The School Certificate

Course Performance Descriptors and School-based Assessment

Assessment for the Stage 5 Mandatory Australian Geography course will involve both school-based assessment and a School Certificate Test. Assessment for the Geography Stage 5 Elective course will involve school-based assessment only. The school-based assessment program needs to take the School Certificate grading system into account.

The School Certificate grading system is concerned with describing student achievement at the completion of a Stage 5 course. The grades A, B, C, D and E summarise levels of achievement ranging from Excellent (grade A) to Elementary (grade E). By applying the Geography Course Performance Descriptor statements to the available evidence of student achievement, teachers are able to make a summative judgement of the grade achieved by a student at the end of a course.

Where tasks are scheduled throughout the course, greater emphasis would generally be given to those tasks held towards the end of the course. For example, in a Stage 5 course extending over Years 9 and 10, the assessment information collected in Year 10 provides the fullest and latest picture of student achievement. In this case, a student’s performance in Year 9 would not be included in determining their grade unless that student had exited the course at the end of Year 9.

Information on achievement of Stage 4 outcomes is not to be used for the purpose of determining a grade for the School Certificate for formative and summative purposes. However, the tasks undertaken in Stage 4 should provide useful information about student progress. In this way, a student’s performance should benefit when similar techniques are applied in the assessment of the course during Stage 5.