The final SACs for the year are happening right now. For those in Year 12, these will be the last ever! So we at Get Intellect thought it might be timely to answer 4 of the most common questions about SACs and the mysterious standardised ranking system.
1. Are SACs important?
Yes they are. SAC’s are used as a way of ranking individuals within a class/s. i.e. 1st, second third etc. The difficulty of SAC’s as we know can range from school to school, which is why exams and moderation comes into account. This is so that students in high achieving schools/classes are not disadvantaged.
2. Why do SACs rankings matter and how do they work?
Whatever you get as your exam mark, you keep. For example, you get 45/50; you will get 45/50 for your exam, (A+, A, B+ etc will depend on the performance of that years cohort in that subject). However depending on your ranking, your SAC marks can change. So this means, the mark you get at school isn’t necessarily indicative of your standardised SAC mark.
The person ranked first will get the highest exam mark as their SAC mark. The 2nd ranked person will get the second highest exam mark in their class as their SAC mark. For example, Joe is ranked 1st and gets A on his exam. Brigid is ranked 2nd and gets B+ on her exam. Henry is ranked 3rd and he gets A+ on the exam. Essentially these are the three highest exam marks in the class for that subject.
All individuals will keep their exam marks. Joe however will get A+ as his SAC mark because his ranked first. Brigid will get A since she is ranked second and Henry will get B+ since he’s ranked third.
| Ranking | Exam Mark | Standardised SAC Mark | |
| Joe | 1 | A | A+ |
| Brigid | 2 | B+ | A |
| Henry | 3 | A+ | B+ |
3. What is SAC moderation and standardisation?
Every subject has 3 Graded Assessments, GA1, GA2, and GA3. These GA’s have different weightings (which you can find from the VCAA website) and the weighted results are added up for a ‘final score’. For 2-exam subjects excluding maths, GA1 is the first exam, GA2 are the Unit 3/4 SAC scores, and GA3 is the second exam.
Your SAC scores are moderated by how well your cohort performs in the exam(s). If your cohort is not as strong, your SAC marks will be moderated down, and vice versa if your cohort does well. But you keep your exam mark; it doesn’t change.
4. Do badly on SACs smash the exam?
While it is still possible to do well even after receiving a bad SAC mark and ranking by doing well in the exam, this can only aid you so far. As SACs can be worth up to 50% of your subject score, it is important to try and do well in both SACs AND exams.
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