High atar with only 10 units?? (1 Viewer)

[kanra3431]

Hi everyone, I’m a year 11 student starting year 12 this term. Currently, we’re only a week or so into our HSC subjects and many students are deciding which subjects to drop and how many units would be optimal. I go to a t10 selective where many of my peers aim for careers that require a high atar (i.e. 99+, 99.5+) like medicine, law, and hence a lot of students want to make thoughtful decisions regarding subject choices. My principal keeps mentioning that the students who do end up receiving those high atars always do 12+ units. This viewpoint annoys me to no end as it doesn’t consider that the HSC is a process unique to each year 12 student and there are many students who do achieve these marks with only 10 units. She never really makes the reasons for her claims explicit and just tells people to keep their units unless extraneous circumstances dictate that they have to drop. I’m clearly very biased as I do plan to take only 10 units into my HSC but I would like to hear other opinions on this? If my principal’s statement does seem to hold true, why so?
Also, as I’m working on improving my writing, if anything I wrote has incorrect grammar, syntax, or even just sounds weird, I’d really appreciate it if you’d let me know

 

[tito981]

i have heard this a lot as well, i dont think it matters if u do 10 or 12 units, when ppl say that the high atar students do 12 units it is probably because they half study/bludge their 11/12th unit. just my opinion.

 

[dumNerd]

Hi everyone, I’m a year 11 student starting year 12 this term. Currently, we’re only a week or so into our HSC subjects and many students are deciding which subjects to drop and how many units would be optimal. I go to a t10 selective where many of my peers aim for careers that require a high atar (i.e. 99+, 99.5+) like medicine, law, and hence a lot of students want to make thoughtful decisions regarding subject choices. My principal keeps mentioning that the students who do end up receiving those high atars always do 12+ units. This viewpoint annoys me to no end as it doesn’t consider that the HSC is a process unique to each year 12 student and there are many students who do achieve these marks with only 10 units. She never really makes the reasons for her claims explicit and just tells people to keep their units unless extraneous circumstances dictate that they have to drop. I’m clearly very biased as I do plan to take only 10 units into my HSC but I would like to hear other opinions on this? If my principal’s statement does seem to hold true, why so?
Also, as I’m working on improving my writing, if anything I wrote has incorrect grammar, syntax, or even just sounds weird, I’d really appreciate it if you’d let me know

your an orange

 

[c8]

I'd keep the units you have for as long as possible until you are absolutely certain you want to drop but tbh it doesn't matter how many units you do. I know people doing 10 who are doing really well and people doing like 13 who are also doing really well, it always comes down to you and how you prioritise what you need to do.

 

[erucibon]

Most top selective school students actually have 10 units so i don't know what your principal is going on about

 

[quickoats]

This is sort of selection bias - there are more kids doing 10 units as the bare minimum (just to get their HSC) whereas the population who do 12+ units want to study all 12+ of their units even it won’t count, so they’d be more studious overall. This means those with more units seemingly do better.

Not sure how this dynamic plays out at your selective school but this could possibly explain it.

 

[AKONS]

There are a few factors that can affect your exam score. You could study a large amount, but a degree of luck is needed in terms of the exam questions given on the day of the HSC. Do they match your strengths or weaknesses? Maybe you were sleepy and made silly mistakes. The list goes on.

It's not impossible to get 99+ with 10 units. It's 100% possible. However, there's more risk involved. Every unit will count no matter what. What if you don't do as well as you could of on exam day for a subject? It will count anyway. That's the thing to consider, do you personally think the risk is outweighed by the potential reward? Are the extra study periods or hours free worth it? That's up to personal opinion.

Hope this helps and good luck with HSC

 

[jojosiwa123]

There are a few factors that can affect your exam score. You could study a large amount, but a degree of luck is needed in terms of the exam questions given on the day of the HSC. Do they match your strengths or weaknesses? Maybe you were sleepy and made silly mistakes. The list goes on.

It's not impossible to get 99+ with 10 units. It's 100% possible. However, there's more risk involved. Every unit will count no matter what. What if you don't do as well as you could of on exam day for a subject? It will count anyway. That's the thing to consider, do you personally think the risk is outweighed by the potential reward? Are the extra study periods or hours free worth it? That's up to personal opinion.

Hope this helps and good luck with HSC

completely agree. for most, the 12th unit subject is a total bludge. however hsc can be a total game of chance- imagine if u bomb a subject you thought you would ace... that 12th unit subject gives you a chance to save your atar, even if you’ve been bludging it you still have that sliver of hope.

 

[turtle67]

do 11

 

[Skkkkkkkkkk]

its hard to fail 10 units if u study properly. and u can study much more when dropping to ten units

 

[bubbletea4lyfe]

You have to take into consideration about the scaling and how well you do in your subjects. If you don’t have much time to study you may consider doing 10units. If you have two subjects that you are deciding to drop one of them and these two avergae have similar results, I wouldn’t advise you to drop one.

 

[beetree1]

I would suggest doing 10 units because doing 12 units is just like setting yourself up for fail for that extra 2 units so why waste time on it?
But 11 units is also a good idea if you are not confident with English (do Adv and Ext 1 English) as they can take half of each to make up one score for your english which may be higher than anticipated if you only did 2 units.

Doing 10 units has been really good for me this year, esp cos I did 2u english and 4u math meaning I just had pretty much 3 subjects to study for and I could separate my time throughout the holidays etc quite effectively!