Specialist Maths - What the hell? =.="

[zero_sample]

I felt the marking was quite fair in all regards, I thought I lost 3 marks but I still got a 50 (Y)(Y) BOOM!!!

[Romperait]

I felt the marking was quite fair in all regards, I thought I lost 3 marks but I still got a 50 (Y)(Y) BOOM!!!

Headshot!

[Lighties]

If it helps, maths has always been my very best subject. And then results come out and I find that my spesh score didn't even contribute towards my ATAR, even with scaling. >______>

*Okay, I just realised the massive scaling you kids got this year and retract my statement. A 40 scales to 51, really? REALLY? That's damn epic compared to last year. >(

[Jdog]

i thought spesh scaling was a fucking joke to be honest.


since when was a 42 in spesh equivalent to a 52, that is disgusting scaling.

[paulsterio]

i thought spesh scaling was a fucking joke to be honest.


since when was a 42 in spesh equivalent to a 52, that is disgusting scaling.

Even though I benefited from the scaling I do agree it's really excessive, but then and again, language scaling is excessive as well

[Russ]

Specialist scaling is broken. LOTE scaling is also broken, but at least it gives humanities students the ability to compete,so fix it second. Not that the VCAA ever will, because the current status quo is far too well supported by the government

[pi]

I loved the scaling (highly biased point of view)

Would have got 99.15 with my scores last year (which, coincidentally, was the ATAR aim I had for 2011), I'm not minding the extra 0.2

[WhoTookMyUsername]

Specialist scaling is broken. LOTE scaling is also broken, but at least it gives humanities students the ability to compete,so fix it second. Not that the VCAA ever will, because the current status quo is far too well supported by the government

Spesh scaling simply reflects students average achievement in other subjects. it increased as year 11 scores were taken into account. Languages is just a random +5 on a whim by the government. Now this is unfair, especially when it's a constant for already high scoring latin etc

42 -> 47 is way more than

30 -> 35

(difference between)

[Russ]

I am aware of that, my point is that the system is broken

[|ll|lll|]

Since when was spesh marked so harshly?!?!?!?!!!!!!! =.="


*RAGE*

how do you know spesh was marked so hardly? If the exam's marked hardly it  implies that it's a consistent hardness, which should NOT affect how difficult it is to get a certain score. Shouldn't it just mean a lower score is required for x study score?

E.g.
In 2 years the cohort of 4 same students who did the exact same exam and wrote the exact same things are marked differently
Year 1: Student 1: 100% Student 2: 100% Student 3: 90% Student 4:80%
Year 2: Student 1: 50% Student 2: 50% Student 3: 40 % Student 4: 30%

Study scores year 1
Student 1: 50, 2: 50 3: 23 4: 10
Year 2
Student 1: 50, student 2: 50, student 3: 23, student 4: 10

I think you have to wait until you see A+ cut offs etc. before you make any judgement

I think what he meant was that the examiners were extremely pedantic this year and hence marked harshly, deducting marks for the most superficial form of mistakes (perhaps so, to make up for the high scaling), or else he would have gotten a higher raw score (above his personal expectations) which scales up even higher.

[taiga]

With that scaling I wouldn't complain about your raw scores.

[Greatness]

This scaling is part of the system, this system is beatable. So to maximise your atar/take full advantage of the scaling, play the system.
If you're half decent at maths.
If you like learning a language do a  lote.
If you like both, do both.

[Russ]

I am aware of that, my point is that the system is broken

what alternative do you suggest?

Something where this isn't necessary

This scaling is part of the system, this system is beatable. So to maximise your atar/take full advantage of the scaling, play the system.

For a start, reverse the spesh decision and come up with a way to stop bell curves from breaking the minor humanities subjects.

Tbh, i'd be okay with getting rid of the ATAR and just passing on marks, but $$$

[paulsterio]

If it wasn't for scaling, I wouldn't have done spesh, I would have done further, end of story

The maths scaling is a little bit excessive, but not unfair, specialist maths is considerably harder than methods and the cohort is much stronger, especially near the top end, losing a few marks is really punishing (look at Thushan)

Languages on the other hand are unfair, they don't have statistical reasons to scale up languages, some languages are difficult (I agree), but for Latin, 35->50 or something like that is just obscene :S

[pi]

Have you tried latin? I "learnt" latin in yrs 7 and 8 and found it ridiculously difficult. Good latin teachers are rare, and tutors are even rarer. There are so many conjugations and what-not to remember too, very hard imo.

I agree that scaling for something like Chinese SL is a bit over-the-top (especially as many doing this had a solid Chinese background as children anyway... -mini rant).