Page 2571 - Week 08 - Thursday, 30 August 2007

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(1) The changes that were made in late 2006 should have appeared in the ACT Board of Senior Secondary Studies (BSSS) Policy and Procedures Manual 2007 (the manual). This was an omission. The changes will be added as an addendum to the version on the BSSS website. The change to policy was that the year 12 candidature will be defined as ‘the group of students who complete at least one T course’.

(1) The 2008 edition of the manual will contain the new policy.

(2) Yes.

(3) The purpose of the manual is to outline BSSS policies and general procedures. Apart from the fact that the table is not the intellectual property of the BSSS, operational procedures are not part of the manual.

(4) No.

(5) Yes; (a) a new table relevant to the cohort of students is produced by the NSW Scaling Committee at the end of each year; (b) the 2006 UAIs were slightly higher than those in 2005, for each TER.

(6) As the table is not the property of the BSSS or the Department of Education and Training, I am unable to comment.

(7) (a) As a result of the changes made in 2006 based on the recommendations of Dr Daryl Daley, the group of students for whom notional aggregates scores are calculated includes students who did not complete year 12 but completed at least one T course.

(b) Course scores are calculated for T courses only. Therefore there is no data available for students who do not complete a T course, with which to calculate a notional aggregate score.

(8) Refer 7 (b) above.

(9) No. The BSSS has recently sought a range of external independent advice on its procedures and also regularly reviews its procedures as new data becomes available. The BSSS has evidence to suggest that the calculation of notional aggregates for students who leave the ACT senior secondary system at the end of year 10, and those who leave during years 11 or 12 without completing a T course, would improve the accuracy and fairness of the system as there is no reliable data on which to make such calculations.

(10)(a) 2006 – 1268, 2005 – 999, 2004 – 1040, 2003 – 964, 2002 - 866

(b) 2006 – 563, 2005 – 523, 2004 – 457, 2003 – 460, 2002 - 510

(d) 2006 – 3 students, 2005 – 11 students, 2004 – 20 students, 2003 – 10 students, 2002 – 19 students.

(11) Non-government schools provide only aggregated student data to the Department of Education and Training for the school census and not individual student attendance records. Therefore, it is not possible to determine whether individual non-government students did not complete year 11 or year 12. The data in tables 1 and 2 is for government college enrolments only.

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