Makes it sound as though everyone who takes a gap year is gonna fail.. But seriously, a gap year can help, as you will have confirmed grades and then can decide where to apply and get a firm offer. No waiting to find out your results to ensure you get in. (my plan)

It can also help depending on what you do during your gap year. I year helping a charity somewhere might be better than a year at the festivals.

My brother has failed to get into Uni twice now, both times he wanted to do Religious Studies and Philosophy. He's now going back to collage to get more basic qualifications to do something else...
For the last two years, all he's really done is bum around...

People today don't need degrees, they need a practical education. Coming out of university I feel that I am most qualified to go and do a Masters/Ph.D, not go out and develop software/admin networks/send a robot to Mars/etc...

I went to Uni at 21 instead of 18, decided I wanted some cash instead and went to work.

I think I made more out of it because I waited, in every sense.

I think for most people a degree is a complete waste of time and money. Unless it is relevant to the career that you intend to go into then all it does is increase your debt or tax liability for the next dozen years or more and reduce your income during the first four years or so. The so called degree premium is now down to £100 000 over your lifetime from the £400 000 when debts were first introduced. So in a few more years it will down to zero for all but the highest paying degrees.

It depends on the course. I feel brilliantly qualified to clobber Tesco et al for their unlawful returns policies, not to mention dodgy builders, car salesmen/garages, electricity/gas companies, banks etc...

That's quite a statement - do you have any evidence to back it up? I would consider the company I work as being one of the top employers, and I'm not exactly falling over Oxbridge graduates - there are none amongst the 100-odd people in my research group.

Depends on the business I think.

I was listening to the radlio on the way in this morning and they were doing the whole 'waiting round while students opened their results' thing. Some of the grades you need these days to get into fairly middling courses/unis are scary, compared to when I was 18. One of the students they were talking to needed 3 A's to get into Warwick to study History. In my day, if you got 3 A's you had about a 50/50 chance of getting into Oxbridge, and if you didn't you could pretty much pick any course anywhere else. Whatever the cause of grade inflation, you'd have to be downright deluded to suggest it hasn't happened.

Jon

I had an acquaintance who was offered a place at Cambridge of a 2 B's and a C. He got 4 A's anyway. Though this was years ago.

That's a fairly standard easy offer. I was offerred 3Cs for a Top-5 in-country-for-subject ranked course. My friend was offerred BBC a few years back. Once they've interviewed you and you've passed any required additional assessments then they may want you regardless, and whilst they still expect As, they only require a lesser grade to reduce pressure/allow for slipups/etc. It's done on a per-college basis, in Cambridge at least. Churchill, for example, never make easy offers, but if you mess up you may still be allowed to attend.

If they want you they make an easy offer to ensure that you get in.

That's what I said.