Internal Rank and External Mark? (1 Viewer)

[brachester]

Hi, I have a question. I came 4th in my ESL class, and i reckon i can get at least a 90 for my external. However, the one who came 3rd didn't do very well in the external (he said he can only get around 70). Does that mean i'll get the 4th lowest mark of the external for my internal marks since i came 4th? (which means my internal will be <=70) and he'll get the third highest mark for his internal (which means >=90)? How's that even fair?

 

[khorne]

The person who comes first and last get the first and last exam marks as their respective assessment marks. The rest of the marks are curve fitted between those two, preserving the gap between them. Thus, it is true that the person above you will get the third highest mark, but it may not be >=90, for their internals.

 

[cem]

Hi, I have a question. I came 4th in my ESL class, and i reckon i can get at least a 90 for my external. However, the one who came 3rd didn't do very well in the external (he said he can only get around 70). Does that mean i'll get the 4th lowest mark of the external for my internal marks since i came 4th? (which means my internal will be <=70) and he'll get the third highest mark for his internal (which means >=90)? How's that even fair?

You will keep your own external mark so 50% of the marks reflects your efforts in the exam.

The internals have to be moderated across the state as all schools set different tasks and then mark them to different standards so the only fair way to do it is to use the one common task you all did - the exam - as the basis for that moderation.

So the BOS takes the top exam mark and gives that to the first placed person from your school as their internal mark and they usually give the lowest exam mark to the student who was ranked last by the school. That means that the range of marks for the internal marks will also be the same as the external marks. They also allocate the same number of marks - so if your class earned 1489 marks in the exam your class will have 1489 marks awarded for your total internal marks as well. They also work out the mean and median from the exam and attempt to keep them the same as well. Finally they preserve the ranks AND relative gaps. If you were ranked 4th and were only three marks say behind 3rd then your internal mark will still be about 3 behind 3rds internally (remember that he will also keep his own external mark). It is fair as it reflects 50% of your work and in that part of the course you ranked 4th.

Where students get confused is the completely incorrect understanding that many people put out that 4th exam mark will be given to 4th ranked student when it won't necessarily be the case - ranks AND relative gaps are maintained.

 

[bikinigal]

Hey cem,

I am always tripped up by the phrase "relative gaps". What happens if you are ranked 4th and those top 4 score the highest raw exam marks - let's say 88,87,86 & 85 1st to 4th respectively. For the sake of illustration, let's say the school assessment marks of ranks 1 to 4 were reported as 85, 82, 78, 71. Let us also assume they are in a very small cohort of 6 students and ranks 5 & 6 score raw exam marks of 58 & 50 resp. and reported school assessment marks of 52 & 46 respectively.

How would these external marks be moderated to maintain the relative gap? Would 4th rank on an external of 85 (only 1 mark lower than 3rd & 3 marks away from 1st) end up with a moderated assessment mark in the 70s? Also, can you minimise the damage by blitzing the external & getting the top mark (& if you DID manage to do this, would you mod ass mark still be in the 70s?)

Cheers for any light you can shed on this.

 

[cem]

They will try to maintain the difference between the ranks e.g. one mark between the top four would still be about one mark but would also be even - so if two marks between first and second were needed to get all the statistics right then it would also be two marks between 2nd and 3rd and 3rd and 4th.

Your external mark will not have any effect on the internal mark - that internal mark can now only be affected by the way you and your cohort go.

You also have to realise that generally those two much lower marks will also be much lower than the external marks - as that is what the assessment marks suggest so the relative gap between 4th and 5th will still also be a large one - initially it was nearly 30 and that gap will also be maintained.

 

[D94]

Your ideal situation is if the lowest ranked exam mark is say 5 marks different from the top, and that you are all relatively high compared to the state. In this case, your first place person will be pinned with the highest exam mark, and your last place person will only be 5 marks away. So, even if your internal assessments are 30 marks different, it will be effectively contracted to only 5 marks, meaning you will all get fairly close marks. And ultimately, this is why you choose the subjects you are interested in because it can have an overall effect on the cohort if you lack interest, expanding the spread of marks.

