Many universities will offer entry based on year 11 results

A wish come true. Niamh received an early offer to her chosen psychology course based on her year 11 results.

29/07/2020. Niamh Anderson, year 12 student at St Marys Senior High School in Sydney's western suburbs, who is applying for university in 2021. Britta Campion / The Australian

Worry about the damage online schooling at home may have done to her HSC marks and ATAR made Year 12 student Niamh Anderson prick up her ears when she heard of Western Sydney University’s early offer True Rewards program.

The teacher who is Ms Anderson’s assigned personal mentor at St Mary’s Senior High School in western Sydney told her that the program had been expanded this year to take account of Year 11 results.

“I wasn’t 100 per cent sure if I’d get the band I needed with my year 12 results, but I tried really hard last year, and I did quite well,” Ms Anderson, 18, says.

“And for the bachelor of psychology (honours) course, I needed Bs in any two subjects and I had four. So I was eligible to apply.

“I applied for it because especially this year with COVID it has definitely been harder, more stressful, especially working from home. I’m so thankful that I have the teachers that I have because after speaking to some of my friends from other schools, they did not get the same help that I did.”

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Another COVID-related bit of bad luck was the disappointing uncertainty about her TAFE certificate III course in assistant nursing, which was affected by concerns about students in clinical settings.

Her scheduled placement with an aged care home was cancelled and although the college is doing its best to find another one, they may simply run out of time. She had been relying on using that as a credential to build her case for university eligibility, so the True Reward option was even more attractive.

In this very different year, Ms Anderson is one of thousands of final year high school students who have had the chance to rely, at least in part, on Year 11 results.

Some universities have been accepting Year 11 results as part of a package of criteria for early offers for some time, but about a quarter, including some in the Group of Eight, are effectively conceding for the first time that Year 11 results, on their own or in combination with other criteria, can be a decent proxy credential.

Institutions offering this opportunity include the University of Western Australia, Australian Catholic University, the University of Adelaide and the Australian National University.

Variations and conditions apply. For Ms Anderson, although the offer would be made on the basis of her Year 11 results, it would also be contingent on her successfully completing Year 12. At Murdoch University, students can opt to rely on Year 11 results or their HSC results, whichever turn out to be higher.

ACU has introduced an early entry program, ACU Guarantee, where Year 11 results are taken into account and students can also provide a personal statement about their achievements and goals.

ANU is using its own calculations to create ANU Selection Ranks based on Year 11 results, which will mirror the ATAR. This includes equity adjustments; it has also eased its co-curricular and service requirements in the light of social distancing and the effects of lockdown on moving around the community.

Macquarie University has removed the cap on the number of students to be admitted through its early offer Leaders and Achievers and School Recommendation Schemes (SRS), whose criteria already include Year 11 results.

On Thursday Ms Anderson received a conditional offer from WSU, one of 2000 made to students based on their Year 11 results. She is grateful that she applied herself to study last year.

“I did quite poorly at the start of that year with my assessments,” she says.

“And I don’t like seeing bad results. I really wanted to bring them up and just try the best that I could. But a lot of kids didn’t. Because, you know, everyone always says Year 11 doesn’t matter.”