VCE Stuff > Victorian Technical Score Discussion
{SAC RANKINGS} -All you need to know about it-
inish:
--- Quote from: hamo94 on June 23, 2015, 05:00:39 pm ---I strongly beg to differ.
Exams are important, sure, but so are SACs, especially in languages where they are weighted 50/50.
I've experienced this first hand, where 1 rank (so 1 spot difference in terms of rankings) meant a study score difference of 2-3. I've also experienced a case where 7 ranks meant a study score difference of 8 (the exact same exam score resulted in discrepancy from 47 to 38, a delightful, extraordinary score to a respectable one). It was very feasible for me to get a study score 2-3 higher than what I would've for my language if I was a rank higher. Sure, there were specific circumstances that made it happen, but to think that exams are 'far more important' is significantly misleading. The only scenarios where it's applicable is probably Mathematics oriented subjects where the weighting is 33/67, and even then after a certain ranking you miss out on the chance of receiving a 49/50 even if you full mark the exam.
I believe that you genuinely think you're right and that's fine, we were all naive in this VCE road once, just felt that it's necessary to correct you :)
Tl;dr do not listen to inish above
exams are important but so are SACs
--- End quote ---
Here is the graded distribution for maths methods:
http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/Documents/statistics/2013/section3/vce_mathematical_methods_cas_ga13.pdf
Let's analyse the high achievers:
The top 15% of students in SACS were awarded scores between 89-100.
The top 15% of students in Exam 1 were awarded scores between 60-80.
The top 15% of students in Exam 2 were awarded scores between 100-160.
As you can see, the difference between the best student in the state and the 'top 15%ile' student in the state is, after SACS is 11. The difference for Exam 2 was 60 marks. There is a much larger deviation, and thus, who wins Exam 2 wins everything.
Seriously guys, you are wasting your time worrying about SACS, do your best in them but spend your time worrying about the exam, that's what VCAA creates to spread the students properly.
inish:
Same deal in languages, check it out here:
http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/Documents/statistics/2013/section3/vce_lote_german_ga13.pdf
The difference between the best student and the 15%ile student for SACS is just 3 marks out of 50. This is almost nothing. The difference between the best student and the 15%ile student in exam is 90 marks out of 400.
Who wins the exam, gets the cake.
If you're maths literate, the standard deviation for the SACS for Unit 3 was 6.8, the standard deviation for the exam was 62.
This makes sense, it's better to measure students all by the same centrally organised exam.
On an anecdotal level, this holds for me personally. I wasn't the highest rank for methods, mostly because I lost marks for notation bla bla and this bla bla. I felt I was still the strongest at maths, did well on the exam and got the highest study score in my cohort.
Orb:
Inish dear, let's not cherry pick. And for the record, I agree with Maths, it's indeed possible for you to get a high range score simply from acing the exam. But this isn't what i'm disagreeing with. It's your generalist claims that I find a bit annoying.
But even if you didn't, let's look at your case in German.
3 marks out of 50 --> 24 marks out of 400. They're weighted the same, remember?
You also seem to be under the misconception that 310/400 is 90 marks from first. Let me enlighten you here, with languages that have essays, it is impossible for you to get 400/400 or full marks. The examiners will always deduct marks from even the top range essays, it's inevitable. But i'll just file that under lack of experience with languages and that's perfectly fine as that.
Most subjects are weighted out of 75-100 mark exams, so really, after expecting to lose 3-4 marks at the very least, the max will only be around 380/400. 24 marks out of a 70 mark gap from the exam means huge influences by SAC grades.
If you end up with a scaled SAC score of 0 and an exam score of 100, you'll end up with a weighted average of 50 which is less than a raw 30, theoretically. Obviously this scenario is not very plausible but we'll keep it here for comedic value.
Note that you cherry picked German. For a language like Chinese Second Language, the difference between the 1st student and someone near the 80th percentile is around 45-50 marks/400.
The difference SAC wise is 3 marks/50 = 24 marks/400.
If every SAC mark could affect 8 marks/400 on the exam, that would have a substantial weighting on your end score, given 8 marks/400 is the difference between a 45 and a 50.
There goes your theory of 'who wins the exam, gets the cake'.
And before you go implying that i'm not maths literate, check your calculations first :)
Note:Nothing personal, i just felt a bit riled at your veiled accusation.
inish:
--- Quote from: hamo94 on June 23, 2015, 10:10:00 pm ---Inish dear, let's not cherry pick. And for the record, I agree with Maths, it's indeed possible for you to get a high range score simply from acing the exam. But this isn't what i'm disagreeing with. It's your generalist claims that I find a bit annoying.
But even if you didn't, let's look at your case in German.
3 marks out of 50 --> 24 marks out of 400. They're weighted the same, remember?
You also seem to be under the misconception that 310/400 is 90 marks from first. Let me enlighten you here, with languages that have essays, it is impossible for you to get 400/400 or full marks. The examiners will always deduct marks from even the top range essays, it's inevitable. But i'll just file that under lack of experience with languages and that's perfectly fine as that.
Most subjects are weighted out of 75-100 mark exams, so really, after expecting to lose 3-4 marks at the very least, the max will only be around 380/400. 24 marks out of a 70 mark gap from the exam means huge influences by SAC grades.
If you end up with a scaled SAC score of 0 and an exam score of 100, you'll end up with a weighted average of 50 which is less than a raw 30, theoretically. Obviously this scenario is not very plausible but we'll keep it here for comedic value.
Note that you cherry picked German. For a language like Chinese Second Language, the difference between the 1st student and someone near the 80th percentile is around 45-50 marks/400.
The difference SAC wise is 3 marks/50 = 24 marks/400.
If every SAC mark could affect 8 marks/400 on the exam, that would have a substantial weighting on your end score, given 8 marks/400 is the difference between a 45 and a 50.
There goes your theory of 'who wins the exam, gets the cake'.
And before you go implying that i'm not maths literate, check your calculations first :)
Note:Nothing personal, i just felt a bit riled at your veiled accusation.
--- End quote ---
I didn't cherry-pick German, you go to Scotch and most Scotchies do German afaik so I looked up German. What I said is consistent for Italian and French, as well.
CSL is obviously going to be skewed, I would guess that most of the high-achievers in that subject were proficient at Chinese before entering the subject. A quick google search showing the names of the high-achievers will probably confirm this.
I did not make a 'veiled accusation'.
We've each made our points.
Glasses:
I hope you guys don't mind me interrupting, but could someone please answer my question:
Does the VCAA use SAC rankings based on each student's performance throughout the whole year, or each unit separately? (Specifically for Psychology)
I.e. - does each student get one ranking for Unit 3 and another for Unit 4, or one based on Unit 3 and 4 combined?
Thanks!! :)
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