The relative gap is maintained, relative to the mode of marks. The lowest ranked person, for their moderated assessment mark, can't get lower than the lowest exam mark.

 

[bikinigal]

Okay..my next question is going to sound really thick (esp as I continually referenced RAW exam marks in my question and neither cem or D94 corrected me) - but, can I confirm that student's moderated assessment marks are initially calculated from the cohort's RAW exam marks and their ranks (and this is where the relative gaps are applied) AND that these marks are then mapped to performance bands to give the reported assessment mark that goes onto the Record of Achievement along with the (aligned) Exam Mark & HSC Mark.

Thanks once again for all your help

P.S. I have literally been trying to get my head around this since my eldest son did his HSC in 2008. It was hard to see it from his results as he came 1st in 4 of his subject, 2nd in one & 7th in the other. His only large relative gaps were in subjects he was coming first in so he got his own exam mark as his assessment mark anyway. The one odd one though, that I didn't think twice about at the time but now perplexes me, was English (Adv) where he ranked 7th. I know that he had a reported exam mark of 84 yet received a reported assessment of 89 (HSC mark 86). That year in his cohort there was only ONE band 6 so I really don't understand how THAT distribution came about (unless, of course, the mod ass mark was calculated from raw exam marks). I didn't bother looking into it as he got into his desired uni course & his UAI was high enough to see him become Dux of his school. But now that I have my youngest son going through, sitting on ranks =1, 2, 3,3 & 4, my interest has been piqued.

 

[cem]

Okay..my next question is going to sound really thick (esp as I continually referenced RAW exam marks in my question and neither cem or D94 corrected me) - but, can I confirm that student's moderated assessment marks are initially calculated from the cohort's RAW exam marks and their ranks (and this is where the relative gaps are applied) AND that these marks are then mapped to performance bands to give the reported assessment mark that goes onto the Record of Achievement along with the (aligned) Exam Mark & HSC Mark.

The mapping of marks to performance bands is done on RAW exam marks as part of the marking process. Only after the raw exam marks are aligned do they moderate the assessment marks.

 

[weirdguy99]

What about a school that has a very wide range of marks, from lets say <50% to mid 90s? Will this disadvantage the students that perform well (band 5+)?

 

[bikinigal]

The mapping of marks to performance bands is done on RAW exam marks as part of the marking process. Only after the raw exam marks are aligned do they moderate the assessment marks.

Thanks cem - I'm beginning to get a handle on it now (I think.... ) It will be a lot clearer when the results come out as I have a vague idea of the assessment marks assigned by the school to each student in his classes (in particular the differences). By then, however, my 2 sons' experiences with the HSC will be at an end and therein lies the irony that is often inherent in the getting of wisdom; it arrives too late to be of any practical use. Who knows, I might encounter a perplexed friend with a younger child about to undertake this educational right of passage (or torture, depending upon the child) and I might be able to enlighten them.

Cheers again

 

[lonelynight99]

They will try to maintain the difference between the ranks e.g. one mark between the top four would still be about one mark but would also be even - so if two marks between first and second were needed to get all the statistics right then it would also be two marks between 2nd and 3rd and 3rd and 4th.

Your external mark will not have any effect on the internal mark - that internal mark can now only be affected by the way you and your cohort go.

You also have to realise that generally those two much lower marks will also be much lower than the external marks - as that is what the assessment marks suggest so the relative gap between 4th and 5th will still also be a large one - initially it was nearly 30 and that gap will also be maintained.

Hi cem, I came 2nd in my ESL class and the difference between me and the 1st rank is only 1%, but the different between me and the 3rd rank is like 25%...
In the external exam, assume I got 92 HSC marks, so will my internal assessment be similar to my HSC marks?

 

[Beaconite]

hi