (UKCAT or LNAT) or ask your school to be ready to register you for BMAT and other Cambridge assessments required for Oxford and other elite university entrance
• Going to be interviewed?  Make sure you know what to expect.

There's lots you can do now to get a head start on other candidates and give yourself the best chance of success.  Get advice sooner rather than later.  

Article on the iniquities of the current system in today's Telegraph: 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/universityeducation/student-life/9737039/Personal-statement-for-sale-is-the-current-system-fair.html?dm_i=14DE,13WBO,5PB90J,3GXRX,1

Our comment: 
'Admissions tutors clearly do see through Personal Statements that are 'the work of more than one mind' to use the phrase of an Oxford admissions tutor we spoke to: to a certain extent it is expected, but a pre-fabricated response is certainly dangerous and will be caught out by UCAS similarity detection software.  What the independent sector offers, or should offer, is tailored guidance on not just the Personal Statement, but the whole application: where to apply with a particular set of predictions, how to balance the academic and extra-curricular in the statement in relation to particular universities, how to demonstrate proper reflection on work experience, whatever the experience may be, rather than simply listing 'stuff I have done', how to find the right course and university and appropriate insurance choices if things go wrong on results day.  I work in an independent school where we go out of our way to give the best quality advice, which might very well be not what the candidate or their parents want to hear.  We also get a lot of pupils from other schools (sometimes other independent schools) who are not offered the same level of support - but it is support with the whole process, and definitely not a Personal Statement writing service.  In fact we've just sent back a statement that was clearly written by someone else.'

University applications figures are out. They make for interesting reading. Numbers are down, but the top end (courses asking for ABB and above) will be as competitive as ever. I wonder how many more Unis will be forced to scrap courses? Check out the Guardian article on this: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2012/nov/28/university-applications-uk-students-down-ucas

Getting ready for your interview at Oxford or Cambridge?

A few things to remember: 

1.  Revise your AS an A2 work: as a bare minimum you should feel comfortable talking about the work you have already covered, should know the key concepts from the syllabus and should be ready to explore any works you claim to have studied for your A levels.
2.  Re-read your personal statement!  You may have written it a couple of months ago, but if you said you read Plato's Republic or Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal you'd better be able to prove it.  Anything you claim familiarity with in a personal statement should be a nice, easy way for the interviewers to get you started.  Make sure it is.  
3.  Make sure you are reading something NOW and are prepared to talk about that too.  A novel, a science book, history, the Economist, the New Scientist, just show you are engaging with a world beyond Facebook updates of your best friend pouting in a nightclub.  
4. Make eye contact.  Shake hands.  
5.  Breathe.  
6.  Think before you answer.
7.  If you don't understand a question, don't be afraid to ask for clarification.
8.  When you've finished answering, don't feel you have to keep talking until they interrupt.  Say your piece then stop.
9.  They are testing your ability to argue logically and coherently: if you find you've changed your mind as a result of the direction of questioning, that's OK - say so.  Don't just cave in the moment they challenge you, but on the other hand, if you do modify your position in the face of overwhelming argument, that's OK, it shows you're intellectually flexible and teachable. 
10  GOOD LUCK
See the link below for sample questions for a range of subjects from Oxford.  

We know…writing the Personal Statement is hard, and maybe starting in a punchy way is the hardest thing of all.  It might help to know what others tend to use - try to be a little bit original, but also just try to keep it authentic: don't use long words and be something you aren't: speak from the heart about why you actually want to study the subject.  Remember that you are applying for a job: the job of being a really good student for some of the top academics in the country who absolutely love their subjects.  Having said that, there are some seriously stale phrases that just make Admissions tutors yawn.  Here are some from an article in the Telegraph (full article here) that draws on material provided by UCAS itself: 

Straight from the horse's mouth: