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Stupid UAI craze (2 Viewers)

Lazarus

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I might just add that English (Standard) & (Advanced) have the same scaling, as they're scaled as a single course.

If a Standard student has the same raw mark as an Advanced student, they will both end up with the same scaled mark, however, the Board will give them different aligned marks. It's quite misleading.
 

Morgues

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Originally posted by spice girl

The good thing about knowing how things are scaled, you can set priorities on which subjects to concentrate more on. Like in my case, improving on phys will go a lot further into a good UAI than improving on economics, although I got the same scaled mark for both subjects, and that's because economics is scaled down.
I suggest you do some research dude, economics and physics had exactly the same scaling last year
again your concentrating on the HSC mark (that you got no way of predicting using trial results) you put in and not looking at the percentile
Its the state position and scaled mark columns that you should be concentrating on
 

spice girl

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Well I typed in 93 for eco, and 92 for phys, and my phys subject was counted whereas eco wasn't.

Many of my school teachers say that the trial mark for their students wasn't far off than the actual HSC marks that they got, so that was the assumption that I based it on.

Can you explain to me why my 93 for eco was scaled down to an aggregate in the 80's towards the UAI? (in the Lazseeker, i mean)
 

spice girl

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O, I've been ambiguous

The BOS scales the mark from the actual HSC exam, and then UAC scales it again. I'm talking about the UAC scale-down...
 

Lazarus

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The answer to your question is something Morgues mentioned earlier - you're trying to compare HSC marks, which is invalid. You need to compare percentiles.

As economics and physics both had exactly the same scaled mean, the candidature for each was of exactly the same ability. Theoretically, anyone who was at the 90th percentile in the physics course would have been at the 90th percentile in the economics course (had they taken it). Obviously there are other factors that come into play, but the Technical Committee on Scaling doesn't worry about them, so neither shall we.

Your physics mark would have placed you in the top 1.4% of the state, and your economics mark the top 4.7% of the state. As the candidatures are comparable, the physics mark is clearly better - and you can see this from the scaled marks. Also keep in mind that the UAI is a rank. This is why physics would have counted over economics.
 

spice girl

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Well you won't really know the percentile rank until december this year, what people are doing are estimates from last year's results.

What I meant (and it's probably a misnomer) by scaling is the decrease (or increase) in marks from the BOS mark (based on outcomes-based marking), to the UAC mark.
 

Minai

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ill post this here, as noone saw it from the Help section:
I read the recent HSC Newsletter and I discovered that the UAI is calculated on raw HSC examination marks and moderated assessment marks, not the actual aligned "HSC Mark" itself as reported by the Board.
I'm just wondering if this affects the accuracy of the Lazseeker, as I assumed when u enter in your marks to get a UAI, u were entering in your estimated aligned "HSC mark", as it were
please correct me if I am wrong too, I just got a bit confused reading that damn document...
 

Lazarus

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Last year's results are all we have to go on.

The UAI is actually calculated from raw exam marks, not from the Board's aligned marks. All assessment marks are re-moderated according to the raw exam marks and are combined with those raw exam marks to produce a raw HSC mark. It is this raw HSC mark that is then standardised and scaled.

It follows that the differences between the Board's aligned marks and the final scaled marks mean nothing. You can't compare aligned HSC marks between courses. Last year, a mark of 87 in physics or a mark of 91 in economics resulted in a scaled mark of 87. This doesn't mean that economics was scaled down. If you looked at the distribution of marks for physics and economics after they had been standardised, you would see that the students who had marks of 87 and 91 respectively would have the same standardised mark.

You could think of it as the standardisation and scaling procedure counterbalancing the Board's act of aligning the economics mark too high. Technically that's not correct, but it's a nice conceptual analogy.

re: MinAi - The UAC released a percentile table equating the Board's aligned marks with scaled marks. You can calculate what the scaled marks would have been from those, even though the UAI calculation process begins with the raw marks.
 

sif not 99

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Originally posted by spice girl
Well I typed in 93 for eco, and 92 for phys, and my phys subject was counted whereas eco wasn't.

Many of my school teachers say that the trial mark for their students wasn't far off than the actual HSC marks that they got, so that was the assumption that I based it on.

Can you explain to me why my 93 for eco was scaled down to an aggregate in the 80's towards the UAI? (in the Lazseeker, i mean)
teacher in my economics class read out the trial hsc marks and their final mark in the hsc. All improved, many by at least 15% and some in excess of 20%. Those at the top many improved by 5-10% from their trial mark to their final hsc mark.
 

Minai

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ah I get it now, thanks for that Laz

and sif: yeah that happened at my school too, the top trial marks for a few eco's students was about high 80's/low 90's, and their HSC mark turned out to be 98
and I think coz spice girl goes to Ruse, there wouldnt be much discrepancy between trial and HSC exam results, since they tend to go well in both either way
 

Morgues

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I got lost in all the technicalities but my point was that there is no reason for you to concentrate on physics instead of economics as they both scale equally
coming in the 10th percentile (for example) in either of them would give you the exact same UAI
 

schwang_thang

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damned uai!

how accurate is this lazseeker thing?
like its cool n all...having one of these estimates thingys
but alla my friends r saying that their marks in the lazseeker r heaps higher than wat they thought they'd get...

btw wat do u mean hsc marks r higher than school assessment marks? do ranks affect the uai at all? or hsc marks? im confused :confused:
 

Lazarus

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I'll let someone else comment on the accuracy, because I'm obviously biased.

If LazSeeker is predicting a UAI that seems too high, chances are, you're estimating your marks too high!

As it says on the LazSeeker page, HSC marks are the average of your aligned exam mark and your moderated assessment mark. HSC marks are not merely exam marks. Your rank is taken into account via the moderated assessment mark.
 

Morgues

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Te lazseeker is just about precise when used properly that is people try to predict their percentile rank in the state instead of blindly putting in half yearly marks, or trial marks
 

ben

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but it's impossible to predict our percentile rank in the state!!
 

Lazarus

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Hrmm well if you're having difficulties, try asking your teachers.
 

Minai

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yes
and obviously take certain factors into account (ie if u goto a selective high, or a school that historically tends to do well etc)
 

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