cherryblossom said:
Could you explain that a little?
Sure. Let's say all the marks for the 2005 Physics course from your school range between 20 and 50 (I know, that's pretty impossible for a year of work, but let's be generous to demonstrate the idea).
What really matters is the rank and standard deviation between students. Having all the students squashed up in 30 marks doesn't really show how they are spaced (imagine if you had 200 students), so, the marks are all scaled up to an average. Most schools scale generously as a matter of course, so the report average is always, say, 75 for Physics. Having a standard average every year not only allows them to see the difference in students each year, but also makes things alot more consistant. Having wildly fluctuating averages doesn't say much for a school, since you can't then compare anything.
But back to our example. Scaling to an average of 75 now puts all the students marks between 85 and 30. That standard deviation shows how the students are spaced relative to each other alot clearer than previously. So this is submitted to the Board of Studies.
You all do the HSC, and your HSC exam marks (aligned) are between 50 and 82. So, your school marks are moderated using rank & standard deviation, to be in the same range of 50 as the bottom mark, and 82 as the highest. So, really, it doesn't matter if your school marks hard or easy, it's all readjusted in the end to compensate.
If in our example, all the students just sucked at Physics, this would show through in the HSC when the range of marks is still in 30-50, so all the school marks will be scaled back down to this range. If you were all marked really hard however, and your exam marks are ALL between 90-100, then your school marks are pulled up.
I think that's answered your question. It gets a lot more in depth but that's how it was explained to me as a simple model, so that's about the best I can do.
