NESA Requirements

HSC Requirements from NESA

To be awarded the HSC students must have:

Satisfactorily completed courses that meet the pattern of study required by NESA for the award of the Higher School Certificate. This includes the completion of the practical, oral or project works required for specific courses and the assessment requirements for each course.
Made a serious attempt at the Higher School Certificate examinations.
Studied a minimum of 12 units in the Preliminary Course and a minimum of 10 units in the HSC course. Both the Preliminary Course and the HSC course must include the following:
- At least six units from Board Developed Courses including at least 2 units of a Board Developed Course in English.
- At least three courses of 2 units value or greater.
- At least four subjects.
- A maximum of 6 units of science may be included in the Year 11 and 7 units in the Year 12.

Extension Courses

Extension Courses build on the content of the corresponding 2 unit course.

Both Advanced English and Mathematics have:

Preliminary Extension Courses.
Extension Courses in English and Mathematics in the Preliminary year.

Additional information about courses is available on NESA Website.

ATAR

To be eligible for an ATAR a student must complete

at least TEN units of Board Developed Courses including
at least two units of English.
no more than two units of a Category B subject can be included in the calculation of an ATAR.

Completing the HSC

To Satisfactorily Complete the HSC Students must:

Follow the course developed or endorsed by NESA.
Apply themselves with diligence and sustained effort to the set tasks and experiences provided in the course by the school, and
Achieve some or all of the course outcomes
complete the mandatory work placement required by the VET Board Developed Courses

NESA has available a flexible pattern of study where subjects can be accumulated towards the award of the HSC. Should a student’s circumstances (eg. illness) require a variation to the pattern of study, an interview should be arranged with the Principal.

What are Units?

All courses offered for the Higher School Certificate have a unit value. Subjects may have a value of 1 unit or 2 units. Most courses are 2 units.

Each unit involves class time of approximately 2 hours per week (60 hours per year). In the HSC each unit has a value of 50 marks, hence a 2 unit course has a value of 100 marks.

2 units = approximately 4 hours per week (120 hours per year) = 100 marks.

The following is a guideline to help you understand the pattern of courses.

1 Unit Course

Studies of Religion can be undertaken as either a
1 unit or a 2 unit course.

There are a few 1 unit Board Endorsed Courses.
These courses do not count in the ATAR.

2 Unit Course

This is the basic structure for all courses. It has a value of 100 marks

Extension Course

Extension study is available in a number of subjects.

Extension courses build on the content of the 2 unit course
and carry an additional value of 1 unit. This requires students to work beyond the standard of the 2 unit course. Extension courses are available in English, Mathematics, History and VET.

English and Mathematics extension courses are available at Preliminary and HSC levels. Students must study the Preliminary extension course in these subjects before proceeding to the two
HSC extension courses (Extension 1 and Extension 2).
The Extension 2 course requires students to work beyond the
standard of the Extension 1 course.

HSC Assessment and Reporting

The school-based assessments give students the opportunity to show their skills and knowledge in ways different to examinations. There can only be one examination block in Year 11 and one in Year 12.
Students need to be aware of the different types of assessment for the courses that they study. Different courses will have particular requirements/tasks. For example there might be a depth study in Science, a multimodal task in English, or investigation style tasks in Mathematics.
Informal tasks will be used assess students so that teachers can place them against the different standards.
The number of tasks is capped at three tasks for Year 11 and four tasks in Year 12.

Teachers have a syllabus package for each course. The packages include the syllabus content which teachers use to develop teaching programs, examination specifications, sample examination papers, sample marking guidelines, and a performance scale.

The syllabuses give a clear idea of the standards that are expected.

School-based assessment tasks will contribute to 50% of the HSC mark. Student’s school assessment mark will be based on performance in assessment tasks undertaken during the HSC course.

The other 50% will come from the HSC examination.

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