HSC students will be given more time to work on their major projects and to prepare for exams to reduce the impact of the current COVID-19 lockdown.
The NSW Education Standards Authority (NESA) COVID-19 Response Committee has announced additional changes to the 2021 HSC timetable to give students additional time to prepare for upcoming HSC exams.
In recognition of the evolving COVID-19 situation and in line with health advice, NESA will:
- Extend the hand in date for all major projects by two weeks. The hand-in date for Industrial Technology has been extended by four weeks.
- Reschedule Drama performance exams to run from September 6-17.
- Music performance exam continue as scheduled, running from August 30 to September 10.
- Reschedule the written exams to begin one week later on October 19 with HSC results out on December 17.
Committee chair Peter Shergold said students could still receive their results, ATAR and university offers this year despite written exams being delayed by a week.
“We know students want certainty about their exams, our priority is to limit disruption to HSC students,” he said.
“We recognise that students and schools across the state are operating under a variety of different circumstances. We will outline a special illness and misadventure process and any other contingency arrangements needed to ensure equity and fairness for all students.”
NESA chief executive officer Paul Martin said the priority for NESA and the school sectors was providing considered advice to students that aligned with the health advice and was fair to the whole cohort.
“The changes to the exam timetables mean all students have some additional time to prepare for exams or complete their project,” Martin said.
“We learnt a lot about our processes in the HSC last year and I am confident that we can apply those lessons this year.”
Earlier this week, oral language exams were rescheduled to start on August 14.
COVID safe exam practices, including minimising school groups mixing, mandatory masks for everyone except the student during the exam, and Perspex screens will be in place at the oral language exams.
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