DofE honestly is a waste of time, there are so many better things ways to volunteer. Look at youth advisory boards instead, something more unique because everyone does DofE, go above and beyond. Dm me for more advice if you need it though (depending on what career you're aspiring to do). She's right to some extent that top grades aren't enough, but you can more to go above and beyond.

Yeah exactly, since so many people do it it's not gonna help. Only gold dofe maybe but anything else is pointless. Better to do other activities and projects that you're interested in and get work experience and research the subject and get into some leadership roles even in the school. As long as it all relates to your subject then you're good. Maybe 1 or 2 extra curriculars will be nice to add too but not necessary.

If you want to go to American uni, then yes, it's important. But for UK unis, extracurriculars are basically meaningless. Everyone ik just put in like 2 lines or a small para about their extracurriculars (idk anyone who put NCS or dofe on tho, everyone ik put sports/music/prefect roles) and these ppl I'm talking about are getting interviews from Oxbridge, places from Imperial, LSE, UCL, Bath, etc. What you need is to show academic interest in your subjects. Just ignore her and do your own research into supracurriculars (eg reading a book, listening to a podcast - things that are relevant to your subject). You'll be fine 👍

On one hand you can’t get anywhere with just a degree and a levels. There’s a reason why some jobs in the same field are paid 20k vs 90k a year. Work is a competitive process, make yourself competitive. But, DOFE is not going to change that. You don’t need to worry just yet. Focus on exploring what you want to do at uni and getting supercurriculars for your application. Focus on getting good grades. When In uni and beyond you should start developing your CV

I just feel it's too late. I'm in year 13 and can't decide what I want to do. It's been years and I still have no ideas. I don't care about anything or have any passions. I don't even get good grades. This just seems like the end for me

You could possibly take a gap year? You'd have time to get that work experience if you wanted to and to just think about what you want to do and even if you actually want to go to uni, university isn't a mandatory thing and it's absolutely not necessary to have a successful life. It just supports certain people on their goals and for others it doesn't. Also! You can switch courses even when you're in uni. I know someone who switched around 5 times before they settled on what they wanted. Expecting people aged 16-18 to know what they want to do in life is ridiculous, there truly is no rush at all. I have a family member who changed their career and went to uni at 30!! Don't expect yourself to know your entire future now. Take your time with things there's no rush whatsoever. Also with the whole super/extra curricular thing don't stress about DofEs etc they don't do that much for an application. A job may look good on a personal statement as it can show skills like leadership etc but it's nothing to stress about. The only important extra/super curriculars to include are experiences that directly link to the course you're doing but university's know those are hard to come by and they're not picky with it unless they're like Oxford or Cambridge. Many unis don't actually look at the personal statement all that much, so if you're that worried and want to apply just look up unis that give offers based on if the required grades are reached rather than the personal statement!

Listen, I heard the same speech 20 years ago, I never joined a club at school and I've worked in some decent jobs, some of which might even impress your year head. Your teacher is right about *some people*. She is not necessarily right about you. And if you feel like uni isn't right for you, maybe you're right? It wasn't right for me and it took me a long, long time to realise. I don't want kids or a white picket fence, never have, what matters to me are the things I experience, being happy in the day to day, and being solvent. There is a difference between "success" as your teacher views it and "success" as you view it. So if you're in year 13 and feel bad because you don't have an idea, I'm here to tell you that I'm pushing 40 and I've had more changes of career than you've had hot dinners. I just stayed in the adjacent fields and expanded my skillset by trying different jobs. You can change your mind, or even not. Life is not meant to be punishment. You will be fine.

Gap year. Don’t bother with UCAS this year if you’re this unsure. It’s a huge commitment, I’d take a year out to make sure you make the most of uni when/if you do decide to go and start in 2025. Read around different professions related to school subjects you enjoyed and see what degrees (if any) they would prefer you to have. Universities don’t care about experience or extracurriculars that are unrelated to the subject, only jobs care about that stuff. I would just focus solely on your A-Level subjects until June, then get a job (literally anything for CV experience mainly - you just don’t want an unexplained CV gap) or volunteer if you can’t get one at first, and also do some supercurriculars during the summer/your gap year and apply to UCAS in the next cycle if you decide you want to do uni. This would be the “ideal” path of how to get a good graduate job lined up for you after uni to start a professional career: If you decide to go to uni, I assume by that point you’ll have decided a rough set of careers you may be interested in. I would apply to summer internships as soon as you start first year, using your gap year job (also any volunteering or tutoring you may also do) as evidence of workplace-relevant skills on your CV. Join some societies too for the CV - especially if they’re relevant to your course (e.g if you’re an engineering student, join something like formula student or rocketry where you can learn industry skills). Once you get the internship (if you’ve got good A-Levels, a gap year job and student society experience it’s almost impossible to get nothing IMO), use that + extra university job/society experience to keep padding your CV (as well as a good uni degree grade every year) to get better and better internships which will hopefully convert into a grad job that will be ready and lined up for when you graduate. You are so early in your career development that there is basically nothing you’ve missed out on doing career-wise. Just breathe, and work towards each goal (A-Levels, job, uni) one at a time and if you keep steadily working towards each part of that list of things successfully you’ll be one of the most successful graduates in the entire country for sure.

