NCEA- does it stay or does it go?

[p01s0n_p1e]

well, being a 5th former at a private school, im doing ncea.
and im lucky enough to not have teachers striking, unlike teh public schools.

i rekon ncea is better for people like me (ie: ones who su><or in exams) but it really blows the monkeys ass for others.
is anyone here at a public school, or in 5th form? how do you see it?
the only real thing i have against it is the marking system is GHEY ASS!

if you get one question wrong, you can still fail or not get that level
ie, i friend in maths got all the achieved questions right, the only excellence (****ing impossible questions if u ask me) question, and he missed out on one merit question, so he only managed to get achieved, where as if they used exam stylez for marking he woulda got 90% easy.

catch my drift?

i wanna hear your views, and please DO NOT turn it into a kj photoshop thread...sheesh!

[GriffiN]

I had NCEA in 6th n 7th form when they were just testing it n stuff.
I agree that for folks who find exams hard, that it can be easier.
But there's so many points against it.
- more work for students (home work, close reading, rewriting...)
- more work for teachers (re-marking, stick to time frame, well pre-pared year plan...)

They are just the main ones - i could go on about it. (lived with a teacher for a year, so caught both sides).

But it's hard i think. The marking is really strict, so you need to following the instructions really closely and as you said, one question or point slightly wrong and you have to redo it.
For teachers fer that point though, it's makes it a bit easier as they have things completely set out and have guides and examples to give reference.

Also, you get a total of 2-3 times .. as i recall, if you're fairly on the mark with a particular answer, you can give an oral (shush) answer. Which is on the good point side as it's something you can't do in exams.

But either way (teacher/student) - it's constant work. Can't cram like you might with an exam and you can't wag as much.
Also, i still had to sit a couple of exams in 6th form - i completely aced em and i think that was due to having to always do homework :D

i like saying 'bah'... so...
bah - imo :)

[_N_]

hehe, I'm just glad that I'm finished with school, looking at the way it works, NCEA looks hard, you'll spending more time making sure you are following the rules instead of actually learning stuff.

My mum was telling me how some kids in our area wen't around and smashed up shops and stuff and got arrested cause they can't have their School Ball, they don't give a s#it about learning.

[Deviant]

I know very little about NCEA, so most of my questions can be answered by N, who knows something about it, and knows something about Uni.

How does NCEA differ from 6th form C?

What about uni where usually 50% of years mark is made up from labs, assignments, projects and presentations?

tell me more, and your thoughts N.

[mird-OC]

highschool aye? have they not dropped that idea yet? :p

[_N_]

NCEA will require the school to send some of the assignments down to wellington to be checked marked for example.
Also from what I heard, the marking will be like: Fail, Credit and some High Mark.
Also, like in subjects like metalwork or woodwork, they will use straws to construct things and won't even know how to use any tool's.
Also, say in an assignment, you miss out on some easy thing, like telling you to include a title page for example would mean that you won't pass cause you haven't completed the assignment.

There will be more workload, more assignments which are assesed.

Like the main difference is that say in UB or SC, you would be marked on the knowledge of the topic. Whereas now, even if you know everything, it doesn't mean that you will pass.

I like UNI cause (well not looking at the social life side which rocks): there are assignments, which are useful, if you don't do them, you don't fail. Lab's are also part of your marks, like, what good is to know everything, but not be able to use it? :)
Most of the time, exams make up a lot of the %. But since it's a UNI, there is no NZQA etc, it's UNI only, no scalling, you get what you get and that's the end of the story. You are marked on how much you know.

[AgentofEvil]

As a 5th former at a public school I'd have to say NCEA sucks. Well it does for me at least. I'm the sort of person who can do no classwork all year, no study at all and still get top marks in exams (I did 2 S C subjects last year). This way I have to work all year. The marking is just stupid, we did a practice assesment at the start of the year in history and I got everything right except for the last 2 questions and i failed the whole thing. It would have been 85-90% under oldstyle marking. The claims that its internal are BS, the two subjects I'm doing are 70% external. It is marginally better than 6thFC though, no gay grades assigned on last years SC performance. The maths class I'm in has one 1 brought in by me and one 3 and the rest are 4s and worse, which means no matter how hard anyone works, only one person can get a top grade and the rest are stuck with 3s and worse.
Ah, I'm glad to get that off my chest. I'm getting so pissed off with school at the momment with the strikes and stuff.

[AgentofEvil]

One other thing, the marking isn't as tough as the electronics unist standards I'm doing, in them you have to get everything perfectly correct, or you fail. The good thing is you can have as many resits as you like.

