The First-Year Student

Archie Lockyer, 18

My friends and I lost our university places when the preliminary A-level results were released. I was predicted A*AA, but I received AAC. I’d always wanted to study English and Film at university, so being scaled down to a C in English was hard. The scaling system assessed schools’ history of grades and, unfortunately, the place I attended had a poor track record for English results. I knew that I was capable of achieving my predicted grades, as I proved in my mock exams and class work. It never crossed my mind that my A-level results would be determined by the academic performance of students from previous years. Searching for a university place was gruelling. Certain universities offered places with an awareness of the issues that had arisen from the scaling system. However, this was made more stressful when some offered those places on the condition that you accept within 24 hours. If students were not eventually awarded their predicted grades, I would not have been able to get into my first-choice university. I had hoped that coming to university would mean meeting people from all walks of life. Because of the pandemic, all of my expectations have been thrown out of the window. I hope the future provides more opportunities for me to meet new people. I find it much easier to interact in real life than on Zoom. Right now, I have a limited ability to develop connections outside of the digital world.