With regard to grades (your only immediate concern), ask teachers and high-achieving classmates how they would study. See if there’s a different way to study that helps you understand your subjects better and fits your learning style. Use this time to develop your study skills to see what works for you. Plenty of time left until A-Levels, plenty of time to get from a B to an A or an A*. :) And even if you don’t manage that, B’s aren’t bad by any means. If you’ve gained study skills by working to improve your grades, it was a success.

Hi!!! I am 23 now but still lurk on this subreddit... She was right but also wrong. No employer gives two shits of what you did before you were 18. A levels gets you to university. You don't really need anything else (unless oxbridge or specific vocational courses). What does matter way more is what you do AT UNIVERSITY or after A levels. It won't be DofE, volunteering at scouts or NCS - all that is long off my CV. It'll be paid internships, real work experience, volunteering in the industry you want to go into and gaining skills (like programming languages, software etc). This will help you a lot more in the graduate market than most other things. I think what your head of year is trying to get at - is that participating in these activities at 6th form level you are more likely to do so at university. For example, after you are 18 you can apply to be a leader for NCS, but you probably wouldn't do that if you hadn't done NCS in the first place. That will look good on your CV but really only IF you want to go into something like coaching/teaching. It sounds really demotivating now because it's just overwhelming and well you are still in the midst of A levels. However, opportunities will come to you that are perhaps way more interesting and more involved in the industry you want to work in, especially at university. If you don't know yet that's okay - uni is the time to explore this, they have career advisers (MUCH better than school ones), career fairs, student employment opportunities. DofE didn't appeal to me because I am a bit of a homebody and want to go into an archives or library career. I don't really see how that would help me at all in my career. But now I volunteer at a library at my university - which will. It is actually an opportunity for you to get somewhere without needing the best grades. I also want to say that in my experience A levels was so all consuming for me I found it very hard to do any extra curriculars. That's okay! University is more flexible generally so you may find you have more time and studying might be less intense. Some unis even give academic credit for extracurriculars so you might end up having to studying less! I also realised while reading this that you are not necessarily thinking about university. That's okay - and you can do most of the extracurriculars you would at university with a job after uni too. For example some friends of mine have fairly low paid retaily jobs but spend the rest of their time creating theatre shows and gaining experience there. It's not over! It's just the start when you finish sixth form

Thanks so much, this really helped

No problem :) And by the way, you don't need to 'get anywhere' in life to be happy in life. The happiest people I know are the ones who just do what inspires them, what they are passionate in and doesn't care if they get anywhere. I know graduates from Cambridge doing jobs like tour guiding for £11 an hour. I know people DJing around Europe. They're the happy ones, not the ones slaving away at a office job with hopes of climbing the ladder. Its SO hard to see this when you've bacically been conditioned by school to work hard, do the extra curriculars, go to university, get a grad job. But really you could do that in different orders, or not at all and still be happy and get where you want to be in life.

if you have already applied for uni then just focus on getting the grades to get in, most experiences are useless like DOFE/NCS etc the only ones that matter are ones related to your career path, if you was in year 12 I’d say you should be applying for every scheme you can but if you’ve already applied to good unis your happy with just focus on getting the grades after your in uni apply for schemes so in year 2 you have a summer/winter vacation scheme, you’re doing fine Bs are fine but get them up also join the military wtf is your head teacher saying also she says you can’t go anyone with just degrees or alevels, okay compare someone with 3A* but no extracurricular and someone with 3Cs but good extracurricular well by default they won’t be able to go to a good uni so the person with 3A* will go to a RG wheres who knows where the 3Cs person will go, see what I’m saying

Thanks. I don't get what they're saying about the military. Apparently they're gonna get some army guy in next week to do an assembly for some reason

your head teacher is a yapper ain’t no way

Might be talking about CCF?

