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I think that the HSC is an excellent credential that shows what students have been able to achieve across their academic school life. The HSC is rigorous. The HSC is broad. The HSC offers pathways into all manner of work, study and life beyond the end of school.
The HSC is administered by a standalone statutory body, NESA (NSW Education Standards Authority). I like that an independent body administers the HSC examinations for all students across the state. Currently, about 75,000 students complete their HSC in any given year, with another 10,000 or so doing at least one HSC subject on their way to the completion of their HSC.
There are some who have concerns about the HSC and about the way that it is used to measure students, cohorts and schools. There are a number of ways of measuring success, some helpful, some less so. I want to sketch out some general thoughts about academic success before exploring specific ways that HSC success gets measured.
It is important to remember that success reflects the efforts of each individual. The first and most important point of comparison for each of us is ourselves. As a school, our aim is for students to become better versions of themselves. And our aim is also for our students to do well academically, noting that the student who gets 75, who, by rights, should have got 65, has done better than the student with a mark of 85 who should have got 95.
As students complete and receive their HSC, the first question they have to answer is “did I apply myself as much as I could have, did I give it my best shot?”. And if the answer is yes, then they can justifiably be proud of their efforts and of their results. We can’t expect anyone to give more than their best efforts. Our hope is always that student results reflect student effort.
The HSC sets out to measure how well students did against set criteria and is reported in bands. For example, students scoring a result of 90% or more do so by meeting the criteria for the highest band, Band 6. It is theoretically possible that everyone could achieve a Band 6 for their courses if they met the criteria. However, when it comes to the ATAR (Australian Tertiary Entrance Rank) it is explicitly designed to rank students for the purposes of admission into university courses of various degrees of scarcity or desirability. Therefore, the HSC and the ATAR are setting out to do two different things.
There are lots of different ways to measure success. One measure of individual success is a student’s HSC results. Another measure of success is their ATAR, noting that not everyone applies for an ATAR.
Another measure of success is collective. Instead of looking at the results of just one, we look at the results of the group. There are various ways to measure this. The current and most widely accepted measure of student and school success is a fairly strange way to measure success, but it is the way that has been used for the best part of the past 30 years. It is to look at the percentage of students who achieve a Band 6 result (with a mark of 90% or above) in any given subject. There is a reason for this.
In January 1997, The Daily Telegraph ran a front-page headline “The Class We Failed” alongside a photo of the Mount Druitt High School Year 12 class of 1996. What was an attack on the government and education system, ended up as an article that shamed the students pictured. To avoid this happening again, the government mandated that the only HSC results that would be made public were the examination results of top performing students. This is why, almost thirty years later, schools are judged and ranked by daily newspapers on the percentage of exam results above 90 that their students achieve.
This is neither fair nor is it the best or most accurate way to rank students or schools. It completely skews the conversation in a way that can lead some to the conclusion that you haven’t really featured unless you’ve got a mark above 90%. This is unfortunate and untrue. One small benefit is that it avoids the public shaming that led us to rank schools the way we do now.
Let me reflect on some different measures that we could use to paint a picture of school performance at NBCS over each of the past three years, and then suggest a better, more effective measure that could be used.
In 2022, we had the great joy of two NBCS students achieving the top-ranking ATAR of 99.95. Across NSW, there were 48 students out of approximately 70,000 who achieved a 99.95 ATAR, and two of them were from NBCS. There were only three schools in NSW that had more than one student receive a 99.95 ATAR, one was James Ruse High School, the other an independent school with 300 plus Year 12 students, and then us, NBCS.
While we were proud of the two students in question, we were proud of the efforts of all our Year 12 students. What was most significant for us was the demonstration that we have the capacity to extend and challenge all students, including the most academically capable. In other words, there is no need to choose an academically selective school to get the best out of your gifted and talented child. However, it feels wrong to focus on only two students from 120 in that year group.
In 2023, we had the joy of seeing our students achieve marks of 90 and above in 18.2% of the exams they sat. This saw NBCS ranked 88th out of the 750 or so schools that have candidates for the HSC. This is the highest ranking NBCS has had to date.
We acknowledge that it is a flawed measure but recognise that it is the measure that is used, and why. We were delighted for all our students in 2023 but note that not all were recognised or included in developing this ranking. To illustrate how flawed this type of ranking can be, we had a student who did not achieve one mark above 90 (all results were marks in the high 80s) and yet the student’s ATAR was 95.
In 2024, our published rank fell, but here is another paradox. Our average mark and average ATAR were the highest we had ever achieved. So, while the percentage of results that were above 90 declined, the overall performance of the year group actually improved by the collective measure.
Earlier this year the Sydney Morning Herald released an analysis of the top 150 public schools in NSW based on the average HSC mark of their students. The reason that the data was based on public schools is that the data on public schools is more readily accessible for study. The data was telling. We were able to examine our results and then indicate the level of performance comparable to the list of the top 150 public schools.
In 2024, NBCS students had their highest HSC average mark to date. It was 79.52%. This mark would have placed us 39th on the list, with 20 selective and 2 partially selective public schools above us, noting that the list excluded independent and catholic schools owing to accessibility of data.
And herein lies another tale. The average HSC mark of NBCS students was the same as Killara High School. Two fine schools, with Year 12 cohorts with equal average HSC marks. However, by the measure used by the newspapers, Killara was ranked 90th in 2024, and NBCS 150th. This shows that the measure has within it some significant flaws. Given this discrepancy, it is reasonable to think that we need to use a variety of measures to provide a richer and more accurate picture of all student performance. I recognise that the more students achieving marks over 90, the higher the average is likely to be, but it is not the whole picture.
So how should we represent the achievement of a student cohort? We need to recognise that academic achievement is only one piece of the puzzle. Are they young people who have grown in character, kindness, and maturity? Are they young people who think of the interests of others as well as their own? Are they young people who give their best efforts and recognise the dignity and importance of hard work? Are they ready to take their place in the world, willing to contribute to it and to their community? These are all things that matter and perhaps matter the most.
And yet, we do judge schools on academic results. When we do this, we are really judging them on learning. And while judging academic results is a proxy for learning, it’s not quite the same thing, but it is close. Our vision remains love learning, and learning is the key thing that we “produce” here at school. But it is bigger than that in the same way that learning is bigger than results.
As a school we will still focus on academic results. As a school, we celebrate the hard work and success of our students. We do it so we can continue to improve what we do and to enhance the academic reputation of the school, a reputation of which staff, students and parents can be proud.
With that in mind, our aim is to measure success in multiple domains. Firstly, in who our students are, and secondly in how they perform. But as we measure how they perform, we need to use multiple perspectives and we need to incorporate the whole cohort, not just a select group at the top of the game. For this reason, when we take a more comprehensive look at student success, we consider the ranking of schools based on high performance that the newspapers use, but we also look at the HSC average of the whole cohort and the average ATAR. We look at specific individual successes, and we incorporate successes including nominations for various HSC showcases in practical and performance subjects. We also celebrate the various pathways to the future for our students, whether work, apprenticeships, TAFE or university.
In the end, the success of our students beyond school will depend on that lovely combination of learning, effort and character which will propel them into the biggest future possible. We do well to remember that.
Tim Watson
Principal
