Class of 2011: ATAR and SS Discussion Thread

[Menang]

VCAA have tried their best, and there's no such thing as a perfect system. The fact remains that spesh and language scaling is really unfair.

Bazza16: I know of quite a few girls from my cohort in MacRob who don't do any of maths, science or languages. If you're talking about not doing languages or spesh (which are the subjects that scale beyond 50), that's the majority of my friends.

So while VCAA have tried their best to even out the playing field, the fact remains that a large number of my friends, even if they were to work really hard and get 50's in everything, wouldn't be able to access the 99.95 ATAR.

[paulsterio]

Okay, even if getting a 50 in say further is easier than getting a 50 in spesh.. it's like saying, it's not fair that someone who got an aggregate of 219 gets the same score as someone who got 211. what are you supposed to say to the kid who gets 6 perfect 50s.. yeh you beat everyone in the state in all your subjects but it's still not good enough cos 99.95s are only for particular subjects.

Hence my suggestion that no subjects should scale beyond 50

[Amnesiac]

Oh my lord, what is this obsession with getting a perfect score? Yes, a 99.95 would be amazing. You would feel brilliant about yourself - for a few months. Then uni would start, no one would ask about your ATAR, and it wouldn't be such a big deal anymore. What matters is getting into your course and knowing that you did the best you possibly could, and feeling that you actually learned something. Yes, the system is unfair for those who don't do a crazily scaled subject, but there are far worse problems with the education system than that. This is coming from someone who did a subject that rarely gets a single 50, as well as no maths/sciences/languages. The fact is, the root of the problem lies not in VCAA/scaling, but in what society places value upon. Because let's not forget, the GAT plays a major role in determining scaling. If society placed more value upon the arts, then people would take it more seriously, rather than just taking it as a bludge subject and bringing down the overall results, etc. etc.

TL;DNR: CHILL OUT GUYS, HIGH SCHOOL IS OVER. Enjoy your fantastic marks and unless you end up as some high up powerful person in the Education Department, the problems with the system are no longer something you have to think about.

[Jdog]

Oh my lord, what is this obsession with getting a perfect score? Yes, a 99.95 would be amazing. You would feel brilliant about yourself - for a few months. Then uni would start, no one would ask about your ATAR, and it wouldn't be such a big deal anymore. What matters is getting into your course and knowing that you did the best you possibly could, and feeling that you actually learned something. Yes, the system is unfair for those who don't do a crazily scaled subject, but there are far worse problems with the education system than that. This is coming from someone who did a subject that rarely gets a single 50, as well as no maths/sciences/languages. The fact is, the root of the problem lies not in VCAA/scaling, but in what society places value upon. Because let's not forget, the GAT plays a major role in determining scaling. If society placed more value upon the arts, then people would take it more seriously, rather than just taking it as a bludge subject and bringing down the overall results, etc. etc.

TL;DNR: CHILL OUT GUYS, HIGH SCHOOL IS OVER. Enjoy your fantastic marks and unless you end up as some high up powerful person in the Education Department, the problems with the system are no longer something you have to think about.

which stooge told you the GAT plays a major part in scaling?

[harlequinphoenix]

Oh my lord, what is this obsession with getting a perfect score? Yes, a 99.95 would be amazing. You would feel brilliant about yourself - for a few months. Then uni would start, no one would ask about your ATAR, and it wouldn't be such a big deal anymore. What matters is getting into your course and knowing that you did the best you possibly could, and feeling that you actually learned something.

So true. Wish I could like your post. But for some reason we can't anymore <.<

[Callum]

So true. Wish I could like your post. But for some reason we can't anymore <.<

Off topic.

We can't like people's posts in this part of the forum as they didn't want people to gain respect for just posting their ATAR scores.

[REBORN]

re: thushan, even 210 cap is okay, as long as it's a possibility for non-spesh/lang people!

i agree! how is it fair that someone who gets 6 perfect scores not get 99.95 just because of the subjects they chose.

...And I don't think its fair for someone who does perfects 6 generally perceived "easy" subjects (bm, further, psych, industry and enterprise, etc.) to get the same score as someone who perfects 6 generally perceived "hard" subjects (Latin, spesh, chem, etc.).

Also hypocritical on VCAA's part IMO - always advocating for students to choose subjects they like rather than subjects that scale but for those very few who want 99.95 they must choose language/spesh.

You are making the big assumption that people who get 99.95 don't like languages and/or spesh. You don't do a subject like latin or spesh because you hate it and just want 99.95. You are so ignorant.

