The VCE is biased

[danieltennis]

really? i dont know if you're being sarcastic because i really hope so. please show me who can memorize 150,000 words in 4-5 days. the essay i wrote was about 3000 words long. and no i didn't memorize it word for word, but i pretty much came close.

I memorised a 2000 word essay an hour before the exam (this included about 10 statistics as well). Your short-term memory can be amazing if you are desperate enough

Wow! That's amazing I wish I can do that in the english exam

[EvangelionZeta]

Just quietly, three out of four of MacRob's 99.95s last year were Humanities students.

I think it's more a reflection upon the students themselves than on the system.  People with a certain drive in, say, English, probably won't strive as hard in six subjects due to the lack of overlap, whereas people who are into Maths are generally somewhat Science orientated and will do Meth+Spesh+Chem+Physics in tandem for great justice.

[sdhains]

Just quietly, three out of four of MacRob's 99.95s last year were Humanities students.

I think it's more a reflection upon the students themselves than on the system.  People with a certain drive in, say, English, probably won't strive as hard in six subjects due to the lack of overlap, whereas people who are into Maths are generally somewhat Science orientated and will do Meth+Spesh+Chem+Physics in tandem for great justice.

I agree.

Languages are an exception as they get bumped up from the modern languages incentive or some shit.  But I think many of the people who are saying 'VCE is UNFAIR' clearly do not understand scaling. It has nothing to do with how 'hard' a subject is for it to be scaled.It just so happens that the conceptually 'harder' subjects such as specialist maths are scaled higher because they have smarter (read: better at vce) students doing the subject. IT IS A RANKING GAME.

I will use the analogy of the running race. If you are in a race with extremely fast and well trained runners. It is going to be exceedingly difficult to place in the top 8 out of 100. Compare this to a race with an inconsistent blend of runners - some very under prepared, some runners who simply don't give a FUCK. In this race it is MUCH easier to come in the top 8 out of 100. If we were to award equal points to both runners for there placings in each race (even though the runner who does poorly in the fast race may be as fast as the runner who does well in the slower race) we would be doing the harder race runner an injustice. Thus, we analyze exactly how much harder the first race was (by getting the times for each of the racers and comparing the two race times), and award points according to how much more difficult it was.
THIS, gives you the markup.

It angers me that people seem to think that VCAA sit there twirling their mustaches making it 'unfair' for the 'poor' humanities students. That is nonsense. There are many reasons why maths/science students tend to do better than humanities students - the VCAAs malevolence or inability to create a fair system is not one of them.

[Fyrefly]

It angers me that people seem to think that VCAA sit there twirling their mustaches making it 'unfair' for the 'poor' humanities students.

[Glockmeister]

I've never liked the VCE system with all the scaling and moderation and all that bs.

Why can't we just get the score we get.

Because such a score would be very meaningless. Is a score of 30/50 in methods really the same as the score of 30/50 in specialist? I really don't think so.

[sdhains]

It angers me that people seem to think that VCAA sit there twirling their mustaches making it 'unfair' for the 'poor' humanities students.

(Image removed from quote.)

Thats so awesome! ahahahahhaha!

[Fyrefly]

It angers me that people seem to think that VCAA sit there twirling their mustaches making it 'unfair' for the 'poor' humanities students.

(Image removed from quote.)

Thats so awesome! ahahahahhaha!

This is my random mullet-moustache man.

I call him 'Bob, the random mullet-moustache man'.

Thank-you Google, you enrich my life.

[TrueTears]

I've never liked the VCE system with all the scaling and moderation and all that bs.

Why can't we just get the score we get.

Because such a score would be very meaningless. Is a score of 30/50 in methods really the same as the score of 30/50 in specialist? I really don't think so.

Well from my perspective scores shouldn't 'mean' anything. In fact, I think the score you get should determine your ranking in that subject, without any moderation or scaling done to the score and also that subject shouldn't be compared with any other subject. Ok, some people might think spesh is harder than methods but some people also think methods is harder than spesh. There shouldn't be this 'scaling' that tries to get each subject on equal terms with each other.

