Identify Trends - Student Achievement Data

What is achievement like across all senior sciences - we have staff reporting that students are not as prepared as they could be when they arrive, but what is the data telling us? I compared all Achievement Standard data from 2015, 2016 and 2017 with the 2016 National results (across all decile schools) and also with the 2016 National Decile 1 results. 

Results seem to indicate that while teachers feel some of our students are less prepared than they could be and that we need to "catch them up" on previous years' learning sometimes, their performances are by-and-large on par with the rest of the country.

These overall results could hide standards that students are find much harder and perform worse in, by mixing the data with standards they found easier and performed better in. This data also reports on internal and exam performance together.

Year 12 Biology Results

Year 12 results across 2015, 2016 and 2017 follow a similar proportion of grades to both 2016
National Statistics and Decile 1 Statistics too, although slightly less Excellences and more of
other grades.

Year 13 Biology Results

2015 results are similar to the National Statistics in Decile 1.

2016 results are similar to the 2016 National Statistics across all deciles.

2017 results shows a large increase in Excellence (almost 50% of all grades).

Year 12 Chemistry Results

Results in 2015 and 2017 are very similar.

2016 saw a small increase in NA and E and a decrease in A and M.

All three years have a higher proportion of NA than 2016 National Statistics and Decile 1 Statistics.

Year 13 Chemistry Results

2015 and 2016 show similar proportions of NA and A grades, with a few more E’s in 2015 than
in 2016.

2017 results show a lot less NA compared to 2016 National Statistics and also Decile 1 schools. There was also a
decrease in E and therefore a large increase in Achieved and Merit grades.

Year 12 Physics Results

2016 has a similar pattern of results to other Decile 1 National Statistics.

2016 and 2017 results both have more NA and less E than the overall 2016 National Statistics.

Compared to 2016, 2017 saw a slight increase in NA and a small decrease in A, while the M
and E remained fairly similar.

Year 13 Physics Results

2016 and 2017 Not Achieved results sit squarely between Decile 1 National Statistics and the
overall National Statistics.

2016 had a greater proportion of M and E than the 2016 National Statistics, and much less
Achieved.

2017 had a very similar proportion of M and E to the 2016 National Statistics.

TLDR: There doesn't seem to be a clear trend across time or the three subjects. Most results are on par with 2016 Decile 1 results, and some appear more like 2016 average nationwide results from all deciles. Results vary by year.