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March 30, 2024, 01:09:07 am

Author Topic: Suzanne Cory High school (SCHS) vs Melbourne High School (MHS) which is better?  (Read 18542 times)  Share 

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disone

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Which school is better?
« Last Edit: October 03, 2016, 01:08:28 pm by disone »

Calebark

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In terms of performance, MHS (5th in state, 2015) beats SCHS (51st in state, 2015) by quite a margin. In terms of school culture, I am afraid I cannot help here. However, this and this  may prove to be somewhat helpful.
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spectroscopy

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they're very different. if you read around the threads you might get an idea. academically mhs ranks higher but in 2014 schs had a student get 99.95 and mhs didnt.

you can do equally well at either school, it just depends what sort of person you are. mhs has lots of mandatory extra-curricular activites, kids get involved, its more strict but people do well. its motivating and its sincerely about more than just marks

at SCHS you have all the same opportunities as you do at MHS but its much more chill and basically no one is forced to do anything.
in year 12 there would be people who would barely go to school and when they did they wouldnt be in class they would study in the public spaces, and in class you see people using their phones and on their laptop (being quiet) and in general its alot more chill and requires self motivation. people would even go in like semi-casual clothes like just the sport top, random trackie pants and a non schs hoodie (LOL)
 
if you are self motivated or quite different in terms of your study habits and hobbies etc then maybe schs is more flexible but MHS is a probably a better environment to be in overall. some people go to schs and get lazy and then end up with atars in the mid-low 80's. mhs motto is "more than just marks" which is pretty reflective of the school.

*i've got an example for how schs is flexible and how it could either allow you to be way better than a conventional class would allow or get distracted and do worse. my mate went there and every class he had, he and his mate would walk into class, stay for the first 5 minutes when the teacher updates everyone on deadlines and outlines what they'll be learning today, then the two of them would just leave the classroom and go to one of the private study rooms and just do work by themselves with no teacher supervision, separate from the rest of the class, for the rest of the period. this rooms are like separate from the main areas so you could go in there and be watching funny videos and laughing and doing no work or you could be in there smashing through exercise after exercise of methods work. its really up to you what you do with that flexibility.
if you get into the school you obviously aren't dumb so people don't really abuse the freedom, but there is the odd case of people who just never do work.

but the flexibility is great if you're the kind of bloke who likes to sit there in a solo environment or with a couple of friends and just brainstorm for subjects or smash through the work without the distractions of a normal class or having to go at the pace of the teacher. this is particularly good for high achievers and shit who dont want to have to sit in class for 20 minutes of teachers teaching when they already know what is being learnt. or on the flip side you might be quite far behind and the teacher will be teaching stuff that builds up on ideas that you don't know, meaning that its going in one ear and out the other. but if you can study by yourself you can use that time to catch up instead of trying to build a roof on a house that has no walls.


i feel like in general the MHS environment moulds you into a certain type of person. they tend to study hard, be outgoing, confident, reasonably sporty, etc.
SCHS doesn't mould you into anything, it gives you the clay and says mould yourself into whatever you want and we will accomodate

just my 2cents havings lots of mates from both schools over many different cohorts

EDIT: Added the paragraph with the red asterisks
« Last Edit: October 03, 2016, 03:10:17 pm by spectroscopy »

vox nihili

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I can't speak for MHS, but I've done a little bit of work at SCHS and liked it there. It almost has an American high school feel about it and the students there seem to get on really well. I've always got an overwhelming sense that the students there are funnier than the average student too, but no idea why hahah. Probably comes down to the fact that the school retains a fairly laid-back vibe, despite having students that clearly work really hard.



Just another little tidbit. The demographics of the schools are fairly different. For all intents and purposes, MHS resembles an elite private school with respect to its demographics. More than 70% of its students come from the highest quartile of earners, whilst only 4% come from the poorest quartile.
At SCHS it's 49% and 8% respectively. There are also more students from LOTE backgrounds at SCHS than at MHS.
I'd caution you against looking into that too much, but it's worth consideration.

Also worth knowing that MHS is a larger cohort (~1300 v ~700 I think) and has more money to throw around (about 4K more per student)
« Last Edit: October 03, 2016, 03:57:16 pm by vox nihili »
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The Usual Student

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In terms of performance, MHS (5th in state, 2015) beats SCHS (51st in state, 2015) by quite a margin. In terms of school culture, I am afraid I cannot help here. However, this and this  may prove to be somewhat helpful.

