George Pearce - iamPearce

Like many, I received my A-Level results this Thursday, and have started the preparations for moving away to University in late September. I obtained grade A in Physics, B in Maths and C in Chemistry, as well as a pass in the Advanced Welsh Bacc.

I’m currently waiting for the results of appealing my maths result, I was five out of six hundred marks away from the A grade, which cost me my place at Birmingham University. For the moment at least, my intention is to study the same course (Physics, three years) in Cardiff University, who were my insurance choice.

I’m really happy with my results, hoping that I can bring the B back up to an A, which is what I ultimately wanted – A in Physics and A in Maths, are excellent foundations for my studying at degree level.

I’m on a train on my way to Cardiff writing this, staying with a friend and I’ll hopefully be able to go and look for work and such while I’m there

Having now received all of my offers from Universities, I’ve made my final choices and submitted them to UCAS.

Assuming I achieve the grades, I will be studying at Birmingham University on the F300 Physics Bsc course.

If I don’t, I’ll be studying at Cardiff, on the same course. (Assuming I get some basic grades).

As I posted before, I looked around both Uni’s and they were both amazing – both places I’d be more than happy to spend my three years on that degree, so whatever happens I think I’m well set. Even better, I don’t need to deal with UCAS at *all* (I think) until August, when my results come out. .

I went and visited the Physics department at Birmingham University yesterday – I was at Cardiff last week and those two make up my firm choice and fallback, ready for when I ship off to university in September.

I really enjoyed my time at Birmingham, I like the facilities, the department, and I got along well with the staff that I spoke too.

As Birmingham is also the higher ranked university; and the one with the higher grade requirements, it is pretty likely now that it’s going to be my first choice (firm) with Cardiff being my fallback.

That means that in as little as 8 months; I could be studying in Birmingham – a prospect I’m quite looking forward to.

The Birmingham Physics department I would definitely recommend considering, when thinking about a UK Physics degree (as would I the Cardiff department), their research grade is very high, and looking around their labs and such; there is a huge amount of equipment available for research projects (and some of the things first years were doing looked fascinating).

I’m now on the way back from Cardiff, as I posted earlier I spent today there on a physics applicant day.

Its been a brilliant day, and I’m very pleasantly surprised that Cardiff has made me consider my previous decision that it would be my fallback uni, behind Birmingham. Granted, I have only so far been to Cardiff uni open day and the applicant day in next week, so I’ll compare the two directly, but I really enjoyed my time at Cardiff today.

The department looked great, the atmosphere was brilliant and I really liked that the department isn’t vast like Birmingham’s is, I like how personal everything seemed.
The facilities were also very good, and everything just seemed really nice, enough for me to sway from being definite about Birmingham for a while .

I also met an absolutely awe inspiring guy while I was there, on the same applicant day as me, called Glyn. I’m hoping to find his blog, and I believe I have his Facebook details but he was absolutely brilliant – him and catching back up with an old friend made the day for me.

Back on track though, I have Birmingham open day next Tuesday, and after that, now that my offers are all through, I can start thinking about my actual choices.

Interesting food for thought is that if I firm with Cardiff and achieve AAA grades (two A’s and my welsh bac) then I’ll automatically be eligible for a sizable grant, which I don’t think applies at Birmigham. I’ll find this out on Tuesday, though.

Well, I’m now about an hour from my train change for home, so I’m going to have a read.

I am off to Cardiff today. In fact, I’m on my way there now, on the ten to six train. Very early. I’m far more awake than I expected to be.

I’m on my way to look at Cardiff university, I have been invited for an applicant day today. I’m planning on taking some photos with my phone, so I’ll add those to this later. I’m looking forward to getting there (and getting a coffee) and from what I have heard about the university it sounds great, so today should be an experience. Also catching up with an old friend, who I haven’t seen in quite a while .

Ciao for now, back to my music and book .

On the 20th, I received my AS Level results for the exams I sat in July of this year.

In Physics, I got an A grade, Chemistry a B grade, Biology a C grade, and Maths a C grade.

I will be resitting a paper from Chemistry which dragged me down from an A and from Maths which brought me down from a B, although I am considering resitting all three Maths papers, as I feel I am capable of achieving more than I did.

These results are the basis of my choosing a degree at University to apply to once I’ve finished my A Levels, and I think I will be combining my passion for business with my love of physics to do a masters degree in Physics with Business, possibly at The University of Birmingham. I’m currently researching the degree and it’s potential applications, so I can ensure it’s the right thing for me, but right now everything seems promising.

My results aren’t entirely what I was hoping for, while Chemistry and Physics are good results I’m disappointed with my performance in my Maths and Biology exams. My intention is to put in more work and revision in the next year to ensure I leave with the grades I want – AAB or better.

I’ve only recently started seriously looking at where I’m heading for University, and the processes involved in application and funding. Before this week, I’d pretty much assumed I’d go to Bath and study business, but something happened in the last few days that made me reconsider.

I’m now much more seriously considering doing a degree in Physics, and working in a field such as Nuclear Physics, and then go on to do an applied masters in Business afterwards. It’d be cool to head to Cambridge, do Natural Sciences there, and this is also a possibility.

I’d also been wondering whether Uni is the best thing for me. It started off with me reading posts on other blogs by people my age about the same thing, whether Uni was suitable for them, it’s just assumed to be the ‘given’ thing that people wanting to do professional jobs do these days. I talked to a careers advisor about it, and as well as having a massive impact on your job potential, University makes adults of people, which makes it more than just the academic experience you go for. My doubts have been pretty much quashed by this. University is definitely where I will go next.

Looking at the loan processes online, and it doesn’t look like I’m going to be able to borrow enough money to cover my living costs for Uni, even if I do cover all my course fees, which will make my recent challenge to myself all the more useful, as it will end up funding my costs, most likely. So if anyone fancies donating..

Now, my question to the world, is where are the best places in the UK to study a degree in Physics? I’m looking into UCL too.