Minister for Education and Training today welcomed the findings of the two independent reports into the 2008 Higher School Certificate Special Examination provisions. The reports were by Walter Turnbull chartered accountants and Dr Jan Keightley, former Chief Executive of the Senior Secondary Assessment Board of South Australia

"Walter Turnbull, looked at the policies and procedures in place and their implementation by the Board of Studies," said Ms Firth.

"The audit found appropriate procedures were in place, there were clear guidelines and the Board of Studies complied with its established procedures.

"Dr Jan Keightley assessed a random sample of applications to test whether the Board of Studies' special provision benchmarks were being consistently applied.

"She found there was no evidence of any one schooling system or school being treated differently from others.

Dr Keightley found the measures set for determining special provision applications were appropriate and objective. These included medical reports providing diagnoses and evidence of student special needs and teacher comments observing the impact of the student's condition on their examination performance.

The Board of Studies may approve HSC special examination provisions for students with a special need that would prevent them from reading or answering the exam.

There are 18 categories of special needs:

• Asperger's syndrome • ADHD • Back disability • Cerebral palsy • Chronic fatigue/M.E. • Colour blindness • Diabetes • Epilepsy • Hand or arm disability • Head injury • Hearing impairment • Irlen syndrome • Illness or late injury • Learning difficulty • Medical miscellaneous • Pregnancy • Psychological • Vision impairment

Special provisions can include extra break or reading time, being allowed to eat during an examination, enlarged font size or colour paper and the use of a writer or scribe.

"Special provisions for the HSC are in place to provide students with a disability a fair go in their exams.

"We want to make sure every one of this state's students, regardless of which school they attend, has equal access to doing well in their HSC exams," said Ms Firth

Last year, 67,327 students sat Higher School Certificate examinations. There were a total of 4,613 applications for special provisions representing 7% of all students. Of these 71% of applications were granted in full.

Information about eligibility for special provisions is available on the Board of Studies website www.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au