At a tangent, you can go solo in a glider at 16 in the UK, and time in gliders will help with a PPL. So, it might be something useful to do now - since you are 15 and will be 16 in August, you could be ready to solo on your 16th birthday. It depends how much of a natural you are and how much effort you put in, but at my incredibly advanced (to you!) age I managed complete beginner to solo in a similar period of time and plenty of other equally untalented folks have. I also was using an inheritance to fund my flying (in fact I still am)...
As to A-levels vs craft apprenticeship, a lot depends on what you yourself can do. I'd agree that A-levels on their own aren't that useful for getting a job, so would you want to do a relevent degree? A good degree from a good institute should always be helpful for getting a job, even sometimes in fairly unrelated areas. I'd also say that the University experience is not to be missed - it's a very sudden severing of the apron strings if you move away from home.
Last edited by cats_five; 13th April 2008 at 17:01.