Guide to how Study Scores and ATARs are calculated!

[brenden]

I think this should be stickied. And maybe there should be a rule "Don't ask for predictions unless you've read Paul's guide, looked at the grade distributions and given it a go yourself".

[pi]

I think this should be stickied. And maybe there should be a rule "Don't ask for predictions unless you've read Paul's guide, looked at the grade distributions and given it a go yourself".

Stickied for added effect.

[FlorianK]

How is the ESL exam score calculated? (Why out of 400?)
?

[Jenny_2108]

How is the ESL exam score calculated? (Why out of 400?)
?

Hey Florian, there are sections A and B. Which one is text response and context response?

[paulsterio]

Hey Florian, there are sections A and B. Which one is text response and context response?

A - Text

B - Context

[FlorianK]

How is the ESL exam score calculated? (Why out of 400?)
?

Hey Florian, there are sections A and B. Which one is text response and context response?

We are writing the same Exam as the english kids - basically.

Section A is excactly the same - same questions for every single book (Text response)
Section B is the same question as English, but we only need to study 1 book
Section C is the same piece we have to analyse, but we have to summarise the article first in noteform and we get judged on it.

Section A Text response 40marks
Section B Context 30marks
Section C Note-taking 15marks Text Analysis 15marks

[Jenny_2108]

How is the ESL exam score calculated? (Why out of 400?)
?

Hey Florian, there are sections A and B. Which one is text response and context response?

We are writing the same Exam as the english kids - basically.

Section A is excactly the same - same questions for every single book (Text response)
Section B is the same question as English, but we only need to study 1 book
Section C is the same piece we have to analyse, but we have to summarise the article first in noteform and we get judged on it.

Section A Text response 40marks
Section B Context 30marks
Section C Note-taking 15marks Text Analysis 15marks

Section B: we only need 1 book? My school studies a book and a film, can I give evidence from both?
Section C: I thought English is harder and they have to compare 2 articles while ESL is easier and only 1 article?

[paulsterio]

Section B - yes you're allowed to give evidence from both if you wish

Section C - I don't know - they don't really say that ESL is easier per se - it's just two different tasks - I think the stimulus is the same.

[brenden]

Paul, if you receive the equivalent exam mark for your sac mark, why then are the graphed exam marks normally distributed and the sac marks are skewed?

[vashappenin]

I don't know if it was discussed previously in this post, but I'll ask anyway, because I'm still a little confused.
If Thushan, Dan and Paul's sac scores were 90, 70 and 60 respectively for SACS, but for the exam Dan got 95, Paul got 85 and Thushan got 80.
Would that mean that because he was rank 1 for SACs, Thushan's SAC score would now be 95? And does that mean that Thushan's exam GA score will still be 80?
This is so confusing! Please correct me if I'm wrong :S

[brenden]

I don't know if it was discussed previously in this post, but I'll ask anyway, because I'm still a little confused.
If Thushan, Dan and Paul's sac scores were 90, 70 and 60 respectively for SACS, but for the exam Dan got 95, Paul got 85 and Thushan got 80.
Would that mean that because he was rank 1 for SACs, Thushan's SAC score would now be 95? And does that mean that Thushan's exam GA score will still be 80?
This is so confusing! Please correct me if I'm wrong :S

You are correct.

[Vicky95]

So basically being ranked 1 in a strong cohort accounts for naught if the same student does not perform equally well in the exam.

Whereas a student who is ranked, say 10th  in the cohort and does exceptionally well in the exam will now ace overall as his SAC GA score now gets automatically scaled up.

[Truck]

So basically being ranked 1 in a strong cohort accounts for naught if the same student does not perform equally well in the exam.

Whereas a student who is ranked, say 10th  in the cohort and does exceptionally well in the exam will now ace overall as his SAC GA score now gets automatically scaled up.

pretty much.

a while back our chemistry and maths methods teachers showed us a list of their prior years class, and what grades each student got to get their specific study score (to help give us an indication etc). There was not a single student, in either chemistry or Maths methods, who had a SAC score that was lower then their exam score(s) - at worst they were the same, at best higher. this was at MHS so maybe it's different at other schools, but i doubt it'd be any different at macrob .

[Vicky95]

I should stop getting nervous and just aim to do my best! Que sera sera...

[Vicky95]

Another quick question - I've been hearing how SAC scores get scaled up? So a student getting say 100/100 can't expect any scaling - go any higher than that? Is that his max SAC score?