ASSESSMENT POLICY (Years 11 and 12)

Scotch College has adopted this policy for the assessment of Senior School work.

At the beginning of the year students will receive assessment guidelines for each subject outlining the following:

• The details of the course assessment structure
• The type of assessments that will be used
• The timing and nature of each assessment
• The work that will be covered by each assessment

At various times during the year, students will receive information about their progress.

At the end of the year, Year 8 to 10 students will receive an IBMYP 1-7 grade for each subject studied.

Year 11 to 12 students will receive a grade or level for each subject studied - provided the course and the assessment items for that course have been completed. A student may confirm with the Curriculum Leader for each of his subjects that results for assessment items have been entered correctly.

Review of Marks and Grades

A student may ask for a review of his marks and/or grades to determine whether:

• the assessment procedures conform with the Curriculum Council guidelines;
• the assessment procedures conform with the Scotch College assessment policy;
• there are any procedural or computational errors.

A review must be requested within five School days of issue of grades. In a review, work will not be remarked.

Absence from Tests and Examinations

A student who knows that he is going to be absent has the responsibility to inform his class teacher well in advance, so that suitable arrangements can be made.

Students who miss a test or examination without giving prior notification will be given zero. This result may be amended if documentation outlining the appropriate medical / misadventure circumstances is provided and special consideration is granted. The result is determined as an estimate or by sitting a supplementary test or exam.

Failure to submit Assignments/Projects/Fieldwork

If a student fails to submit work on time, without a valid reason, parents and the House Head will be notified. Failure to submit work in Year 11 and 12 could result in a U (Unfinished) or RNM (requirements not met) for the course.

Students who are absent when work is due must submit the work on return to School or as soon thereafter as possible. A student may gain an extension of time without penalty provided a valid reason is given in advance of the due date. A note or medical certificate may be required in appropriate cases.

If an assignment is due on the day of a School excursion or camp or a pre-arranged absence, it should be submitted before the student leaves.
Computer failure may not be taken as a valid reason for the late submission of an assignment.

Cheating

If cheating in an examination or test is established, then a zero will be given for the whole paper. The parents of the student will be advised by the Headmaster. A student who willingly allows another student access to his work will also score zero.

Plagiarism

A student's work will not be accepted if it is clear that it contains a significant amount of unacknowledged material that is not his own. The student's parents and House Head will be advised.

Plagiarism Defined

Students at Scotch College are explicitly taught how to acknowledge their sources of information.

Submitting an assignment that has been copied from a book, article, CD-ROM or the internet or from another student without permission or acknowledgment is called plagiarism.

It is unethical and unacceptable for a student to engage in any of the following actions:

• submit an essay written in whole or part by another student as if it were his own
• download an essay from the internet, then quote or paraphrase from it, in whole or in part, without acknowledging the original source or obtaining permission to use it
• restate a phrase verbatim (word for word) from another writer without acknowledging the source
• paraphrase part of another writer's work without acknowledging the source with a citation, footnote or endnote
• reproduce the substance of another writer's ideas without acknowledging the source
• cheat on tests or quizzes through the use of hidden notes, viewing another student's paper, revealing the answers on his own paper to another student, through verbal communication, sign language, or other means of storing and communicating information, including electronic devices, recording devices, mobile phones, headsets and laptops
• copy another student's homework and submit the work as if it were his own
• have another person, for example a tutor or parent, do parts or all of his assignment

Cheating comes in many different forms and the list above is not exhaustive.

Plagiarism detection and prevention

There are a number of methods for determining if plagiarism has occurred. These include:

• Searching for the occurrence of specific sentences or unusual phrases contained within a suspect assignment using Internet search engines
• Searching Library full text databases for text taken directly from a journal article
• Searching research papers available for purchase via "paper mills"
• Checking students' work using plagiarism detection software, such as Turnitin. Turnitin allows students to review their work and provides teachers and students with a tool for checking the integrity of work submitted.

Any work submitted by a student may be checked for plagiarism, including through an electronic system, and be held in the database for future matching purposes and protection of his work against copying by others.

Course Change

The Curriculum Council Syllabus Manual for Year 11 & 12 subjects 2008 states that students who have missed assessments because of transfer from one school to another, or from commencing a subject late in the school year (in exceptional and justifiable circumstances), will be provided with an opportunity to demonstrate achievement of subject outcomes or objectives. This must provide sufficient information for teachers to estimate the position in relation to other students at the time of assigning final grades and numerical assessment. Such students will not be expected to complete all missed assessment tasks. They will however be informed of the work they have missed.

With the exception of special cases, Scotch College will not accept changes of courses after Term 1.

Examination Instructions

Scotch College will follow the examination rules used by the Curriculum Council for the TEE. These are given in the Year 12 Curriculum Council handbook and will be supplied separately to Year 11 students.

Breaches of these rules and/or instructions will incur severe penalties.

Learning Difficulties

Students who have temporary or permanent disabilities may get appropriate consideration for assignments, tests and examinations. The School Psychologist and Director of Teaching and Learning in conjunction with Curriculum Leaders, will determine the type and amount of consideration to be given. Parents and students will be obliged to supply (or to have supplied) over a number of years, documentation to support an application for special consideration in internal or external assessments. Further information on this can be obtained from Ms Lipscombe, the School Psychologist.

Subject Completion

In order to complete a subject and be eligible to receive a grade, a student must complete the School's education and assessment programme for the subject.

If a Curriculum Leader feels that a student will not complete a course he/she will inform the Director of Teaching and Learning. Some possible reasons for not completing a course might be:

• Starting a course late in the year.
• Not completing sufficient assessment items.
• Failure to complete assessments at the end of the year, including the final School examinations

It is important to distinguish between failure to gain a sufficient standard in a course and not completing the course itself.

For all subjects in Years 11 and 12, if a student fails to submit work by the due date or fails to arrive for a test or examination and the reason is unacceptable, a letter will be sent home by the Director of Teaching & Learning advising his parents/guardians that this has occurred. Failure a second time means that a student is in danger of not completing the assessment programme for the course and is likely to be awarded a U notation for the subject. U means the subject cannot count towards Secondary Graduation.

It is possible however to change a U notation to a grade in the following year if the student completes the assessment programme. For students still at school, the process for this would involve a recommendation from the appropriate Curriculum Leader to the Director of Teaching & Learning.

A teacher is under no obligation to accept or mark tasks that arrive late unless there has been some previous negotiation. Similarly, a student or parent cannot demand that a School provide additional opportunities for a student to complete a task. This in effect means that a student must show that he has attempted the whole assessment programme before a grade can be determined. As a School we have the discretionary power to decide between cases for which there is an acceptable reason for a student not submitting a task and cases where there is not an acceptable reason. The determination of an unacceptable reason will be by the Curriculum Leader following a recommendation from the class teacher.

In Year 12 it is possible for students to receive both a U notation for not attempting assessment items and a numerical assessment. The U notation means that the subject cannot be used for Secondary Graduation but the numerical assessment could be used for calculation of the TER. In calculating the numerical assessment a zero would be given for the assessment items that have not been attempted. In these cases, the student could show through the final examination that he has demonstrated the outcomes of the course. Any questions concerning the School Assessment Policy should be addressed to the Director of Curriculum Administration.

Reports

Grades on reports reflect work covered during the year or the length of the course if it is less than a year.

School Reports are confidential communications between the School and parents, and through them with the boy. As well as being a report on past performances, they also provide the School with an educational tool, because the report can contain constructive criticism and advice for the boy. Accordingly, the report is frequently not suitable as a reference for employment. A confidential reference is available on request from the Headmaster's Personal Assistant.