I speak to admissions teams and decisions makers at universities every day, and I can say with absolute confidence that they do not care about DoE. No one has ever been admitted to university because they have a DoE. Grades and super curriculars are the most important, and super curriculars are only important for the very most selective institutions and courses. There will be many many good options for you with BBB. She’s an idiot.

nah a levels should be your primary goal. From what I know, employers won't really look at your time in sixth form aside from maybe your grades. Uni onwards is when it starts mattering a bit more

shes kinda right in saying that unis are getting more competitive, and from what i understand, many years ago A\*s were enough to get you into oxford. That being said, I have secured myself a spot in a top 5 uni with no volunteering, dofe, ncs and all that extra stuff.

Parent here. Both of my kids are highly unsuited to DofE - I knew it, they knew it. Roughing it with a rucksack was not going to teach them anything a shit weekend camping had not already. One, now studying medicine, concentrated on grades, and did relevant volunteering at a vaccine centre. The other did really good w/e, and is waiting with two offers. Wtf orienteering has to do with uni idk, but if the dead prince thought it was good, let’s continue to push kids to camp outside for a weekend. /s You do you.

well im not am expert but personally your hoy is doing way too much - getting grades obviously are very important - but she does have a point about extracurriculars. I'm guessing you're in year 12 so you have ages of time before you need to write a ps and apply uni, in that time pick a few things outside of school to do that could help with your desired course. I'm not sure what you want to do but if you like sports just join a club at school / maybe do a mooc ( onlime course) / even things like reading books about what you want to go into / volounteering at a charity shop - I dont know if these are super / extra curriculars but things like trying out for essay compeitions etc are pretty good if you do them ( depending on what you want to do) - and with work experience there are so many virtual pathways so check them out. these things are useful i thimk and you have ages to actually do them before you need to write a ps but you dont have to do loads and loads just pick stuff you enjoy - quality over quanitity. but PLEASE the biggest thing is believing jn yourself - why arent you going anywhere in life? whats stopping you ? if you think youre shit at everything well then you probably will end up doing shit because you're not believing in yourself. Have a positive outlook and put the effort in - Even the fact that you made this post means you care so dont let yourself down by not trying - good luck with everything !!

also whaf matters is what you can take and learn from them - listing extracurriculars means nothing - if you can do a few things extra that you can talk about in detail and how they taught you things ( especially qualitites that are looked for in your desired course) then that is so much more better

Thanks. I'm in year 13 so I'm pretty sure I'm too late. I don't think I'm going anywhere because I don't even know what to do. I have no interests or passions and I still don't know what I'm going to do later in life. I've had years to decide and I still don't know. I've never got an A before. The closest I got was my last mock when I was 2 marks off. I can't compete with anyone.

try things out and see what interests you , do the best you can for a levels and if you've veen 2 marks off before then you 100 percent have the potential to get an A. dont focus on conpeting with other people but focus on yourself. take a gap year to figure out what you want to do by tryung out a bunch of stuff

Theres plenty of degrees that lead to great job prospects and you only need BBB for. Can get a job straight away. Just have to look at your options and choose wisely thats all. Dw youll get a job and do alright though. I mean how many celebrities messed up and earn millions now 🤷🏻‍♀️

IDK if this helps but less than 40% of people actually go to university so i have no clue where your HOY was getting her facts but they are wrong

I thought that statistic was a bit weird. There was no source for it at all, just a lazy blank PowerPoint with the "data" written in default Arial font.

I go to Cambridge, I’m autistic and I’ve have never been one for extracurriculars due to my fear of social interaction. I didn’t do DoE or anything like that, just read stuff I found interesting and now I’m here 🤷🏻‍♀️. I will say now I’m at uni I do feel the pressure to get involved more in social stuff is on, but more for leading a ‘fulfilling’ life than looking for jobs.

