VCAA staff ’forced to play along’ with leaked exam question scandal

The Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority has apologised to students for the first time over the biggest leak of VCE exam material in decades.

The Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority has apologised to students for the first time for the biggest leak of VCE exam material in decades.

When prompted by the Sunday Herald Sun, the authority said staff are “working to address the issues caused by the early publication of some examination questions”.

“The VCAA sincerely apologises for these errors,” a spokesman said.

“We are working to ensure every student is assessed fairly.”

It’s a turning point for the VCAA, which has until now staunchly refused to admit the extent of the leaks, the impact on students, or even that leaked questions and case studies appeared in actual exams.

The VCAA has also clarified that it became aware of the accidental inclusion of embedded exam questions and case studies in exam instruction booklets, known as cover sheets, on Saturday 12 October, and then took them down.

This means students had up to a week to access and share the exam material, with some teachers noticing it on October 5.

Their apology comes after a VCAA insider revealed staff in the examination unit were “forced to play along with a fake story” that leaks on exam cover sheets were samples, not actual questions from the real exams.

“All exams staff have been told to stick to the story of sample content when they have been asked to work 18-hour days rewriting content,” they said.

“There is one (person) who has almost killed herself trying to fix this whilst high-level leaders were going home.”

The VCAA staff member said a number of senior staff overseeing exams were also on leave for extended periods, leaving junior staff to manage the crisis. Picture: Supplied

The person’s position has been removed for privacy reasons.

The Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority (VCAA) staff member said a number of senior staff overseeing exams were also on leave for extended periods, leaving junior staff to manage the crisis.

It comes as the Herald Sun can reveal that potentially thousands of students spent a full five days from October 5 to October 10 sharing and downloading leaked exam questions before the VCAA found and pulled the corrupted exam cover sheets, the Herald Sun can reveal.

Meanwhile, VCAA CEO Kylie White continued to insist to everyone, including her own board, that the 2024 exams were “on track”.

This is despite the fact that stressed staff were merely swapping names when “rewriting” some leaked questions, or rewording case studies but not changing the content. At least 14 exams have questions that are very similar, or totally identical to the leaked material, including two that have at least half of the questions compromised – Business Management and Product Design.

The VCAA also sent out multiple missives about their progress implementing the Bennett Review’s recommendations at the same time that staff were secretly rewriting exams due to the availability of actual exam content on the cover sheets, which is believed to extend to every single VCE subject.

The review into errors in the 2022 and 2023 chemistry and maths exams, led by Professor John Bennett, required the VCAA to put in place a series of stricter protocols.

These include “updated training and guidance for the VCAA’s editors and desktop publishers”.

The error in the coversheets arose from a desktop publishing error, which saw questions from the actual exams able to be highlighted and read when pasted into another document.

Back in March, Education Minister Ben Carroll committed to ensuring the VCAA moved swiftly to implement all the Bennett recommendations, including the desktop publishing upgrade.

VCAA CEO Kylie White continued to insist to everyone, including her own board, that the 2024 exams were “on track”. Picture: Supplied

But according to the VCAA most recent annual report, not all recommendations were implemented prior to the 2024 exams even though the government committed to them in full.

As recently as October 2, VCAA said it had implemented a recommendation which was to respond to exam issues raised by a member of the community.

In an update sent to schools, it noted that “Policies, processes, and procedures have been improved to include responses to exam issues, including a process to investigate the matter to determine appropriate resolution”.

But teachers who spoke to the VCAA about the similarities in the final exams and the leaked questions said they were fobbed off, or told the exams had been rewritten.

The VCAA did not properly respond and did not commit to investigate. Instead, they were told there was, in the words of one year 12 co-ordinator, “nothing to see”.

“We were told any similarities were entirely coincidental and were due to exams sticking to the study design,” he said.

: VCE students are responding to the VCAA's exam bungle, with the Herald Sun finding another hidden case study on the business exam. Picture: TikTok

Another veteran VCE teacher said: “from my perspective the issue is they could have contained it by being open and honest. They tried to hide it which is the major problem”.

One promotional video produced by the VCAA around this time, claims that: “Each exam undergoes a series of development steps, comprehensive checks, and validations to give students the best chance to demonstrate their knowledge clearly and fairly. Every detail is reviewed by subject matter experts and rigorously edited for accuracy. Before exams go to print, they pass through final rounds of quality control from initial design to secure delivery, the process is carefully managed to ensure each exam arrives ready for students,” the video says.