<p>first :)</p>
<p>second xD</p>
<p>Can’t wait for admission decisions and WE FINALLY GET OUR OWN SUB-FORUM! woot!</p>
<p>third! this is pretty cool. now we can all be nervous together!</p>
<p>fourth. !</p>
<p>I’m soooo nervous its ridiculous!</p>
<p>ME TOO! So, what is everybody doing to pass the time?</p>
<p>absolutley nothing! got final school results yesterday… so now… absolutley nothing… what about you???</p>
<p>Wait, I’m curious, how does school in Australia work? Are you guys on “summer vacation” now or something?</p>
<p>School is pretty much keeping me busy. I don’t have exams until after winter vacation, so I’m probably going to spend the next two weeks off from school studying!</p>
<p>I’ve been on holidays since novemebr 6th! which is when my exams finished… and nobody is hiring so I basically have nooothing to do. I can explain our school system if you really want… but its kinda weird</p>
<p>Explain away! I’ve always been curious as to how that works.</p>
<p>oy vey.</p>
<p>Okay so high school starts in 7th grade and from 7th-10th you take required courses… English/Maths/PE/Health/Science (general science - covers everything physics/bio/chem/geology etc). In 7th and 8th grades at my school a foreign language is mandatory and in 7th and 8th grades you also have to take Music/Design&Technology/Computers/Visual Arts… I think thats it… then in 9th and 10th grades… at least at my school you get three electives… some schools take two… which are all the preforming arts so drama/music and like computers and textiles and design&technology and all the foriegn languages. Then at the end of 10th grade you sit a set of external exams which are called the School Certificate, used to be called the leaving certificate but then the majority of people stopped leaving school in 10th grade. I actually missed my school certificate cause I was at a high school in the states, but I still qualified for one, cause it was considered an exchange…
Then in 11th grade everything changes. You start the Preliminary course for the Higher School Certificate and you choose subjects based on units. At my school you have to take 12 units in 11th grade, and english is mandatory. Most schools only require English (Standard) which is a two unit subject, but my school doesn’t offer Standard level only English (Advanced) and they make all 11th graders take English Extension 1 which is a one unit subject on top of Advanced. Most subjects are two units… with some having extensions that are one unit. And there is a variety of subjects and levels… like in Maths say there is General Mathematics, Mathematics and Mathematics Extension 1… I hope I’m not loosing you… and each gets harder.
I took for example… English Advanced, English Extension 1, French Continuers, Chemistry, Ancient History, Mathematics and Mathematics Extension 1… </p>
<p>Then in 12th grade you can drop to 10 units… you need to do at least ten, its mandated by the state… again this is statewide not nationwide… each state has their own method I guess… but we only have 5 states (and two territories lol). I did 11 units… I dropped the Ancient History which was two units and picked up another extension. In 12th grade there are more extensions. All the languages have an extension unit and Maths and English Have Extension 2… which makes a total of four units per subject. So I did extension 2 mathematics… which is equivalent of first year math at University. </p>
<p>So basically you study all year, have random assesments at school (we had four, one each quarter) which make up your school mark. But this is the weird part. Once you get your school mark… forget about it. You never get told your school mark, its your rank that counts. so your rank order is sent to this place called the Board of Studies… who do all these exam things… and you graduate from high school in September. </p>
<p>In october the Higher School Certificate exams start… and they are external… so everyone in the state taking the same subject as you takes the same exam. The mark you earn in that exam is your mark… and you are put into Bands 1-6… 6 is the highest and means a mark above 90… 5 is 80-89… 4 is 70-79 and so on until 1 is less then 50, or at least thats how I think it works. </p>
<p>Then they take your school marks and align them with the marks your school achieved on the exams. so the top mark on the exam gets given to the person coming 1st the bottom mark gets given to the person coming last and all the other marks get fitted in in between. </p>
<p>Then like a month after the exams finished <em>they are over about a month</em> you get your HSC marks… so you get an exam mark… a school assesment mark and an overall HSC mark… 2 unit subjects are out of 100, 1 unit subjects out of 50… then the next day you get whats called your UAI… or University Admissions Index… which dictates basically what university you can go to and what you can study, different courses have different UAI cut offs, like a combined Bachelor of Arts/Bachelor of Laws at Sydney University had a UAI cut off of 99.5 last year… which meant you needed a UAI of 99.5 to get into the course. The UAI is like a scaled mark… so 99.5 means your in the top 0.5% of the state… and it goes up in increments of 0.05 so you can get 99.5… 99.55…99.6 and so on and so forth…</p>
<p>yeah thats about it… lots of stress and for most girls lots and lots and lots of chocoloate… and for most people lots and lots of caffiene. It doesn’t sound that bad, but believe me, when half of your grade is based on one set of exams its pretty nerve racking when that exam is on an entire years worth of knowledge… </p>
<p>anyways I hope you understood that… ask if it didn’t make sense and if not I’ll explain (hopefully) next year at USC 
with the handy dandy hand movements that our princapal use to explain scaling.</p>
<p>oh yeah haha scaling. Its like to make it fairer, cause its easier to get 100 in one course then in another… say general maths and extension 2 maths… so when they are calculating the UAI different subjects have different weighting basically… makes it fairer if you take harder subjects…</p>
<p>told you it was long winded… and thats the simple version xP</p>
<p>WOW! Thanks for the explanation. I think I understood everything…kind of. That’s really confusing, but I guess you worked really hard. I love learning about things like that. hehe. <em>head explodes</em></p>
<p>you could say the last year was hell… but it will all be worth it if I get to USC hehe</p>
<p>but yes stupid system… then again most are xD glad you understood it though… don’t quite understand it myself</p>
<p>I figure I’ll join this party. Beeish, that was fantastic. I’m not extremely worried about admissions, but more for financial aid, because $52K is a lot of money :D. So, how is everyone and how was winter break?</p>
<p>Usc usc usc usc usc usc usc usc</p>
<p>I’m just worried about everything… </p>
<p>and I agree trojans trojans trojans trojans</p>
<p>I was being all sentimental yesterday and looking at the cards and letters I got when I left my school in the US and I noticed someone said something about me being a die hard trojan fan cause I wore my USC sweatshirt everyday to school in winter… and I was like haha yeah… I didn’t notice before… I’m going to need a new sweatshirt if I end up going though… the old one is all stretched out and worn out</p>
<p>I’ve held off of getting a trojan sweatshirt or hat recently until I decide to attend. I’d rather not be the idiot at <insert other=“” posssible=“” college=“”> wearing a USC sweatshirt. Beeish, where were you in the US?</insert></p>
<p>I was in LA. I’ve had the sweatshirt though since 9th grade… so I got my fair use out of it even if I don’t end up going haha.</p>
<p>I need to stop looking on CC. I keep reviewing past profiles of people who got scholarships, and it is killing me. I need something to distract me XD. Just think, we might know about whether we got in or not in 20 days!!!</p>
<p>haha cboy im doing the same thing! i’m so anxious to hear back!</p>