that may be dangerous, not following instructions......at least 100 words by implication means maybe 120, 150 words.......for someone with moderate levels of english, the more you write, the more mistakes you make....and the more marks subtracted...........

remember, msian way of exams is, do NOT stray from the 'norm'..........if you do, no matter how brilliant the language, how succinct the argument, you are WRONG.......remember morals...........

if i am a marker, and the minimum is 100 words, i will start deducting marks once it exceeds 300 words.....one can impress the marker adequately with 300 words, if not, one is just wordy........lots of bulk and little content........

back to ts's question, it is a good thing to sub-stratify the a band, too many people are getting a's such that it means little now, you cannot differentiate between the REAL a's and the mediocre extensively coached a's..........the british a-levels have also done the same with the new a* band.........but unis like oxbridge don't even bother with the a-levels (they assume everyone applying is going to get 3a's), they select based on the interview and personal statement.........

in this respect, banded results system like spm/stpm/a-levels is inferior to either the percentile ranking system (eg aussie ter system) or raw marks system (eg american sats)...........

of course they lay out the results in order, and if the cohort size is big enough, it will follow the bell shaped normal curve, or close to it........

however, a's are not always given based on the percentage of cohort........but on the actual cut off marks.........which is why the number of a's keeps on increasing as students get better at spotting questions, and regurgitate sample model answers.......this happens with spm, and it happened with a-levels........how else can you explain in some subjects, 25% of students gets a grades........that is why the band grade system does not stratify the top a band adequately.......

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Added on October 5, 2009, 4:43 pmyou are mistaken..........

the steps are in 0.05 steps..........ie you get ters like 97.45, 97.50, 97.55 etc........

yes the ter is an overall ranking, each individual subject is also graded in the band form, so you do know how you perform in individual subjects........eg, in sam, you get a 20 step banding system, from a top of a20, a19, a18, a17, b16 and down........

i consider it the best grading system, where the unis have BOTH the overall rank of the student in relation to his peers without the effects of variations of the difficulty of the papers......and the individual grades of each subject taken........to help them select students, especially for critical courses......

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Added on October 5, 2009, 4:47 pmi know sats is not really the actual raw marks, but it is as close as you can get to raw marks, compared to either the band format of a-levels, or the percentile ranking of ter........

This post has been edited by limeuu: Oct 5 2009, 04:47 PM

different subjects are given different weigthage, and adjusted according........ie, someone scoring well on a 'soft' subject, may get a lower ter weighting than someone with a lower result on a hard subject like the sciences and specialist maths.........so it is already moderated......

in practice, it doesn't matter, as there are prerequisites for each uni course, and you will be competing against people with the same combination of subjects........even in 'generic' courses like laws (yes, anyone can do laws with any year 12 subjects), someone doing sciences will have an advantage as the same scores will translate into a higher ter than someone in the arts/humanities........

some of the peculiarities of the ter ranking system relates to the fact that it is a nationwide system based on a different examination format in each individual state......you are only referring to south australia.........each state in australia have their own different year 12 syllabus/exam format/results format.......the ter/enter/uai/op equivalence exercise is complex, but has been developed and fine tuned over the last 30 years and works fine for a country with many different education systems........it will be replaced by the nationwide atar next year..........

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Te..._Admission_Rank
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tertiary_Entrance_Rank

that unfortunately, is a fact.........that more intelligent people gravitates towards the sciences.......

fair or not, it works for that country........i don't hear people complaining in oz........you want an 'advantage'?.....go take the science subjects then.......

it might interest people to know that while in the uk a levels an A in any subject is equivalent, many blue chip unis will choose people who take solid subjects compared to soft subjects, and it is estimated that there is a 2 grade difference between the sciences and 'film studies', the 'softest' a-level subject.........ie the same person getting say a b in film studies will get a d in one of the science subjects.......

life is never supposed to be fair........that is why there is a gaussian distribution for almost everything......and thus some people are going to fall in the tail ends of the curve.....

in any case what is it you want?........first you criticise that hard subjects may be disadvantaged.......and when i explain they have compensated for that, you criticise that it is not fair..........

This post has been edited by limeuu: Oct 5 2009, 11:49 PM

if you think mumeichan is correct, an a+ is not based on actual marks but the top x% of the gaussian curve.......the truth is, it is a composite of the percentile cut off, and the actual marks......

which means that if it is an easy paper that year, and lots of people score above 85, they will move the a+ cut off upwards........

i don't think the gap between 1a and 2a is that wide........there are a lot of 1a's around, which i think is a very broad band.........in any case, nobody know how the bands are made, other than that the number of a's have increased significantly over the last 10 years.......if you have access to any schools spm results, go compare the overall results in 1998 and 2008........you will be amazed.....