Which subject to drop for HSC? (1 Viewer)

[roryg03]

Hi guys, I'm new here and looking for some subject selection advice.
I'm in year 11 at a school in regional NSW with a ranking around the 350 mark but (somewhat regrettably) decided against boarding in Sydney for year 11/12. Teachers have begun to hassle us to order next years textbooks (this is not the only reason I ask this question) but I'm unsure between Physics and Business because I only want 10 or 11 units. I'm also doing adv English, ext maths, chem and SOR1, looking at also picking up ext science for HSC. My original plan was to drop both Physics and Business and pick up ext science and 4U maths but I haven't done amazingly well in ext maths, though it has probably been my favourite subject (also, the teacher singled out 3 students he thought could do 4U next year and said no one else could and I wasn't one of the three- I could give NESA a ring and get them to sort that out but I'm not too fussed), so I'm in a bit of a conundrum and would greatly appreciate some help/recommendations.

Original Motives- Business was always going to be somewhat of an 'enjoyable bludge' because they didn't run the Agriculture course and I chose Physics bc 'its just maths' (which I found that it sorta is sorta isn't) and I enjoy the sciences.
ATAR- looking to aim very high (hopefully 99+) to keep my options open for uni (see below v v).
Enjoyment- I've mostly enjoyed business this year; class and teacher are both good and content has been slightly heavy but manageable and mostly interesting and enjoyable. Physics on the other hand, has been a boring slog but still, teacher is good and class is quite committed, although we were taught the entire waves and thermo module pretty much a week before prelims bc it 'wasn't very relevant for year 12'.
Marks/Study- Overall this year has been far from my best in terms of grades and marks but I'm very motivated to improving that for year 12. Business and Physics have been my two least studied subjects all year. For Business because its easy and I found the prelim exam not at all challenging. Physics because I just couldn't find the motivation for it and kept either going to the kitchen to eat or doing chem instead. Based on how I found prelims and other assessments, I'm probably hovering around the high 80s/low 90s for business but somewhere in the 60s for Physics (though our whole class did so badly in physics and chem prelims they had to soften the marking criteria for both :/), which I could definitely improve if I studied for Physics as much as I did for the other subjects. Also, my best mate is generally on par with me academically is smashing it in Phys.
What I've Heard- Business is trash in HSC year, everyone's telling me to drop it; HSC Physics is just built on the basics of the Prelim course.
Tutoring/Coaching- Coming from a selective school in southern Syd in years 7/8, I am aware of my tutoring options in Sydney (Matrix, Talent, Du etc.- obviously would have to be online) and locally. I took Talent online classes for physics (among others) for a term but dropped them bc I joined midway through a topic and couldn't latch on very well but wouldn't rule out starting them again for year 12.
Uni- I'm clueless as to what I want to do tbh, wanted to be a pilot forever but don't think I'd enjoy the repetitiveness of being one so thinking something science or business related (though that hardly narrows it down).

Thanks so much just for reading all that, would love some advice or even some tips for enjoying physics more.

 

[shashysha]

For me business is definitely an enjoyable bludge between doing 4u math and physics.Business in HSC year is essentially just memorising throughout the year and quite easy to do well in, but of course some people don't memorise well or would not enjoy doing it for a year (personally I'm fine with it though). I would recommend doing 4U maths though, I was also on the fence about doing it at the end of year 11 as I didn't think I could handle it and the rest of my grade had tutored for it a year prior, but I'm glad I did because it's quite rewarding to answer the hard questions and it just makes your overall maths game better (you lowkey breeze through 3u), as well as the fire scaling.

Year 12 physics i found to be MUCH more interesting and engaging than year 11 physics so I'd recommend keeping it until the first task to see if you would enjoy it or not (although this should apply for all your subjects), also if your mate is smashing it then you could consider asking him for help and revise together. It's known as one of the harder subjects for a reason but I think if you apply yourself and draw some real world connections to the subject you would end up engaging yourself and enjoying it more. All in all I'd wait until after the first and maybe second task to gauge your interest before making a decision.