[p01s0n_p1e]

yea, the marking goes
fail, achieved, merit, excellence.
ive only failed one of my assignments so far, graphics- but i totally like, suck at drawing, also it woulda helped to actually hand in the project...:(
it is total bull****, for the statistics internal we had, 40% failed becaus they didnt put down the lower and upper quartile, even though everyone did a scatter pattern, you had to make a question, then draw the appropriate graph for the question, and then comment/conclude it. i was stuck at school for 2 ****ing hours extra while i did this stupid resit.

now that is pure crap

[varkk]

Originally posted by _N_
I like UNI cause (well not looking at the social life side which rocks): there are assignments, which are useful, if you don't do them, you don't fail. Lab's are also part of your marks, like, what good is to know everything, but not be able to use it? :)
Most of the time, exams make up a lot of the %. But since it's a UNI, there is no NZQA etc, it's UNI only, no scalling, you get what you get and that's the end of the story. You are marked on how much you know.

Well there is scaling at uni(well here at canterbury anyway), it is up to the course supervisor/lecturer concerned. They set up the course, give the material and then set exams and other assesment, mark it and then send the final grades off to registry who then send these out to the students at the end of the course. Also most lecturers stress that understanding the topic is more important than being able to cough up the correct answers on demand(although it definitly helps)

on a side note, how much of the school kids 'protesting' is just them taking off from school rather than any real feeling of political awareness?

[Deviant]

N, our mark are scaled in some cases. For end of semester exams, the lecturer marks the exams and has a week to do so. Then the exam result go to a board where they review the marks, look at the spread and compare the marks with other subjects from the same students and decide whether to scale and by how much.

[Antallica]

Well seeing as I got 45% last year in SC Maths... (yeah I know I'm a 6th form repeater)

It's so damn easy...... Merits all around my friends :D :D

[_N_]

k, forgot about scalling the exam,
my mum is a teacher, so I hear plenty about it, SC and UB were by far better systems.

[Deviant]

This sounds like another:

Lets help the poor students who can't pass anything at the expence of the performing students. That way almost everyone passes, and no one can tell if you actually did any good, cause you look like one of the norm.

[Geek4Life]

I hate all the "everyones a winner" stuff. Bring back winning and losing.

Though being able to resit is nice.

[mird-OC]

"we decided instead of passing or failing, we thought it would be be better to give everyone a prize for being a great person."

[SilverPriest]

NCEA is stupid.
Treats everyone like this:

[GooGlo]

Teehehehe, I had a "practice" exam and barely got achievment. Then they revised it because not many people passed and i got excellence :)

Fully agree SP, The warm fuzzys are great if your retarded but most of us live in the real world.

[KingJackal]

Originally posted by Deviant
This sounds like another:

Lets help the poor students who can't pass anything at the expence of the performing students. That way almost everyone passes, and no one can tell if you actually did any good, cause you look like one of the norm.

EXACTLY what pisses me off.

Yeah, sure - let'scramp the style on everyone that gives a sh*t about their future. Let's let everyone settle for mind numbing mediocrity, and stop intelligent kids from getting out of the rut. At least the lazy students will be able to feel a part of the group :rolleyes:

I'm so glad I didn't have to put up with any of that. Load of BS if you ask me. Perhaps it'll be on the shoulders of Universities ( through STAR courses etc ) and private groups ( like the scholarship papers for 7th form ) to keep kids sharp.

Everything I've ever come across that has been unit-standards based has turned me off. It removes all inspiration for flair, talent and intelligence.

Aparently we're building a modern knowledge economy. And we're armed only with mediocrity and a lack of individualism.

Yep, we're f*cked.... :(

[Deviant]

Oh KJ, you are on the same level as me with this. We are setting up loosers for our future, and forcing any chance of a future overseas, and that's probably where I'm headed.

[Geek4Life]

I totally agree, we're just stuffing the economy.

[varkk]

Well the universities are going to have some trouble in a few years when these students taught to strive for mediocrity arrive, and start failing courses as they are ill prepared for real work/pressure. Also more students will be eligable to go than now and many may not be up to it. There has already been alot of new soft 1st year courses setup to help people who aren't suitable, then they fail in their second year...ah the downward spiral will continue

[Volodkovich]

yea, like pretty much all the ppl i know at school (including me) are planning on going overseas when they start to work. It makes perfect sense really, there arent very many jobs here compared to other places, and if u do get that job here, u'll get shizznat pay. For eg, im planning to be an aeronautical engineer and theres no likelyhood of me getting a job here...and even if i do i know the pay will suck...therfor i go overseas, get a job easier, and get better pay

[Deviant]

Originally posted by varkk
Well the universities are going to have some trouble in a few years when these students taught to strive for mediocrity arrive, and start failing courses as they are ill prepared for real work/pressure. Also more students will be eligable to go than now and many may not be up to it. There has already been alot of new soft 1st year courses setup to help people who aren't suitable, then they fail in their second year...ah the downward spiral will continue

Good points you raise, some people just can't see stupidity coming, we have to treat crims and idiots so nice.

Another thing that gets on my wick, is time out for kids, don't yell at them etc etc right up until they are in jail, then it's be nice to the crim cause he's got rights. We teach them from day one to be stupid and how have we are going to be so nice to them when they are bad.