Exam Results

As almost everyone in New Zealand knows, the NCEA [our system name also called NZQA] results were given out today! I love to hear about what other people got and so that’s why I’m making this post, in case you lot want to know what I achieved.

Before I begin it may help you for me to go through the NCEA marking schedule. We do not use the A B C D E F system that most overseas countries use, instead we use [listed from worst to best] Not Achieved, Achieved, Merit and Excellence. Merits and Excellences are what most people aim for and are pleased with.

So, if you read this blog post, you will know that I had to have surgery in late October. This greatly impaired my last internal [assessments marked by my school] and 2 technology externals [assessments marked by NCEA] as I was doing them from home with no teacher guidance. One of them I did not complete and the other two I only managed to get an achieved in which was as I suspected they would. For my actual exams I was still impaired due to the aftercare of my surgery, etc. Because of my impairment, I was given a derived grade where the markers looked at my results throughout the year and compared them to my exam results. If I say got straight Excellences throughout the year in biology but only got Merit in my exam, they would bump my grade up to an Excellence because it is likely I would’ve gotten that grade if I hadn’t been impaired.

Now that long confusing bit is over, I’ll let you know what subjects I do. In 2013 I was required to do English and mathematics. I then also did specialist science [a more difficult science with extra topics] which included chemistry, biology and physics. I chose to do history, fabric design and digital technologies which is computing.

I got an endorsement for the whole year which basically means my average grade. I got a Merit endorsement which I am pleased about. I also got course endorsements for the subjects I could get them in. Merit for history and maths whilst I got an Excellence endorsement for English. I am extremely happy with my English as I wasn’t doing too well in that subject during the year.

My external results for technology courses, the ones I did from home;

Fabric Design: Achieved

Digital Technologies Computing: Achieved

My external results from the exams;

English: Achieved, Merit, Excellence

History: Merit, Excellence
Mathematics: Merit, Merit, Merit

Specialist Science;
- Biology: Merit, Merit
- Chemistry: Achieved, Merit
- Physics: Excellence, Excellence

So there they are. I am most pleased with my physics and maths results as I did not think I would get those grades. I don’t cope well with exams but I think I did okay and I am happy to be a solid merit girl. A lot of my friends did a lot better than me but I think it’s important not to compare yourself to other people as we all have different strengths and weakness and exams do not always reflect how good you are at a subject. I hope everyone who got their results back, be it Level One, Two or Three, did well and wish you all the best for your educational future.