Extesion2 English and UAI (1 Viewer)

[1986]

Dear Einstein,
I am confused about the process of scaling. According to my Modern Histroy Teacher, We (as a school) are obsessed unecessarily with scaling. To what extent are marks changed, on the basis of
a) class/ school performance and b) difficulty of course?

Also, Is it true that marks averaging in the 80s (in decent, non-vet subjects, cobined with rankings of 1-5) give a UAI in the 90s?

 

[Carla2003]

Hiya,

Is it true that people getting Austudy get extra UAI points added??? That is really unfair if it is!!!

 

[Lazarus]

a) See Explanation of HSC Marks.

b) The 'difficulty' of a course is never taken into account.

3) No, you're not automatically given extra UAI points if you receive Austudy.

 

[deyveed]

Laz. How do they determine how much a subject should be scaled to?
Do they look at the "quality of the candidature"?

 

[Lazarus]

That's exactly it. There's a bit more info in the full 2001 report, if I recall correctly.

 

[deyveed]

Well how do they do that?
Do they simply look the average marks of students in a course and from that they set the scaling values?
Is this process fair?
What if all the bludgers with bad marks in every subject comes to do 4u Maths? Does that mean truly smart 4u Maths students don't receive the scaling they should have?

 

[deyveed]

So it would be best to discourage stupid ppl from doing your subject?

 

[Lazarus]

Originally posted by deyveed
Well how do they do that?
Do they simply look the average marks of students in a course and from that they set the scaling values?

I did say there was more information in the 2001 scaling report:

The model underpinning the scaling algorithm specifies that the scaled mean in a course is equal to the average academic achievement of the course candidature, where for individual students, academic achievement is defined as the average scaled mark in all courses completed. This leads to a set of simultaneous equations from which the scaled means of 2 unit courses were obtained. The scaled standard deviation for a course was set equal to the standard deviation of the academic achievement of the course candidature. (emphasis added)

Originally posted by deyveed
Is this process fair?

As fair as it can be... the only 'unfair' aspect of the whole system I've seen is that EE2 students need to take the 2u course when ME2 students don't.

Originally posted by deyveed
What if all the bludgers with bad marks in every subject comes to do 4u Maths? Does that mean truly smart 4u Maths students don't receive the scaling they should have?

Yes and no.

Your scaled mark is determined by TWO criteria -

a) The scaling for the course (i.e. scaled mean)
b) Your position in the course

Each criterion is just as important as the other. The "truly smart 4u Maths students" would have very high positions, and so would most likely still end up with high scaled marks. However, the course as a whole would be poorly scaled.

Originally posted by deyveed
So it would be best to discourage stupid ppl from doing your subject?

Theoretically it shouldn't make any difference, but in practise it might.

 

[Survivor39]

Is it true that the raw exam marks are scaled to align marks?? And this scaling is out of your control because it is determined by some guy's opinion on whether the exam is hard or easy??

 

[deyveed]

The raw exam marks are aligned to aligned marks.
The scaling is not determined by anybody's opinion and does not depend on the difficulty of the exam. The scaling is determined by the quality of the candidature of the course.

 

[deyveed]

Laz. In that case, does it mean that the scaling, aligning, moderating of marks is completely fair and is independent of anyone elses?
e.g. You can't say that your school/friends/subject is pulling me down.

 

[Survivor39]

Originally posted by deyveed
The raw exam marks are aligned to aligned marks.

yeah, i'm talking aout the aligned mark...there's some guy who decide the difficulties of the exams and thus, determining how the raw marks are aligned. Is this true?

 

[deyveed]

No. There is no one to determine the difficulty of a subject and from that decides how the marks are aligned. Instead, a process of calculating the average marks of a person in all their subjects is used to determine the 'difficulty' of a subject and gives it the scaling values. If a subject is full of very smart people with high marks in their other subjects, expect high scaling for that subject. e.g. Distinction courses

 

[Survivor39]

what you are talking about is the scaling from HSC marks to form the aggregate of the UAI...

But don't you understand, i am not talking about that scaling....
I am talking about how raw EXAM marks are transformed into ALIGNED marks, which undertakes a different path to the scaling of the courses you are referring to....*sigh* let Laz answer it...

 

[deyveed]

Oh sorry. In that case, the answer would still be no. No one just pulls a number out of their head to determine how raw marks are aligned.
If i remember in another post correctly, raw marks are aligned to specific outcomes or something.

 

[Ragerunner]

Aligning is simply to fit your raw marks to appropiate bands.

So say they think a raw mark of 75/100 is worth a band 5 then your mark will be increased to 80 or so to compensate the alignment.

How a subject aligns changes every year. In 2002 English advanced and Mathematics 2U seemed to align very well..

 

[Lazarus]

Originally posted by Survivor39
Is it true that the raw exam marks are scaled to align marks?? And this scaling is out of your control because it is determined by some guy's opinion on whether the exam is hard or easy??

Yes, and yes. Use the term 'aligning' though, not 'scaling', to avoid confusion. Remember that your aligned marks have no bearing on your UAI.

Originally posted by deyveed
Laz. In that case, does it mean that the scaling, aligning, moderating of marks is completely fair and is independent of anyone elses?
e.g. You can't say that your school/friends/subject is pulling me down.

Theoretically, yes. In practise, there are minor variations due to 'anomalous' students who, at the last minute, decide that Extension 1 isn't going to count and so don't try in the exam, or whatever.

Originally posted by everyone
I still don't understand this 'aligning' thing - please help me.

Read <a href=http://www.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/hsc/hsc_update_2002_06.html target=_blank>this</a>.

 

[Leanne]

so wiv aligning.....it can go up or down like scaling right?

 

[Lazarus]

Yes; though usually up, with aligning, due to the restricted range of marks (50-100 compared with 0-100).

 

[Ragerunner]

I've just made up a pdf file about some of the more interesting things to know while reading up on them myself. (Not complete)

http://users.on.net/unix/HSC.pdf

Scroll to page 6 if you want to know how the judges come to the decision of how well a subject will align. It appears to be a pretty hefty process.