NCEAs compared to GCSE's and A-levels

[Tia Maria]

Can someone who is familiar with both the UK and NZ system explain the similarities and differences to me?

I'm not looking for a 'which is better or worse' but just the practicalities.

For instance in the UK, GCSEs are a 2 year course which you start at age 15, many children leave at 16 but some stay on to take a 2 year A-level course and leave at 18.

But for NCEAs I've seen references to level 1, 2 and 3 and those being year long courses and therefore shorter than the 4 years for GCSEa and A-levels. How does this work?

Also I've seen lots of references to credits, do these just determine whether you have, for instance, done enough to get NCEA History, or do they also affect the grade?

Also I notice lots of courses require you to have taken previous courses, does this work well, or does it restrict children's choices as they have to choose quite early which path to take?

Finally, I notice NCEAs don't use grades A to E but pass marks and merits. Is a pass similar to a C grade or an E grade in GCSEs or A-levels?

If possible can you refer to both age and Year group in NZ as I haven't quite got my head around these - what is the last compulsory schoool year in NZ and is that when children are 16yrs old?

Cheers

Tia

[three to go]

Hi Tia

Sorry can't help you with the specifics of your enquiry - I am still trying to understand it all myself !

I just wondered if you had looked at the Min of Ed and NZQA websites? I find the pages below useful for general info. The pdf 'Understanding NCEA' from the NZQA may be of some use with regard to credits / grades etc

http://www.nzqa.govt.nz/ncea/about/index.html

http://www.nzqa.govt.nz/publications...stand-ncea.pdf

http://www.minedu.govt.nz/Parents/Yo...ndingNCEA.aspx

http://www.minedu.govt.nz/NZEducatio...NCEA/NCEA.aspx

TTG

[Tia Maria]

Thanks TTG, I think I'm slowly understanding it, although I'm sure someone can tell me if I've got the wrong end of the stick!

From what I can tell you do NCEAs in Year 11 (the equivalent of UK 5th form) and it is a 1 year course comprising of some compulsory units in Literacy & Maths and other units chosen by the student.

You don't get NCEAs in specific subjects as you do with GCSEs, instead you pass, (hopefully!), the year and can also get Merits and Excellence. You end up with NCEA level 1. In the same respect those who choose to do IGCSE in NZ will most likely do these in one year in Year 11, even though technically it is a 2 year course.

Then those that choose to stay on can take NCEA level 2, in Year 12, (similar to lower 6th in UK), and NCEA level 3, in Year 13 (upper 6th in the UK). You need to do level 3 in order to get to University. There are various unit requirements in order to pass but it appears you can sometimes use units from previous years and bank units also.

It seems important to check out possible University course early on, in order to establish what subjects they need you to take, and some units in level 3 require you to have taken previous courses in level 2, so students need to be aware of certain study paths.

There appears to be great debate over whether A/S levels and A-levels, (offered via the CIE programme), are 'better' than NCEAs but what they all seem to agree on is the approach to learning is different. A-levels allow the students to specialise more fully while NCEAs take a broader approach to learning. To further complicate matters there is also the IB, which while taking on the more general format of NCEAs, is argued to offer more depth and critical thinking.

Can anyone confirm if this sounds about right?!

Cheers

Tia

[slim8589]

Having been a teacher for 15 years in the Uk and 6 here I'll say that you have got the general gist of it.

NCEA Level 1 is roughly equivalent to GCSE, Level 3 to A'Level.

Students study a range of subjects at Level 1 for just 1 year and need to gain 80 credits to pass level 1. Some need to be from maths, some from English.

In addition to this there are 2 types of exam that they can take. Achievement Standards are assessed at either Not Achieved, Achieved, Merit or Excellence. These standards will be a mixture of old school, sit in the hall externally marked exams and internally assessed project work.
The other standards are Unit standards which are more vocational and are either a pass or a fail. Most of those will disappear shortly.
Both types of standard carry a credit value that contributes to that 80 credit pass mark.

It is similar at level 2 and 3 but the credits required are 60 and 80 respectively (although they don't all have to be at Level 2 or Level 3).

One major difference is that rather than being able to say "I passed English" or "I passed Physics" all of the courses are made up of a number of assessments so it is possible to get your 80 credits and only have a few credits in a specific subject.

The students are well aware of this and will 'cherry-pick' the subjects that they need to pass. Also it is possible to have picked up enough credits part way through the year meaning that they don't have to do any work towards the end. To try to combat this they have introduced endorsements that indicate that a certain number of credits were gained at Merit or Excellence level. This works for the really motivated kids but not the rest.

I hope that goes some way to explaining things but please do feel free to ask more specific questions.

Having worked in both systems I would say they both have their faults but I am not a fan of NCEA and that is one (of the many) reason we are leaving as I would much prefer my kids to do GCSE's.

