Hi everyone
Ds is having to pick A levels in the next few weeks (although we're lucky and his school allows quite a lot of leeway in changing options later on).
He is definitely wanting to do Economics and Politics. He was thinking of French as his third.
However he has done a bit of research and discovered that many universities require maths A level for students planning to study Economics at degree level.
At the moment, he thinks that is what he would like to do - probably not on its own but combined with Politics or maybe as PPE.
He definitely was not thinking of doing Maths A level until this and it's a bit of a curveball.
Most of my friends' children who have done maths have done Maths/Physics/Chemistry and often FM as well. I don't have a handle on what Maths A level is really like for non-scientists.
For context he was a great mathematician in primary school and has struggled a lot more since secondary school - he used to be able to see the answer without doing the hard work in between and once things required lots of different stages that became hard for him. However he is getting better at not panicking when he can't work out where to go immediately and he's working hard at it. He's still good - his predictions have been wavering between 7 and 8 for the last couple of years - but I would not say he finds it naturally easy any more.
How is maths A level for those students who are not complete maths geniuses? How much harder is it to do maths without the other sciences?
Obviously we will talk to his teacher at parents' evening and one of my good friends is a maths teacher so I'll talk to her too.
But I wondered if I could get some feedback on here as well?
There are some universities that don't require maths so, if it sounds as though he would struggle to do well enough to get to the sort of uni he wants to, we need to do some work looking at those so that he's making an informed choice.
Thank you!

DD did maths, eng lit and sociology. (Plus AS chem). Maths was her best subject. I don’t think it’s an issue if they’re not doing sciences. She certainly didn’t think so.

I don’t think not doing a science is an issue either.
Physics makes the mechanics side a bit easier but neither of my two ( who didn’t do Physics ) felt it had much of an impact.
My understanding is that any economics at uni level is really tricky without A level maths.

Both DDs did Maths with essay subjects, that bit is not a problem. DD1 also did an Economics degree. Whilst some are more maths heavy than others (hers less maths heavy than most) she would have found it very difficult without Maths A level. In fact, the uni held compulsory catch up sessions for those (few) students who had not completed FM at A level. I'd get DS to think very carefully about why/whether he is interested in the Economics bit if he is not a Maths fan and does not find is fairly easy, Econ is a maths heavy subject at Uni., which I think many don't realise. Good luck with it all anyway!

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I remember a friend of DD's who did maths, FM & economics at A level. She told me that effectively she was doing 3 maths A levels. I think most people would recommend maths for someone interested in an economics degree.

Thank you this is helpful.
Economics is far and away his favourite subject at GCSE but I suspect is maybe quite different from what it would be like at degree?
I think he finds sums and graphs and that sort of thing easy - it's the shapes and angles and circle things he struggles with more. I don't know how much of that there is in maths a level.
I agree that he probably needs to know more about whether he's suited to an economics degree before making his decisions. He loves the concepts and theories - maybe there are courses that deal with that side of things more?
PPE does not seem to require maths but needs a high grade at maths GCSE. But I don't really know what PPE involves!

It would be worth looking more at the universities offering Economics / courses including Economics as a BA / BAEcon rather than (or as well as, obviously) BSc. Economics more as a social science.

e.g. the options at Manchester, which don't require Maths A level - it is just one of the many on the must include one of list - and if I'm reading the module list correctly, it is possible to give the 'really heavy Maths' courses a swerve altogether in first year, with the aim of moving off onto one of the more social science-y 'Economics and...' courses from second year.

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Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.Groucho Marx

Thank you everyone.
It was probably naive of me not to raise how much maths would be involved in an economics degree.
He loves sums but struggles more with some of the more spatial awareness stuff like angles and shapes. I think he needs to delve a bit more into the differences between a straight economics degree and a degree in something like politics and economics which doesn't seem to require maths and is maybe more conceptual, and also into what he would be doing in maths a level and whether he thinks he could cope with it.
Food for thought.
(DD didn't start thinking about degree courses till year 12 so it feels a bit early but I can see it's probably necessary).

Sorry I cross posted with you. Thank you.
Yes there are a number of places that seem to offer eg politics and economics as a BA (Bath is one that cropped up on a quick look) without a requirement for maths. (It also offered economics and politics which did require maths!)
I will get him to do some research!

Yes, very different
DD was the same - but found the mechanics bit of A level OK (shapes etc), although she said the Physicists were at a distinct advantage here. She really struggled with it in FM though so it is maybe worth asking the maths teachers what the breakdown of the A level offered is?
I did PPE, loved the Politics, was OK with the Economics but found the stats side a bit hard and HATED (so much so that I dropped it) the Philosophy. Others were the opposite. I had assumed the Philosophy would be lots of what an 18 year old might consider thinking, sitting around discussing the meaning of life etc. In fact it was a monumental amount of reading, and (being the best part of 40 years ago) not having studied Latin or Greek put me at a distinct disadvantage. I'm sure that's not the case now thankfully.

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mad?