Parent's trying to pick my subjects for me, what should I do

[SergeantPorkchops]

I am in year 10, and we recently had to submit a draft of our VCE selections for year 11. For my VCE subjects, I chose:
Math Methods
English
Chemistry
History: 20th century
Biology
Chinese 3&4

My father was quite supportive of my choices and gave me many helpful tips for my subject selections, however, my mother was livid when she saw I chose history as a vce subject and started going on a rant about how I should choose subjects that scale up instead of subjects that I enjoy and that I would never be able to become a doctor (I have no idea what I want to be in the future) and that I have to choose 2 maths subjects. I am quite bad at maths (scores usually from 50-70) and absolutely do not want to do 2 maths subjects. My mothers reasons for not accepting history as my selection is that she thinks it scales down (im not sure if it does or doesn't) and she said she will not sign the subject selection sheet as she does not agree with my decision.

What should I do, this is really stressing me out

[Sine]

I think history scales down just slightly (for most study scores it is less than 1).

I obviously don't know your specific circumstances and knowledge level about scaling etc but Could a better understanding of scaling help?

The reasons scaling of subjects occurs is because each subject has a different cohort of students completing the subjects. So some cohorts have a lot of students who do well making it a strong cohort whilst other subjects may be a weak cohort. You can see from this it would be unfair to give someone who is average in a subject with a strong cohort the same score as an average student in a much weaker cohort.

Scaling is there to overcome these differences in cohort strength so we can properly compare scores between subjects.

A little bit of a misconception is that harder subjects get scaled up. That is not true, it is about the strength of the cohort. This strength is measured by how students of a particular cohort go in their other subjects.

E.g Maths Methods has quite a strong cohort so students are scaled up (usually about 4-5). Further Maths has a slightly weak cohort so scores get scaled-down (usually about 2-3)

Students generally do better when they choose subjects that they actually want to do rather than choosing subjects that scale-up.

I think your message should be:
- choosing subjects specifically because the scale-up is not the best path to a good ATAR.
- Students do better when they have subjects they like and are motivated to study for
- Students can still get great atars with subjects that scale down (I know some people who have scored high 99s and had mainly scaled-down subjects)
- Also, possibly some explanation on what scaling is and how it works to make subjects more equal

[Duck Tails]

Hey SergeantPorkchops,

First off, welcome to AN!
Definitely agree with Sine; at the end of the say, scaling really doesn't matter and generally, it's a bad idea to choose subjects solely depending on how they scale. Your mum isn't the one doing VCE, you are - you should be able to choose what subjects you want to do. You're more likely to get a higher ATAR by doing subjects that you're genuinely interested in than doing subjects that you really couldn't give a crap about because they scale up.
If it's any solace, I want to become a doctor and am doing history next year; so far, I haven't come across a course that requires to do two maths. According to my careers advisor, if you do the subjects you've listed (and do well, of course) you can pretty much get into any course. Especially since you're not sure what you want to be career-wise, i think it's definitely better to have a good mix of subjects than to be stuck in maths-science mode for the majority of your school week.

Hope this helped at least a little bit; remember, we're always here to help if you need
Good luck!

[heids]

Doing subjects that you enjoy and that play to your strengths is usually the most effective method of scoring highly.

For me, my highest scaled score was HHD, the 'lowest prestige' subject that also scaled down the most... but the one that matched my interests and how my brain works.  Methods, which scaled up, trailed distantly behind and didn't make my top 4 subjects.

With Methods/Chem/English, you're set with common course pre-requisites, so you should be fine to fill the rest with what YOU want to do.

It's probably worth trying to explain how scaling and scoring works, but if she's still refusing to sign your form, I'd recommend talking to a teacher/careers counsellor/VCE coordinator about how to handle that.  It must be really stressful!  Your mum clearly cares a lot about you, but it doesn't mean she's handling it the best way.

[iamflowting]

Even if you convince your mum here and now that you want to do History, there is nothing stopping her from just doing the same thing when you are doing course preferences or when you are picking a career path. I would recommend having a proper honest talk with your mum. It can be scary, but it can really help if you let your parents understand your point of view.

My mum was against many of the subjects I chose in high school. And honestly she had a good reason to be skeptical. But I told her my reasons. I told her I would try my best and if I didn't do well, well, I guess the only one I would be able to blame would be myself.

"Do whatever makes you happy". I didn't expect to hear these words from my mum but it has really shaped who I am today. Honestly, my ATAR was well below what I would have expected before VCE. The course I'm doing wasn't even in my top 3 preferences. But my mum understands that I am still trying my best and she is still supporting me while I find my direction.

Just understand that your parents do want what is best for you. Sometimes they know what that 'best' is, but sometimes they don't and its important to let them know when that's the case.

