Scaling? (1 Viewer)

[Hila]

Hey guys,
I know these kind of 'DO MY SUBJECTS SCALE HIGH' questions are sort of annoying... But I recently read a thread where someone took similarish subjects to mine... And apparently they don't very scale well. All of year 11 I didn't care about scaling, I just took what I enjoy taking (essay based subjects. I'm hopeless at math and science.) But now because yr 12 is just around the corner... I'm getting worried. I wanna do law so my ATAR aim is pretty high (99+)
Is it possible for me to achieve that with these subjects? Apparently I can get low 90s but over that it's really difficult or rare or something
My subjects for yr 12 and year 11 ranks:

English Advanced (10th)
English Extension 1 (1st)
English Extension 2 (yr 12)
Legal Studies (10th)
Society and Culture (1st)
Modern History (8th)
Ancient History (17th...)
Extension History (yr 12)
LOTE continuers (4 people in the class... I'm coming last)

This is just a rough guess but for both histories as well as, society and legal there are about 60 students. English is 100 and something kids, I think, and extension I have no idea as many students drop out. I'll guess about 30?

Thoughts? I'm gonna try really hard to get better ranks in year 12.

 

[sghguos]

I understand your goals are high. Sorry to say but the reality is that your ranks are not that great and neither are your subjects.

I would be happy with, lets say

83~

considering you did well in the externals

 

[madharris]

I understand your goals are high. Sorry to say but the reality is that your ranks are not that great and neither are your subjects.

I would be happy with, lets say

83~

considering you did well in the externals

She's not asking for an atar estimate, and she's in year 11

OP: I don't know what your school rank is, so I can't tell if you will be able to get your desired atar. However, your subjects do not scale terribly. You have a combination of average - good. It's not difficult to get 90s with your subject combination however 99 will be a bit harder. Don't worry though, there are many different ways to get into law.
If it helps, my friend in 2010 did Ext 2 eng, drama, Society and culture, general maths and modern and achieved 98.95 last year which are similar to your subjects in terms of scaling.
You're more likely to do better at subjects that you enjoy

Just wondering, what are you thinking about dropping... as you mentioned 16 units

 

[someth1ng]

You can get any ATAR with almost any subject combination - it's just what you do with that subject combination that truly makes the difference.

 

[Shadowdude]

You can get any ATAR with almost any subject combination - it's just what you do with that subject combination that truly makes the difference.

no, you can get any atar with any subject combination

there's no "almost"


To the OP, you just have to extremely well - and I mean... very, very well, maybe 95+ in all subjects if you want a 99+ ATAR. Reality is, that even if you don't considering scaling, 99+ ATAR basically means best 1000 students in the state - and so you need to go very, very well regardless of that.

Personally with those ranks, you will need to improve majorly - as in top of the class, 1st in everything. Those ranks simply aren't good enough, nor even close to being good enough for 99+ ATAR unless you tell us you're from James Ruse or some other very, very good/highly ranked school

 

[deswa1]

You can get any ATAR with almost any subject combination - it's just what you do with that subject combination that truly makes the difference.

no, you can get any atar with any subject combination

there's no "almost"

Yes this is true but I'm going to be politically incorrect in a sense and say that this is BS. Yes you can get 99.95 with the most random subject combination. No one will ever do it though- the simple reason being that if you want .95 with gen maths, drama, society and culture, textiles and standard english, you pretty much need to top the state in all your subjects.

So yeah its possible to get any ATAR with any combination but lets be serious, it won't happen and it gives a lot of people a false sense of hope. This sounds harsh but its true

Note: This post really only refers to very top end ATAR's. If you want something like 95 (which is still pretty top end)- that is achievable with any combination.

In regards to OP's post- yes 99 with your subjects is very achievable- they don't scale that bad. Honestly though you need to improve your ranks quite a bit to achieve 99 as those ranks would only lead 99 at higher end selective schools and I doubt you go to one from cohort sizes and subjects offered.

