Hi I am currently in my gcse year (year 11,15 years old) in England. I have choose my alevels for next year I want to do business, economics, history or politics. Will these subjects impress investment banks ? I currently want to work in research or strategy.
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Banks don't care about what subjects you chose. Just get ABB or above and go to a target university.
Some universities do not consider Business and Economics as distinct enough A Levels. Choose something else and drop one of those two.
Thank you very much would you recommend politics instead of business ?
Yes, sounds good.
Would definitely not take business and Econ together. Would lean towards Econ out of these two and dropping business.
Taking some Maths for a level future proofs you a bit but if it's not a strong subject (anything less than a 8/9 at GCSE) then don't force it.
Thank you very much I got a grade 7 in my mocks for maths so I am considering a-levels. Not sure if a B in maths is better than a A* in business ?
Anything lower than an 8 or 9 in maths and you should not be taking A-Level maths because you will not get an A or A* at A-Level. You wanna optimise your A-levels for the highest grades (but I would frankly avoid business over Econ) to get into the best universities.
Just note that not having a maths a level disallows you from doing pure Economics degrees.
This is a silly thing to state as an absolute; it's just more likely to be the case. When I did my A Levels, there were a slew of grade 8/9 students failing to get above a grade D in mocks whilst I got an A with a grade 6. Just worked harder on doing bridge work over the summer and boom, smashed my AS (they were not difficult).
You should take A-Level maths if you're comfortable with the back half of the paper. I never cared for or was particularly good at the stupid geometry questions or however far someone has to cycle or stupid questions like that, but the pure questions and stats I was good at. Hence performed better at AS/A2. If this is the case for OP, then absolutely they should take A Level maths if they enjoy it.
It does not matter if you take Business or Econ at A-Level - do whichever you'll get a higher grade in/whichever one you find more interesting.
You do not need to study Economics at University to get into IB. Economics is an academic discipline about resource allocation and utility in its most basic form... It won't teach you anything you need for IB. An accounting or finance degree is more useful, but in the UK you can study whatever you want.
All fair points! I agree with everything.
I was exchanging nuance for simplicity in my response, which may have been irresponsible...
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