Don't get me wrong, I don't hate the current system, it's just that if changes were to be implemented, those would be my inputs.

[ninwa]

It angers me that people seem to think that VCAA sit there twirling their mustaches making it 'unfair' for the 'poor' humanities students. That is nonsense. There are many reasons why maths/science students tend to do better than humanities students - the VCAAs malevolence or inability to create a fair system is not one of them.

To be fair, I used to think like that - feeling sorry for myself because I didn't do spesh and was therefore disadvantaged somehow. I think some of it is just irrationality borne out of the stress of approaching exams. Or the very human tendency to blame anyone except ourselves when we don't do as well as we hoped (I was very guilty of that when I got bad SAC marks!)

I did 3 maths/science subjects in VCE and yet my top 4 consisted of English, music, German and business management. Of course I changed my viewpoint after that

[ninwa]

Ok, some people might think spesh is harder than methods but some people also think methods is harder than spesh.

I'd love to meet the person who thinks further is harder than spesh, though

[TrueTears]

Ok, some people might think spesh is harder than methods but some people also think methods is harder than spesh.

I'd love to meet the person who thinks further is harder than spesh, though

hahahahahah

[xXNovaxX]

Ok, some people might think spesh is harder than methods but some people also think methods is harder than spesh.

I'd love to meet the person who thinks further is harder than spesh, though

hello, nice to meet you

[Glockmeister]

I've never liked the VCE system with all the scaling and moderation and all that bs.

Why can't we just get the score we get.

Because such a score would be very meaningless. Is a score of 30/50 in methods really the same as the score of 30/50 in specialist? I really don't think so.

Well from my perspective scores shouldn't 'mean' anything. In fact, I think the score you get should determine your ranking in that subject, without any moderation or scaling done to the score and also that subject shouldn't be compared with any other subject. Ok, some people might think spesh is harder than methods but some people also think methods is harder than spesh. There shouldn't be this 'scaling' that tries to get each subject on equal terms with each other.

Don't get me wrong, I don't hate the current system, it's just that if changes were to be implemented, those would be my inputs.

Well, I'd have to object to your proposes changes for statistical reasons. For the purposes for calculating an ENTER (or ATAR after 2009) score (which is what scaling is for), you need to ensure that statistically that each population is normalised so that the scores from one subject can be compared, and thus added to another.

[TrueTears]

I've never liked the VCE system with all the scaling and moderation and all that bs.

Why can't we just get the score we get.

Because such a score would be very meaningless. Is a score of 30/50 in methods really the same as the score of 30/50 in specialist? I really don't think so.

Well from my perspective scores shouldn't 'mean' anything. In fact, I think the score you get should determine your ranking in that subject, without any moderation or scaling done to the score and also that subject shouldn't be compared with any other subject. Ok, some people might think spesh is harder than methods but some people also think methods is harder than spesh. There shouldn't be this 'scaling' that tries to get each subject on equal terms with each other.

Don't get me wrong, I don't hate the current system, it's just that if changes were to be implemented, those would be my inputs.

Well, I'd have to object to your proposes changes for statistical reasons. For the purposes for calculating an ENTER (or ATAR after 2009) score (which is what scaling is for), you need to ensure that statistically that each population is normalised so that the scores from one subject can be compared, and thus added to another.

Ahhhh see and this is where I get lost lol.

[kamil9876]

lol yeah I agree with kurrymuncher that you don't care about VCE anymore once it's done and your at uni. Comparing vce math/science it's pretty similair to the Turing Test and the Chineese room:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_test#The_Chinese_room

"John Searle's 1980 paper Minds, Brains, and Programs proposed an argument against the Turing Test known as the "Chinese room" thought experiment. Searle argued that software (such as ELIZA) could pass the Turing Test simply by manipulating symbols of which they had no understanding. Without understanding, they could not be described as "thinking" in the same sense people do. Therefore—Searle concludes—the Turing Test cannot prove that a machine[student] can think"