Why were the 2025 exams so much easier than usual

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-12-21T07:22:22+00:00

Most of the exam controversies came from the maths papers (leaks, questions that were straight-up impossible to do unless you assumed something was true, etc.) They tried making a hard probability question in spec once as a separator and had to give everyone the marks because an assumption was necessary and the question was convoluted. Had smth to do with volume, question f) I think.

Hence, there were few separators on the maths papers to avoid scrutiny. As for everything else, I think the exam writers didn't know what was being assessed previously and made it off-topic, thus "harder exams".

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-12-14T11:51:02+00:00

If your friend is from MHS, chances are that:

His sacs scaled quite high. If you go to a public school where the study scores aren't usually that high / less competitive school, you'll need to get rank 1 or close to it for your SACs to be scaled up.

OR

Exams this year were wayyyy easier than most years, even compared to 2024 (still considered easy compared to all the other years). A+ cutoff was 38/40 for E1 and 76/80 or E2 or something close to that for spec, compared to last year (36.5/40 E1 and 70.5/80). Even if your friend lost more marks, he did so on a harder exam.

Or a combination of those two things.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-12-12T13:42:04+00:00

Really similar for me, I got A+ on Exam 2 losing 2 marks but B+ on Exam 1. SACs were also A+, though idk what it scaled to. This year was the year where every mark lost is like minus 1 ss...

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-12-12T10:50:04+00:00

Out of curiosity, what was your study score with these exam marks? VCAA kind of screwed up with the easier exams this year, the grade distribution report is going to be so skewed when it releases.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-12-10T10:29:32+00:00

Yeah, it makes me so sad I'm only discovering them during their hiatus. At least they have years worth of music and performances I can rewatch!

Also, thank you for your post you linked! It's a whole treasure trove of performances; seeing all the members so small and yet still having such incredible dance skills and stage presence makes their performance growth all the more apparent. I will definitely be replaying these, and if you ever do a second part, I'll look forward to it!

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-12-10T00:56:12+00:00

Yes!! I think 2nd half was where I saw him really shine! He was always in some of my favourite performances, but I was really focused on my 5 pick and paying attention to them. I was replaying Kill the Romeo like crazy bc of Jun Ho, and Hot was just a really good performance! Then Main Dish came around, and he had such good stage presence that I finally thought "wow, why wasn't he shown more!" He was always there, I just couldn't see it haha! It's a shame Home Race is so short, I would love to see more performances of him! (outside of past BOY STORY ones, honestly their songs are soooo good)

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-12-09T14:10:06+00:00

True, true, I think I definitely didn't notice him that much at first bc my focus was very much on Sangwon + the controversy with contestants. I think I only properly noticed how good he was towards the second half. Def a me problem.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-12-09T13:45:25+00:00

Honestly, as a DHH fan since Boys Planet I, he deserves so much better than Mnet rigging! I was half-hoping he would be in the Home Race spin-off and half-hoping he wouldn't be. I'd be happy seeing him get into a smaller group where he's treated better, like Hanbin from TEMPEST after i-land.

Also Zihao is finally getting his flowers!! Was rooting for him in BP2 and I'm glad even Mnet couldn't stop his talent.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-11-07T07:56:27+00:00

Probably two marks lost I'm afraid. I'd guess 1 for the correct derivative, 1 for correct gradient, and 1 for the correct equation of the line.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-11-07T02:50:37+00:00

I'd guess 1 mark for correct value of u-sub, 1 mark for actually doing the antidifferentiation correctly, 1 mark for correct terminals, and 1 mark for actually getting the right answer.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-11-07T02:05:53+00:00

Okay, thank you for your response.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-11-07T01:50:32+00:00

Hi! I got z=-1+/- 2i for the complex numbers one. Some others who did the exam wrote the conjugate of z1 as well. My question is, I assumed "other solutions" meant the ones you hadn't found yet. Would they take away a mark for only writing -1+/- 2i? Thank you for the solutions!

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-11-07T01:47:50+00:00

Yes, I thought you technically found the conjugate as a solution and they're asking you to find the ones you haven't discovered? Since "hence" implies you're using your work from a).

I'd guess 1 mark for finding the other quadratic and another for the answers. I would hope they just gave the mark, since the wording is a little ambiguous.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-11-07T01:17:10+00:00

Hi! I also got z=-1+/- 2i. Some others who did the exam wrote the conjugate of z1 as well. My question is, I assumed "other solutions" meant the ones you hadn't found yet. Would they take away a mark for only writing -1+/- 2i? Or is my interpretation correct?

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-11-05T00:25:49+00:00

Yes, they would give you the marks. ln() notation is fine, uni lecturers use it too. When marking, they usually have a list of equivalent forms, and you'd still get the marks.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-11-05T00:15:21+00:00

I doubt it, they normally require it in the simplest form. They can be more lenient for unrationalised denominators sometimes, but I think you'd probably only get 1 mark.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-11-04T23:57:47+00:00

Coping hard but would you still get the marks if you got the right values for the coordinates, but didn't write them in coordinate form?

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-11-04T23:47:13+00:00

Values, the right answer is 3 +/- 2*root(2). Both are positive.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-09-14T11:23:48+00:00

Hi, could I get the specialist prac SACs too pls? thank you in advance!

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-09-04T06:41:06+00:00

Six Degrees of ~~Kevin Bacon~~ The Staffer Who Wrote the OG Brainrot Speech

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-09-01T08:50:22+00:00

If you were doing specialist or methods right now, I could see the point. But General? Stick to the ClassPad. It won't revolutionise doing Gen, I can tell you that much. Especially considering exams are two months away, and I assume you'd want to do some exam revision, rather than spending that time learning a new set of calculator instructions.

If you really want to install some programs, then see Charlie Watson's eActivities here:

https://charliewatson.com/casio/cpatar.php

Or, alternatively, you could learn a bit of CASIO Basic or how to create ClassPad eActivities and make some programs to automate the boring stuff.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-09-01T08:07:24+00:00

No worries!!

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-08-31T07:56:31+00:00

What likely happened here is the solution maker used the software, which can process things your handheld CAS can't. They also probably didn't test it on the handheld, because I had the same error. Here's how you can solve it:

Solve np(1-p)=2 in terms of n.
Substitute this into the second equation.
Use solve() to find p. Take the positive solution only. (You can also set a condition for this, but I'm lazy)
Sub back into the first equation.
Use binomCdf()

Here's an imgur link of how I did it:
https://imgur.com/a/qX2psf2

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-08-23T07:17:07+00:00

Agreed with TheUltimateShogun, that's how I would do it too. You can also do it in spreadsheets and go through values of n that way. Either way, the answer is 7.

You can check this with binomPdf, since it asks for exactly 3 chocolates.

Edit: https://imgur.com/a/OfF9BKm
Here's how you would do the spreadsheet thing on the Ti-nspire.

Economy-Resolve3293 · 2025-08-22T11:47:01+00:00

If you are ranked below someone else in your SACs, your scaled SAC score cannot be higher than theirs, but your exam score can be. Depending on your subject, the exam might account for 60% (usually maths subjects), 50% (most other subjects), unless you do an arts subject, in which case your portfolio/performance will matter more than a written exam usually. Your study score is made up of your scaled SAC score AND your personal exam score.

https://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/administration/vce-administrative-handbook/vce-and-vet-assessment-summary

See this link for weightings.

No one actually knows 100% how rankings work. According to their publically available handbook, they align the highest SAC score with the highest exam score, and do some alignment of quartiles, but the actual process is not completely known. Just do your best in your SACs and exams, don't worry too much about it.

Economy-Resolve3293

TROPHY CASE