Question: I'd like to be a forensic scientist when I'm older, do you have any opinions on what I should take for GCSE's? (apart from maths and science)

Jodi Schneider answered on 14 Nov 2014:

Great question! My first advice is to try to get to know a forensic scientist (ask your family & friends, maybe they know someone who works in law enforcement). I’m a computer/information scientist, not a forensic scientist–so take my opinion “with a grain of salt”.

My impression is that digital technology is much more important for forensics these days — for instance, how do you tell if the date stamp on a photo is correct? And if you can’t, how can you use it for evidence? So I think courses about computing, particularly understanding how data is stored, will be really important.

Chemistry & the human body would also come up, I expect. Statistics will help you learn how to interpret and summarize data — something I think you’d use day-to-day. Since you might work with judges, detectives, etc, I suspect that having a “theory of mind” (to understand motives, etc,) would be relevant — so consider psychology and sociology.

Topics like:
– ICT
– Human Physiology and Health
– Statistics
– Sociology or Psychology

Take as much science and math as you can — and try to take a foreign language as well (ideally a language commonly spoken where you want to work).