Exam Board: AQA
Aims
The aims of the course are as follows:
- Give students an understanding of four key elements of business performance: finance, marketing, personnel and logistics.
- Encourage students to use their knowledge of business models and theory to explain the behaviour and success or failure of real businesses around the world.
- Provide students with the confidence and skills needed to run their own organisations in the future.
Entry Requirements
Students should have Grade 4 or higher in GCSE English and Mathematics, or the equivalent grade/mark in their national system of secondary education.
Course Structure
Year 1
- What is business?
- Managers, leadership and decision making
- Decision making to improve marketing performance
- Decision making to improve financial performance
- Decision making to improve human resource performance
Year 2
- Reinforcement of year 1 knowledge
- Analysing the strategic position of a business
- Choosing strategic direction
- Strategic methods: how to pursue strategies
- Managing strategic change
Assessment
- Paper 1 – Written exam of 2 hours (33.3% of final grade).
- Paper 2 – Data Response (as Paper 1).
- Paper 3 – Case Study (as Papers 1 and 2).
Core Text
Business for A Level by Ian Marcousé.
Careers and Opportunities
The individual elements of the Business Studies course give students the chance to decide whether they would like to pursue a business career in finance, marketing, personnel or logistics. The A Level course gives students a sound grounding in each of these career areas. More holistically, the subject should equip students with the skills that they need in later life to become entrepreneurs themselves or managers of departmental areas within a company or corporation.