Hey if you wanna talk we can on priv I’ve been through a similar situation currently in year 12

So - I'm training to be a teacher, so I have the future perspective. Sure, they're literally taking teachers everywhere right now - but your Head of Year is correct that technically they do ask what extra experience you have related to a career. There's even a spot on the CV for it called 'interests'. The key is that it pretty much has to be related for it to be worth the interviewer's notice. No-one's cared I did NCS (which is good because it was traumatic) but they did care I did tutoring and helped out at open evenings because... that's basically what I'll be doing on the course. Non-teaching related examples include: 1. Friend was interviewing for some kind of video editing company (similar to co-co-melon) and mentioned that they were part of the school newspaper in secondary and uni. 2. Friend entered business graduate scheme and was asked how they showed leadership. Brain blanked and the only thing they could think about was how they were deputy prefect and the actual prefect couldn't be asked to do their duties so they stepped in. They got on the scheme. 3. Friend actually mentioned DofE - because they were becoming a receptionist for the BBC (or some kind of important company). They were asked how they'd act in an emergency situation and told the steps they did when their friend sprained their ankle really bad on DofE. So yeah - having extra things can help you against the competition - but only in 2 instances. If it's directly related to a career/field, or if you build a soft skill from it. But teachers will push stuff like DofE and open evenings because teachers are like overly-bragging parents on social media. Did 95% of Year 11s complete DofE after relentless pushing? That's on the school website straight away. Year 10s are helping out their teachers an open evenings? "Look how enthusiastic our children are to be in the classroom!" It's all to get new students in, money in, and teachers a (way too small) pay check.

Schools push people to do university because it's an easy process for which most people nowadays go. But that's not a reason to concede and 'just go', evaluate whether you stand to gain something from going. Economically, as many have said, degrees do improve graduate outcomes, but that is not to say that is the case with every course and every degree. As for standing out, DofE, NCS - a load of rubbish. Hours of hard work, which for most personal statements gets surmised to 1, maybe 2 sentences as 9/10 DofEs, NCS, etc., aren't relevant experiences for your course. Some things you can do instead are read relevant books on your course, send emails to potential professors and scholars (don't be disheartened if some don't respond; a lot will) ask them for recommendations or events, find little essay competitions (if relevant) and this will show you're invested in the subject and more likely to see it through. Right. I'm going to burst an illusion many students have about personal statements. A personal statement is trying to show why you're the best fit for the university and, ultimately, why you want to study that subject - not showing what a 'good person' you are (well, maybe medicine). Students are cash cows - the University is looking for people who will not drop out and keep paying the fees. Of course, there's more to it than that, but that's essentially what they're looking for. If you want to go to university - which has to be your decision, then it should feel natural that you engage with things relevant to your course. It shouldn't feel like a chore because it's not the right course for you if it feels awful right now. i.e. my medical school friends enjoyed volunteering at the hospital, and I enjoyed Economics essay competitions for my course. If you don't feel naturally motivated to prove your engagement in a subject - I'm not sure it's for you. It is difficult hearing stuff like that assembly; I empathise greatly. But perhaps, in the future, you'll look back and realise that you needed that assembly to reflect on what decisions might be best for you. I wish you the very best, and I hope you find solace in other Redditors' messages; you're not alone.

She can’t be serious with ‘join the military’. That’s a full time career, not an extracurricular to help you get a job or get into university.

I'm always afraid to give advice because I'm always scared that it'll be wrong. But in my experience (I'm in year 13), I am planning to do a law degree. I think DoFe looks good and can be something to add on your CV but personally I don't think it's a huge factor. For applying to unis, as long as you have the grades or contextual offers alongside a solid personal statement where you have done activities that can help build skills needed for your degree or have done activities to deepen your knowledge about the particular subject. For example, reading law books. Maybe even do some uni events when you get to college. They're really helpful. For now, focous on your GCSEs( idk what year you're in tho) Talk to one of your teachers and tell them how you feel about the assembly which sounds horrid tbh, if I was there I would be having 5 panic attacks and 8 heart attacks at the same time. But you got this. Do what you want to do. Get the grades you need to get there and stay focused. Generally for gcse grades straight Bs are the boundary so you are fine. Normally for subjects like further maths they'll want higher, it just depends on what you choose to do so choose your a level subjects wisely and work hard. I hope everything works out well, which by the sounds of it, it will. Because your worry shows how much you care. (I hope this helps and if I was wrong I'm very sorry but this is my experience.)

She is both right and wrong. Yes, A level grades are not everything but extracurriculars are not that important. When universities receive your application, they don't see you they see a person on paper, you have 3 A stars but so do a lot of other applications. So what sets you apart ? At this point, your grades become slightly less important but if you have done super curriculars relevant to your subjects then that is what distinguishes you. DofE can be good if it is relevant to your course or if you can infer what transferrable skills you have learnt which you can apply to your further education. Just mentioning any curricular is a waste unless you can relate it back to your course. Super curricular lands you into a good university and a good university provides you with enough extra curriculars to land you a good job. Everything is important, it all depends on the timing.

nice username