By Lucy Carroll
One of the state’s private school sectors is urging the government to radically reform its HSC awards system, saying students are being nudged towards easier subjects in an attempt to score more top bands.
A new Catholic Schools NSW report argues the current HSC award system – the merit lists that recognise only students achieving a band 6, or marks above 90 – is distorting subject selection and discouraging students from taking more difficult courses.
“Students are choosing subjects with an eye on an HSC pay-off as opposed to their longer-term outcomes or career consideration,” said Dallas McInerney, head of Catholic Schools NSW.
Clancy Catholic College principal David Costin with this year’s HSC students.Credit: Steven Siewert
The report argues the present system, which focuses on top band results, is “unfair to students, distorts subject selection and should be amended to include high-scaled marks”.
Enrolments in subjects such as physics, chemistry and extension English courses have tumbled over the decade.
The new report examines the strengths of the HSC, now entering its 59th year, and options for improvement.
For almost three decades, the education authorities have restricted publicly released HSC information each December to band 6 results only – that is, students who have achieved a mark of 90 in a course, and their schools.
The vast majority of awards given each year are for achieving a band 6, those receiving the distinguished achiever or all-round awards. However, bands are not comparable across subjects – it is more difficult to achieve the highest band in some subjects than others.
The report outlines “perennial problems” with the present system, including that some subjects – such as extension maths, physics and economics – need much higher-scaled marks to be awarded a band 6 than others.
“HSC awards criteria are unfair to many high-achieving students. It remains possible for a student to reach an ATAR of 96 yet receive zero awards. The unfairness extends to teachers and school staff; strong class-wide performance in difficult subjects will often go unrecognised,” it states.
Declining or low enrolments in subjects such as economics are partly driven by the awards criteria, the report says.
“Even where the scaling process is well understood, there is incentive for teachers or parents to nudge students towards easier subjects where there is a greater chance of earning an award,” the report says.
“A simple measure to mitigate these problems would be to reward students for achieving high-scaled marks through a new award, for example an Elite Achiever award.”
Schools are inappropriately using band 6s in their yearly HSC analysis, it says, rather than more robust measures of scaled marks or ATARs.
Broader reforms also are needed, the paper says, including publishing a wider range of measures such as median ATAR, value-add scores which compare results to past NAPLAN results, vocational education and training participation, and post-school outcomes.
Private school sectors have previously called for more information about HSC results to be publicly released, saying the focus on band 6 provides a perverse incentive for schools to push students to lower-level subjects.
Top band results are released to the media each year, which form the basis of annual league tables. “Recognising a wider range of achievement and expanding public reporting can help avoid a focus on a single, narrow measure of success,” the report says.
The paper also calls for an expansion of external assessments amid the rise of artificial intelligence, which is heightening the risk of misconduct.
“The rising use of AI will force an expanded use of external assessments to maintain fairness and trust in the HSC. In the context of school assessment, it is intuitive that the risks of plagiarism, collusion or other malpractice is higher in take-home assessments than in in-person exams,” the report says.
David Costin, principal at Clancy Catholic College in western Sydney, says his school invests time in making sure students are choosing subjects they are passionate about and are in line with careers they may want to pursue after school.
“Students are often more motivated to do work and to do their best and challenge themselves when they really enjoy a subject,” Costin says, adding the school’s success rate had lifted over the decade.
“We encourage students to do courses when they’re capable of them. But I think sometimes kids have that worry that they need to get a band 6. And if you are nervous you might not get that, they may shy away and go for an easier option.”
The report also argues universities often rely on HSC bands in their admissions, when utilising a scaled subject mark could provide a fairer and more rigorous entry standard.
McInerney said: “The relationship between the HSC and ATAR needs a reset. Before the universities take the HSC data for admission purposes, it needs to first stand alone as an end-of-school credential. This is in particular for those students who don’t go straight on to university.”
A spokesperson for NESA said: “While there are no immediate plans in place to change senior secondary settings or HSC requirements, we continuously and routinely consider improvements.
“NESA’s board, which includes the three school sector heads, is an important partner in those ongoing conversations.”
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