Having been an external marker both in the UK and here I would also say that I am concerned at the quality of external marking and the cost-cutting that goes on here.

[norma]

Thanks for posting this thread Tia as it is a subject I've been meaning to post on for a while as quite a few of my Kiwi friends are looking at alternatives to NCEA. Thanks also to slim8589 for your explanation and views of the system.

[Tia Maria]

Thanks Slim I had wondered what the difference was between Achievement and Unit standards.

Have you experienced NCEA level 4? I've heard that they are as challenging as A-levels but not as traditional in their approach.

This article is quite old but had an interesting viewpoint on CIE:

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/ED0511/S00029.htm

I find it interesting that one of the reasons CIE is good for schools is because NZ schools have a good chance of getting top spots and winning prizes as other schools are in developing countries, I hadn't realised there was a commercial aspect to it.

And IB now seems to be the latest contender......

I get the impression they are still tweaking NCEAs, would you say that's the case? Teachers seem to either fall into the category of saying lets support the NZ system and find a way to make it work. Or let's just jump ship and adopt International methods instead.

Norma, like you, I live in an area where school options after primary school are a hot topic. I find it difficult as it often feels like everyone is looking for that magic answer for their special child and automatically assume that the standard path won't be good enough, but then it is also an area where lots of school hopping goes on anyway. I think everyone is probably just spoilt by too many good options!

Cheers

Tia

[slim8589]

Tia,

I have no experience with level 4, sorry.

I remain unconvinced by CIE, IB and IGCSE simply from the point of view that they are not that widely known here outside of the expat community as far as I am aware, though that might be different in the big centres. There is a good case for kids that live here and are going to go to uni here (or get a job) to study NCEA simply because that is the system. If my own kids were offered it then I would also want them doing the equivalent NCEA exams to be on the safe side, and to be honest unless I was thinking of returning to Europe I'm not sure what the point of kids doing CIE etc is. There seems to be quite a lot of 'snob' value attached to it.
On the other hand given a choice as to which I'd prefer to teach I much prefer the syllabus led system of GCSE/A'Level as opposed to the make it up as you go along NCEA where supposedly if you teach 'the subject' then the achievements come naturally - nonsense in my experience.
We toyed with the idea of CIE at my school but the cost implications were quite high and there was not a lot of support for it nor was there really much perceived need.

My son started secondary school this year. He was doing fine under the NZ system and if we were staying he would have done NCEA as the other options are not available here and I would have been ok with that. I understand completely the emotions that kick in when you are talking about your own child's education and how people simply want the best for them. I'm not sure there is an ideal as each child is quite obviously different and education is not simply about the exams at the end. Which as I have mentioned before contributes to our decision to leave. I am quite keen to give my two boys wide experiences and believe that our time here with the boys in primary and intermediate school has been a fantastic time for them. But I now want them to see more of the world and think that our next move will provide that for them. The fact that they will be studying the UK curriculum is an added bonus in my eyes.

Finally I'm not sure that it is simply the teachers driving the call for CIE etc (not down here anyway). I know that an awful lot of the staff at Auckland Grammar are from the UK now and I have also visited Takapuna Grammar and Westlake Boy's and if there is a push to move away from NCEA you have to ask, who does that benefit? We had friends who lived in Browns Bay and spent a lot of time on the North Shore a couple of years back and I was struck by how many people there were poms. What limited experience I have is that kiwi parents, kiwi kids, kiwi employers and kiwi Universities are not the ones pushing for the adoption of UK exams.

I'm hoping that none of that sounds too pompous, too scathing of the education system here (because I do not believe it is terrible by any means) or too anti poms on the North Shore

[Tia Maria]

Oh yes the North Shore has a very large expat community from UK, Other Europe, S. Africa, America, Japan & China. Many of the Kiwis that live here are also from other parts of NZ, so it's quite a transient place. It's not quite the melting pot I came from in London but like most suburbs, near to major cities, it is getting more multicultural by the day.

I think this does affect people's desires to look for an exam system that they feel is familiar if only because they often still have a foothold in their home country and feel they may return sometime. I also suspect that the fact that it's got quite a high socio-economic group means there is a lot of parent power. Heavily involved parents are both a blessing and a curse to local schools!

I'd got the impression that the Auckland Grammar reaction to NCEAs was coming more from a traditional education stance, unhappy with an education system that was trying to be more inclusive. A bit like the reaction to GCSEs, when O-levels were first scrapped, from some of the more traditional schools.

I'm not sure where the drive for the IB is coming from but it seems to be appealing to those who wish to be part of the academic elite as it is more expensive than both NCEAs and CIEs.

I also get the impression that when schools offer both NCEAs and CIEs, although it's not openly said, it is felt the more able do CIEs. In terms of entrance to NZ Unis I have no idea whether they are looked on more favourably or not.

Has anyone got kids doing NCEAs, CIE, IBs? What do they think?

Cheers

Tia