Um for the past, I dno, 5 years, Spesh has been taken? +7 satisfied people. +11 is just a bonus.

'Satisfied' is an odd word to use, it's not like they had a choice... And ACTUALLY, people were not happy with methods and spesh scaling being so close (both spesh students and spesh teachers), so in fact, they were not "satisfied" and the trend was not a good one for encouraging the highest level of VCE mathematics.

LOLs, I'm ignorant and you believe "easy" and "hard" 50's exist. 'nuff said there.

I didn't assume anything. How do you know people take latin/spesh because they like it? How do you know they didn't take it because it's merely part of the "azn 5" or they want the scaling? Nice assumption there...

And hmm, don't ever recall saying I hate either of these subjects. Their subject matter is uninteresting to me. They deserve the scaling they got prior to 2011 - everyone, every VCE student, should have a chance of getting 99.95 and now non spesh/lang people can't. I'm not the only one who thinks this is unfair so if you want to argue that even more than you have then take it to PM.

Moderator action: removed real name, sorry for the inconvenience

[pi]

I'm not the only one who thinks this is unfair so if you want to argue that even more than you have then take it to PM.

I'd rather not, I've already got over 5 pages of PM's from you.

Moreover,
"It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument."
    William G. McAdoo

[Panicmode]

I'm not the only one who thinks this is unfair so if you want to argue that even more than you have then take it to PM.

I'd rather not, I've already got over 5 pages of PM's from you.

Moreover,
"It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument."
    William G. McAdoo

Wait, I just wanna know what the two sides of the argument are. What is everyone arguing?

Moderator action: removed real name, sorry for the inconvenience

[Greatness]

They're arguing about how it is unlikely to get a 99.95 without doing a lote or spesh. Yes, it is unfair but vce is a system. If you want the 99.95 that badly then play the system. What's wrong with a 99.90?...
All the same to me, you'll still have a god like status.

[Menang]

They're arguing about how it is unlikely to get a 99.95 without doing a lote or spesh. Yes, it is unfair but vce is a system. If you want the 99.95 that badly then play the system. What's wrong with a 99.90?...
All the same to me, you'll still have a god like status.

It's not a massive deal, and it'll affect only a very small percentage of VCE students, but it still remains a valid argument.

It's not that anyone wants that perfect ATAR so badly. It's just acknowledging that the system discriminates against certain students, especially the humanities and arts/music/drama ones.

It's all well and good to say "play the system" when you're naturally a maths student, but for a majority of my friends that's really not viable, because their strengths lie in other areas (in which they work hard in).

It's not massively wrong, but a system which
a) makes it impossible for a certain group of students to access a perfect score
b) scales against that same group of students
is wrong all the same.

[thushan]

Agree. It's a minor thing, but Monash only offers the Excellence scholarship (which is immensely helpful) to 99,95ers - so I'd think that non-maths/lote students should at least have the chance.
Hence my idea to manually cap the 99,95 cutoff to 209. Or not allow scaling past 50.

[REBORN]

Thank you to both Menang and thushan. I need not to explain anymore. pi can keep harping on about ignorance or whatever the f**k he likes, I can't be bothered explaining when it has been so nicely laid out by the two posters above me.

They're arguing about how it is unlikely to get a 99.95 without doing a lote or spesh. Yes, it is unfair but vce is a system. If you want the 99.95 that badly then play the system. What's wrong with a 99.90?...
All the same to me, you'll still have a god like status.

Also a correction - it's not unlikely, it's impossible

Moderator action: removed real name, sorry for the inconvenience

[harlequinphoenix]

So true. Wish I could like your post. But for some reason we can't anymore <.<

Off topic.

We can't like people's posts in this part of the forum as they didn't want people to gain respect for just posting their ATAR scores.

Okay thanks, I was wondering about that. Fair enough.

[nubs]

but if we were to cap it at 209, like thushan said, there is a potential for more than .05% of the VCE population to obtain a 99.95, and that would just mess up the whole percentile thingo, won't it?

Students who get 50s in languages and subjects like specialist maths may display a greater level of intelligence than those who do so in the humanities subjects

Especially when it comes to maths, for some people, no matter how hard they study, they would still be unable to wholly comprehend or grasp the concepts in specialist maths
The same thing may apply for Language, Music and Art subjects (as there are people out there who have a natural aptitude towards these sorts of this)
They could practice as much as possible, but they may still struggle to create pieces or perform musical items as well as those who are naturally talented in this areas


But this sort of thing may not apply as much to students studying the humanities subjects