Most guidance on choosing a bridging course is really a price comparison. Price tells you very little here, because the products differ more in scope than in cost.

These six questions do the actual work. All of them can be asked in one email, and the answers separate a bridging programme from tuition wearing a seasonal name.

1. Which syllabus does it bridge from, and which to?

The single most revealing question, and the fastest.

A real bridging course names both ends. From IGCSE Mathematics 0580, International Mathematics 0607, Additional Mathematics 0606 or O Level 4024, into Cambridge 9709. A course that only says “A Level Maths” has not done the mapping, because the mapping is the product.

The reason it matters is that the distance genuinely differs by route. A student from 0607 used a graphic display calculator for Papers 3 to 6, and 9709 expects a scientific calculator in every paper while barring graphical calculators along with anything doing symbolic algebra, differentiation or integration. A student from 0580 barely notices that change. A student from 0606 has already met a good deal of what the others are meeting for the first time.

Same destination, three different journeys. If a provider cannot name your starting point, they are teaching the average student rather than yours.

2. Does it stop at the syllabus boundary?

Ask for the contents list, then compare it with the prior-knowledge page of the relevant Cambridge syllabus.

For Mathematics 9709 that page assumes IGCSE 0580 Extended or O Level 4024/4029, and names simple manipulation of surds and the shapes of graphs of the form y = kxⁿ. It is about a page.

If the course contents look like that page, the scope is right. If they look like the opening chapters of the Year 12 textbook — differentiation, integration, the trigonometric identities — you are being sold the course your child’s school teaches, in advance, without knowing which papers the school enters.

The hours are a proxy for the same thing. Twenty or so across a summer is proportionate to a page of assumed knowledge. Forty or sixty means the boundary has been crossed.

3. Is the route personalised, or does everyone do everything?

A course that runs all students through the same sequence has not solved the problem it claims to.

Ask whether there is a diagnostic, and specifically whether it can shorten the course. If the answer is that everyone completes all modules, that is a syllabus rather than a bridge, and a student from 0606 will spend most of it confirming what they already know.

The version that works produces a report first and a route second. Pre-A Level Mathematics includes a Readiness Check whose report identifies which sub-topics are secure and which still cost marks, so the work that follows is the short list rather than the full one.

4. Does it mark written method, or only multiple choice?

This one is easy to overlook and matters more than it sounds, particularly for maths.

Cambridge 9709 states that candidates are expected to show all necessary working, and that no marks are given for unsupported answers from a calculator. A correct answer with nothing beneath it can score zero.

A multiple-choice system cannot test that. A student can select the right option having done the whole thing in their head, which is precisely the habit A Level punishes. So ask directly: does the marking handle structured questions, or only selected answers?

5. What will we know at the end that we did not know at the start?

The output question, and the one providers answer least well.

A good answer is a named list: these sub-topics are secure, these two are still slow. That is a diagnosis, and it remains useful whatever you do next.

A weak answer is a completion certificate or a percentage score. Neither tells a student what to work on, and neither tells a parent whether the money changed anything.

This is also the part that is genuinely hard to produce alone. Working from a textbook, the skill a student fails to notice is by definition the one they do not know they are missing, and self-marking flatters on anything eventually got right.

6. What does it claim about grades?

Then listen for what should not be there.

Nobody can tell you what an A Level result would have been without a summer course. There is no counterfactual, so any claim about grade improvement is unsupportable by construction.

A provider making one is either not thinking carefully or is willing to say things they cannot support, and neither is what you want handling your child’s preparation.

Honest claims are checkable ones: which syllabuses are covered, what the diagnostic reports, how many hours, what the boundary is.

Three answers that should end the conversation

Some responses tell you enough on their own.

“It covers the whole first year of the A Level.” That is a Year 12 course sold in August. Your child’s school teaches that material anyway, at exam pace, with the right paper choices for their route.

“Every student completes all the modules.” No diagnosis, therefore no routing. A student from Additional Mathematics 0606 has already met a good deal of what 9709 assumes, and running them through the full sequence spends their summer confirming what they know.

“Students typically improve by a grade.” Unsupportable by construction, since nobody knows what the result would have been otherwise. A provider willing to say it is willing to say things they cannot support.

None of these mean the provider is dishonest. The first two usually mean the product was designed as tuition and renamed for the season. The third means the marketing is running ahead of the evidence, which is a reason for caution rather than outrage.

What a fair answer sounds like

Since the six questions are framed as tests, it is only reasonable to say what passing looks like.

On scope: “It covers the prior knowledge in the 9709 syllabus — surds, index laws, rearranging, graph shapes — plus the notation and method conventions A Level uses. It does not cover differentiation or integration; your school teaches those.”

On routing: “Students start with a diagnostic. It reports which sub-topics are secure, and most students work considerably fewer than the full set. A student from 0606 typically works very few.”

On output: “You finish with a report naming which sub-topics are secure and which still cost marks.”

On grades: “We can’t tell you what your result would have been otherwise, so we don’t make claims about that.”

Notice that all four are specific and checkable, and none is enthusiastic. A provider who can answer in that register understands the boundary they are working inside.

If the answers instead arrive as adjectives — comprehensive, personalised, expert-led — that is not evidence of a bad course, but it is evidence that nobody has been asked to be precise before.

The question to ask yourself first

Before any of the six, run the free diagnosis, because it may make the whole decision unnecessary.

Open your child’s syllabus, read the prior-knowledge page, and have them attempt questions where each named skill appears as a step inside something longer rather than as the topic. Mark each automatic, slow or gone.

If the list is one or two items and your child reliably works unsupervised, a textbook closes it and you have just saved the fee. If the list is long, or the route is unusual, or unsupervised study does not happen in your house, then the six questions above tell you which provider is worth the money.

You can start with the diagnosis itself: the Readiness Check in Pre-A Level Mathematics produces the list, and the list is what makes every other question answerable.

For the honest version of who needs a course at all, see A Level bridging courses: who they are for, and for what one covers versus what your school teaches, why a bridging course stops where the A Level begins.

Frequently asked questions

What should I look for in an A Level bridging course? +

Six things: it names both syllabus codes, it stops at the syllabus boundary, the route is personalised to the student, it marks written method rather than only multiple choice, it produces a named list of remaining gaps, and it makes no claims about grades.

How do I know if a bridging course is scoped correctly? +

Compare its contents against the prior-knowledge page of your child's A Level syllabus. If they match, the scope is right and the hours should be small. If the contents look like the first chapters of the A Level textbook, you are being offered Year 12 content early.

Should a bridging course promise better grades? +

No, and a promise is a warning sign. Nobody can say what a result would have been without the course, so a grade claim is unsupportable. Look instead for claims that can be checked, like which syllabuses are bridged and what the diagnostic reports.

How many hours should a bridging course be? +

Around twenty across a summer for a typical route. The prior-knowledge section of a Cambridge syllabus runs to about a page, so a course scoped to it should be short. Forty or sixty hours usually means the syllabus boundary has been crossed.

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