Hello!!

[Dovestor]

Hi all, for quite some time now I have been after a change in career. Over the last few weeks I have found myself looking into the merchant navy, the more I look the more I want in, I could join a ship with my current job but I'm really after getting out of the casino industry altogether. However... back in the 'good ol' days of high school I really didn't care much for learning and was more interested in girls, music, sleep and more music. So here I am now at the wonderful age of 28, terrible GCSE grades, no A levels, I have a level 2 in gym instruction but I'm quietly confident that won't get me sponsorship. I spend more time than I care to think about learning off my own back and absolutely love the sciences! but it doesn't change my grades unfortunately. At present I really can't afford to throw myself into several GCSE's and suchlike, and I can't afford to go to college full time, but I fear that doing one subject at a time would take far too long. There is the access course route but with there being so many different access courses to choose from what am I supposed to pick? I know there are no guarantees in life but if I go down that route I want to maximize my chances of landing a sponsorship. Does anyone have any suggestions, hints or know a route I may be able to take. If I have to do one course at a time and take several years to get to a point where I could be considered for a sponsorship I will do it, I'll do whatever I need to do, just trying to find the best and hopefully quickest way to get from where I am now to to having the chance at sponsorship.

Hope I didn't send anyone to sleep with my probably tedious text. Dan.

[Clanky]

I would suggest going along to one of the college open days and speaking to sponsoring companies about what they would require. In many cases the grades that the companies require are simply the minimum grades that the colleges ask for to get onto the course and many colleges have different grades for school leavers and mature students.

You may find that a good pass in maths and physics is enough, but only the companies or colleges will be able to tell you for sure.

[Dovestor]

Cheers Clanky, a good idea that hadn't crossed my mind, I shall keep my eyes peeled for open days .

[Dovestor]

Found a cheaper alternative to booking a load of GCSE courses... going the home schooling route, I'll just teach myself what I need to, go over the stuff I know or think I know and just pay to do the exams. Bought a couple of GCSE physics workbooks and revision guides, and theres plenty of past papers online that I can use to test myself. Registered on Khan academy as I have heard its a useful resource, will be doing the same for Maths in a week or two, now that I have found a reasonably cheap way to do the exams I can afford to get an extra cert or two, so Physics and Maths are the 2 I will absolutely be doing, was thinking of maybe throwing in something like Astronomy, Geography or Statistics just to add to the grade pool. Does anyone have any thoughts, is there any other GCSE's that may be more beneficial (except English.)

[McBoo]

For Maths revision: examsolutions.net is an absolutely fantastic resource! I've linked you to the GCSE revision section where the tutorials are listed by topic.