Teachers are reminded that all syllabuses and related examination and assessment materials have been updated to reflect assessment and examination changes for the Preliminary and HSC course in 2010.

The following documents for 2010 are now available on the Board's website.

• Syllabus
• Assessment and Reporting Requirements
• Sample Assessment Schedule
• Information Regarding the 2010 HSC Examination
• Summary of HSC Examination Specifications and Assessment Requirements

Specimen examination materials that illustrate differences in the types of examination questions will be produced for a small number of courses. Schools will be advised as these become available on the website.

Examination rubrics will be amended where necessary to indicate the criteria that will be used to assess examination responses. These will be available on the Board's website in Term 1, 2010.

Due to ongoing consultation or syllabus reviews, several HSC courses will not be affected by examination and/or assessment changes in 2010. Please go to the HSC Syllabus section of the Board's website for course specific details.

Read more about changes to HSC examinations and assessments
Read the full Board decision
Read the analysis of consultation responses
See the changes for each course
Media Release - February 2009

Inquiries: Chris Thompson, Head, Assessment Unit, chris.thompson@bos.nsw.edu.au, (02) 9367 8069.

Sample Assessment Schedules

The addition of sample assessment schedules for each course will help teachers to better adhere to the Board's recommended number of assessment tasks. The range of schedules demonstrate how assessment programs can be constructed to meet the Board's parameters that three to five tasks are sufficient for a 2 unit course and two to three tasks are sufficient for a 1 unit course.

In most cases for 2 unit courses, the sample schedule uses five tasks, but schools may use four or three if they prefer. In some cases, more than one schedule is provided, and further assessment schedules are planned to be added in the future. Each schedule shows that a variety of tasks can be used and that, overall, the weighting requirements for each of the assessment components are met. (Note that in a small number of courses, the number of tasks varies from the general requirements.)

There are many other ways in which similar HSC assessment grids could be constructed that may involve different types of tasks, timing of tasks and weightings given to each task. Schools may use the sample assessment schedules without modification, or change them to suit their particular needs, being mindful that the weightings for each of the assessment components in HSC courses are mandatory.

The sample assessment schedules reflect any changes that have been made to course assessment components and/or weightings.

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