 

[Shadowdude]

Yes, but the counter-examples to the rule are so contrived. I mean who even does Gen Maths, Drama, Society and Culture, Textiles and Standard English anyway? (inb4 troll account)

 

[Hila]

She's not asking for an atar estimate, and she's in year 11

OP: I don't know what your school rank is, so I can't tell if you will be able to get your desired atar. However, your subjects do not scale terribly. You have a combination of average - good. It's not difficult to get 90s with your subject combination however 99 will be a bit harder. Don't worry though, there are many different ways to get into law.
If it helps, my friend in 2010 did Ext 2 eng, drama, Society and culture, general maths and modern and achieved 98.95 last year which are similar to your subjects in terms of scaling.
You're more likely to do better at subjects that you enjoy

Just wondering, what are you thinking about dropping... as you mentioned 16 units

83. My heart just dropped.

And thanks guys for the reality check... I guess I sorta needed it.

Um, my school ranks really bad, so that's not going to save me. I guess I'll get into law another way. I'll still aiming for something in the 90s though.
And your story was actually comforting

And I don't know what I'm dropping yet... I'll see when I get my yearlies back. I'll probably end up dropping ex history and ancient, or my LOTE...

 

[someth1ng]

Yes, but the counter-examples to the rule are so contrived. I mean who even does Gen Maths, Drama, Society and Culture, Textiles and Standard English anyway? (inb4 troll account)

If nobody does it, it doesn't mean that it's not a subject combination.

If there is one subject combination that cannot get 99.95 ATAR, it makes the "all subject combinations can get any ATAR" false since you can't get 99.95.

So yes, there IS an ALMOST, not all subject combinations can get "any ATAR".

 

[Shadowdude]

If nobody does it, it doesn't mean that it's not a subject combination.

If there is one subject combination that cannot get 99.95 ATAR, it makes the "all subject combinations can get any ATAR" false since you can't get 99.95.

So yes, there IS an ALMOST, not all subject combinations can get "any ATAR".

hmm, seems my early morning posting wasn't with 100% brain power - I originally said you can get any ATAR with any subject combination, and that is true. And what I meant to say that exceptions to the apparent rule are so contrived.


I did the maths myself, a few months ago - with the 2009 Scaling Report - and I showed that even if you picked the so-called "crappiest" subjects, if you did well enough in them, you could get an aggregate that is above the threshold for 99.95 ATAR.

 

[Absolutezero]

If nobody does it, it doesn't mean that it's not a subject combination.

If there is one subject combination that cannot get 99.95 ATAR, it makes the "all subject combinations can get any ATAR" false since you can't get 99.95.

So yes, there IS an ALMOST, not all subject combinations can get "any ATAR".

Someone could top the state with those subjects and get 99.95. You haven't proved this

'If there is one subject combination that cannot get 99.95 ATAR, it makes the "all subject combinations can get any ATAR" false since you can't get 99.95."

actually exists at all.

Both examples being presented are highly unlikely scenarios. So we take the theoretical justification, and state that it is possible with any combination.

 

[D94]

I'll raise the point that to get say 99.7, no matter what subject combination, you will still need to perform extremely well in all your subjects. It's pointless to say only high scaling subjects will get you the 99.7 or 99.95 when you still need to perform well in them. The higher your marks, the lesser impact scaling will have, because the mark is already at a capping point.

Scaling is carried out afresh each year, so you can't definitively say not all subject combinations can get you 99.95. You can't speculate based on such limited data - we don't have a student who has topped in each of the lower scaling subjects, so you can't know if that could have gotten them a 99.95.

But just to be clear, for the OP's subjects, you're going to need around 95+ in all of them in order to achieve 99.7+.

 

[inJust]

My friend got 99.95 atar even though they did ESL English. Because they state ranked it and also vietnamese. Also did really well in phys and chem and maths. LOL.

 

[Marc26]

Lot of units OP

 

[Hila]

Lot of units OP

Yeah I know
I haven't realized this until i got on holidays and I'm like 'Oh... Maybe I picked one subject too many '

 

[asianese]

Wtf is LOTE continuers.. (I know it's languages other than English but which?)