I don't disagree that MHS is more academically proficient then SCHS.
But I Just want to clear something up, that ranking system is total BS, they don't scale any of the study scores when they calculate which schools are ranked higher. For instance, lets say we have two school.s
School 1: A lot of kids do spesh and arguably more competitive subjects
School 2: A lot of kids do further and legal and HHD
 
School 1 will end up getting fewer raw 40s then school 2 just because the popular subjects at those schools are much harder. Once you scale the scores, it becomes much more fair as school 1's  less then 40 scores rightfully scale up to the 40 range. In essence, a 40 in further is the same as a 30 in spesh, so for all the kids getting 30 in spesh they should be also taken into account. However, this system doesn't do that. All it does is count up the number of 40s and put it as a percentage of all the students :P So a school that gets like 50 or so 40+s in further (Eg Glen Waverly or Hailebury) will be placed at the same rank as a school that gets 50 or so 40+s in spesh...... 

MHS gets ripped off by this ranking system since they have a pretty strong methods and spesh cohort from my understanding. I reckon MHS would be close to number 1 if you accounted for scaling, if not probably macrob or some other school that has a strong language or spesh cohort.

IMO, if you want to academically compare the two schools, look at the MEDIAN atar for both of them and other stuff such as percent of students above 99 or 90 atars.
SCHS (2014 couldn't find 2015)
- 38% over 90
- 90% over 60
- i am too lazy to find their median atar but it should be like in their school newsletter or something

MHS (2014)
- 16% over 99
- 54.7% over 95
- 74% over 90
- median atar is 95.45






disone

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Cheers dudes, but I am just really pissed at not getting into MHS but getting into SCHS  :(

dankfrank420

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It really doesn't matter to be honest, I did well enough for Melb High but went to SCHS instead because of location.

Teachers are super chill as spectroscopy said, in year 12 they don't really "push" you to do anything. If you wanna study that's up to you, but teachers aren't really going to check up on your work in general. I dunno about melb high, but it seems they like to get people involved in extra-curricular stuff alot. SCHS is alot more laid back (except the current principle, that's another story altogether)...

I think comparing schools for what ATAR you'll get is pointless. Regardless of which school you go to, if you work hard you will get the ATAR you want - if you don't work hard you'll get a poor ATAR (regardless if you go MHS or SCHS).

Oh and SCHS is co-ed if that matters to you.

The Usual Student

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Cheers dudes, but I am just really pissed at not getting into MHS but getting into SCHS  :(

don't worry man, like in my opinion, the select entry schools all offer the same opportunities to do well. You are not going to do any better then you are at SCHS or at MHS. You can say the school culture pushes you to study but like in all honesty, if you are motivated already, you will do fine.

Work hard and it won't matter what school you go too!

jin0016

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Cheers dudes, but I am just really pissed at not getting into MHS but getting into SCHS  :(
I can understand you. Although Im the opposite. I want to go to SCHS but my parents put MHS for me.

jin0016

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I don't disagree that MHS is more academically proficient then SCHS.
But I Just want to clear something up, that ranking system is total BS, they don't scale any of the study scores when they calculate which schools are ranked higher. For instance, lets say we have two school.s
School 1: A lot of kids do spesh and arguably more competitive subjects
School 2: A lot of kids do further and legal and HHD
 
School 1 will end up getting fewer raw 40s then school 2 just because the popular subjects at those schools are much harder. Once you scale the scores, it becomes much more fair as school 1's  less then 40 scores rightfully scale up to the 40 range. In essence, a 40 in further is the same as a 30 in spesh, so for all the kids getting 30 in spesh they should be also taken into account. However, this system doesn't do that. All it does is count up the number of 40s and put it as a percentage of all the students :P So a school that gets like 50 or so 40+s in further (Eg Glen Waverly or Hailebury) will be placed at the same rank as a school that gets 50 or so 40+s in spesh...... 

MHS gets ripped off by this ranking system since they have a pretty strong methods and spesh cohort from my understanding. I reckon MHS would be close to number 1 if you accounted for scaling, if not probably macrob or some other school that has a strong language or spesh cohort.

IMO, if you want to academically compare the two schools, look at the MEDIAN atar for both of them and other stuff such as percent of students above 99 or 90 atars.
SCHS (2014 couldn't find 2015)
- 38% over 90
- 90% over 60
- i am too lazy to find their median atar but it should be like in their school newsletter or something

MHS (2014)
- 16% over 99
- 54.7% over 95
- 74% over 90
- median atar is 95.45
Yeah and SCHS is a relatively new school so it still has to develop. I mean look at Nossal. It was really far back in rankings at the start when it opened and now its like 12th or something.

disone

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I can understand you. Although Im the opposite. I want to go to SCHS but my parents put MHS for me.
Why didn't you want to get in MHS?

jin0016

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Why didn't you want to get in MHS?
I liked SCHS better. It looks like it has a better environment and the building is so much nicer.

vox nihili

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I liked SCHS better. It looks like it has a better environment and the building is so much nicer.

Possibly debatable :P

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Possibly debatable :P

(Image removed from quote.)
I think he means newer or more modern :P
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jin0016

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I think he means newer or more modern :P
Yeah its more newer and has better tech