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Greek Myth Series ➸ The Olympians 2 of 2

Australian Tertiary Admission Rank (ATAR)

I recently graduated from Year 12 as an ATAR student and since there’s quite a bit of mystery and confusion regarding how ATAR works (from personal experience) I want to share what I’ve learnt about it from the past two years. 

I hope that this helps future and current ATAR students and also non-Australian studyblrs to understand a little bit more about the Australian education system. 

Disclaimer: this is written by a WACE student and it’s all very general!! If you’d like to add something based on your own ATAR experience then please feel free to do so. 

1. Australian Tertiary Admission Rank is the primary method that universities across the country use to ‘assess and compare’ school-leavers. The keyword: rank. Your ATAR is not a score, its a rank. 

The highest ATAR someone can possible get is 99.95 and the lowest being zero. As a year 12 ATAR student, you are essentially being ranked relative to all other students who sat the ATAR exams that year. (Except Queensland because it doesn’t use the ATAR system.) If you get a 90 then that means that you did as good or better than 90% of the student population who took the exams.

This ranking is what most universities across Australia use when it comes to accepting Year 12 applicants. A certain course may have a ‘cutoff’ of 80 ATAR, while medicine courses usually have a cutoff of 98+ ATAR. 

At the end of Year 10 is when you typically pick your subjects if you decide that you want to be a university-bound student after high school. If you want a decent ATAR, then the school usually encourages you to pick a minimum of four ATAR subjects to a maximum of six ATAR subjects. Some schools are okay with a student doing four subjects, but in some schools it’s mandatory that students take six subjects.

For most students, the ATAR subjects that they’ve chosen for both Year 11s and 12s. But you are allowed to pick up or drop out of classes if you think that it doesn’t suit you. 

2. Your ATAR = final school grade + ATAR exams + scaling. Depending which state you live in, you’ll be taking your ATAR exams at the end of year 12 after your final high school exams. (October/November). Your top four ATAR exam scores are then combined with your final year 12 school grades for the same four subjects then some scaling magic happens and you get your ATAR in December.  3. Scaling. Scaling exists to maintain a fairness between the ‘easier’ subjects and ‘harder’ subjects. For example, physics which is generally considered to be a hard subject can get scaled up by a few points while psychology –a comparatively easier subject– can get scaled down. Even if both subjects do get scaled down, the expectation is that physics will only get scaled down by some points while psychology will get scaled down by a lot of points.

For this reason, a lot of students will take more difficult subjects in hopes of getting ‘scaled up’. But if there’s one thing I’ve learnt it’s that you shouldn’t never completely rely on getting scaled up. Yes, doing physics, Maths specialist and chemistry will probably get you in the 95+ ATAR if you do well in them. But doing it *just* because “they get scaled really well” is not a wise decision. 

This scaling factor depends on a number of factors that no one in my school is entirely sure of. But I’ve been told that these can include: how everyone in the state did in the exam, how the school ranked against the other schools, your English scores and so on. It honestly changes every year and can be different from person to person. Just because a subject gets scaled up in the previous year doesn’t guarantee that it will also get scaled up in next year. 

4. Choosing your subjects. Personally, I think it’s a much better decision to have well-balanced ATAR subjects. Think about:

which subjects interest you

your weaknesses + strengths

the required subjects for your preferred uni course

how well/bad scaling is for that particular subject vs the workload

Make informed decisions. Ask teachers and older students what it’s like doing certain subjects. Look at the course outlines if you can get your hands on them. Don’t let anyone pressure you!! It’s your future + education!

5. Course outlines & prac exams are your friends! You know those bits of papers that the teacher usually hands out in the beginning of the year? They’re most like the course outlines. Don’t throw them away. Don’t shove them into the depths of your bag, never to be recovered. Put it somewhere safe and look over it often throughout the year. 

Like any exams, ATAR exams are not a surprise. They will only test you on what you’ve been taught and how well you understand these concepts. The exams are based on the course outline content so make sure that you know it well.

Similarly, print off any recent past exams about that subject and do them regularly. The exam structure and the questions in general tend to be ‘recycled’ by the exam writers…Get the hang of the questions from past exams and your upcoming ATAR exams will be less intimidating. (I legit improved my maths exams score by 10% because I did like 10 prac exams!!).

5. DO YOUR BEST. Honestly, if you want to throw out all that scaling bs out of the window, then that’s fine too. Pick the subjects you wanna do but do your best. Always.