[Failingvce]

I am in year 10, and we recently had to submit a draft of our VCE selections for year 11. For my VCE subjects, I chose:
Math Methods
English
Chemistry
History: 20th century
Biology
Chinese 3&4

My father was quite supportive of my choices and gave me many helpful tips for my subject selections, however, my mother was livid when she saw I chose history as a vce subject and started going on a rant about how I should choose subjects that scale up instead of subjects that I enjoy and that I would never be able to become a doctor (I have no idea what I want to be in the future) and that I have to choose 2 maths subjects. I am quite bad at maths (scores usually from 50-70) and absolutely do not want to do 2 maths subjects. My mothers reasons for not accepting history as my selection is that she thinks it scales down (im not sure if it does or doesn't) and she said she will not sign the subject selection sheet as she does not agree with my decision.

What should I do, this is really stressing me out

hey!
ultimately you always do well in subjects that you enjoy and are willing to put time and effort in! IMO it's not really worth doing subjects that scale up if you don't enjoy them because you may not perform well due to lack of interest. scaling won't help if that happens. e.g you might hate maths a lot but you choose it because it scales. this means you might not work as hard and still get a low score even with the scaling as opposed to history, which you enjoy and are passionate about. because you're willing to work, you can still get a really high score and it'll scale down by only a few points depending on what you get.

I understand that this might be difficult for your parents to grasp as VCE is quite complicated, especially if you don't have any siblings who've already done it and can explain it to you and your parents. maybe try taking them to some information sessions or workshops that may help them understand it more. Schools at this time usually have these sessions or you can also search for some that are externally provided. there are also many videos online that explain VCE to both parents and students or you can always approach your teachers or coordinators for more info. Your mum might be more open to agreeing with you if she understands what you're going through more.

[keltingmeith]

There's a lot of helpful information about trying to explain to you how all of this works and giving your mum the benefit of the doubt that she will see things your way, which is hopefully what's going to happen - but this smells of controlling, and I'm getting warning lights in my head that your mum isn't going to simply change her mind just by presenting her with facts.

So, here's something not a lot of people are aware of - but structured debate is actually a stupidly bad way of trying to convince someone to agree with you. In fact, arguing in GENERAL is a bad way of doing things. This is because of a psychological phenomena known as "cognitive dissonance", which is:

the state of having inconsistent thoughts, beliefs, or attitudes, especially as relating to behavioural decisions and attitude change.

For example, look at this hilarious video about one man coming to term with the facts that steel isn't always heavier than feathers. Sure, this is a skit designed to be funny, but remember that comedy is typically an embellishment of what happens in real life. This man is facing physical distress because something that he took for gospel is all of a sudden proven wrong to him. The way that people typically react to cognitive dissonance? They actually dig in their heels, and believe their original opinion even harder, even with given physical evidence of their thought process being wrong. For the curious, here's a great excerpt from The New Yorker about it.

This makes everything seem a little hopeless, doesn't it? And tbh, it can make things very sticky. However, there is someone who should know your mother better than anyone - your father, the man who has lived with her at this point for probably half of her life. You said your dad was honestly very supportive of you doing what you want. This is the best way to combat cognitive dissonance - by knowing how someone thinks, and being able to use their own logic against them - make them believe for themselves, and have them come to the conclusion on their own terms, that your opinion is the right one. (the other way is just recognising it exists and doing your best daily to combat it, but that's a self thing, not an other people thing)

Also a fan of Heidi's talking to career councillors/teachers at school to see if they can help.

[Vitata]

I have no idea what I want to be in the future

If you still don't know, it's time to make your choice. Or you can just pick subjects you like. I don't like math too and 2 maths won't help me with my future career. Talk about it with your father or other family members who can explain to her this situation (as I understand, she doesn't want to hear anything about YOUR subjects selection). Or you should find the rights words and explain her by yourself. I believe in you. Good luck.

[Massimo1]

Hey there,

My parents forced me to do Units 1&2 Biology and Specialist Maths for Year 11 2019. I ended up on the bottom of my class for specialist and dropping it at the end of Sem1 for Units 1&2 Politics. I can honestly say that picking up Politics was one of the best choices that I have made. I continued to do 1&2 Biology until the end of the year, and I basically got forced to keep it since they already allowed me to drop Spesh after a long talk. I’m currently not having any fun in ¾ Bio, am struggling to keep up and hate the content.

Anyways sorry for the anecdote haha but based of personal experience you really should say something to her. Doing subjects you’re forced to do isn’t worthwhile in my opinion, especially if you’re not interested in it. If she’s concerned about scaling, all your other subjects besides English scale up anyways. I think it’s really be worth it to have a talk with her and convince her to allow you to do History if that's what you want to do.

Good luck!