How much effort should you put into getting top grades?

Aiming for top marks versus enough, grades versus skills and side projects.

Axis: aim to be top … do enough and put the rest into skills and projects

Answers by date: 2 records in 2 sources, newest first; the answers above are the current ones. The advice was refined (2018), never reversed, in these records.

date	who	answer	source
2018-05-29	Ali	Whether to aim higher than a grade C depends on your goals, Ali says: grades are not everything, but a tool to get you where you want to be.	Live Stream - Hangout 00:22:25
2018-05-02	Ali	For the university workload Ali says scope the subject, skip the detail that only matters for coming top of the year, and focus on the bread and butter that gets most of the marks.	Exam Study Tips for University & A-Level students - Revision Q&A with Cambridge students 00:13:36