Repeating Year 11 From Year 12 (1 Viewer)

[RhythmKnight]

Hi, I am currently in Year 12 doing
Extension 1 Maths
Advanced Maths
Advanced English
Physics
Chem
Economics

As seen in the title, I have thoughts on repeating Year 11 as a Year 12 student. I have done few exams for each subjects and the marks are really appalling. I wished I put in more effort being a diligent student studying regularly. Anyways so far my marks are 12/20 for English, 26/26 and 26/35 for Advanced Maths, 10/35 for Extension 1 Maths, 15/20 Economics, Chemistry 15/27 and Physics 36/40. You may say the marks aren't that bad, but they are bad! I haven't put even 20% into school and I know I can do much better. I was really excited for Year 11 but I don't know why I did not feel right. I felt really sad and unmotivated to do anything. I stopped talking to my parents and avoided any communication. I am thinking to restart Year 11 and learn the foundations and set myself for Year 12. If I were to repeat, I will take up Extension 2 Maths and probably drop Economics. What are your thought on this? I feel like I would waste my 1 year of life but at the same time I feel like I can redeem myself to get 99+ ATAR instead of 80 ATAR.

 

[jazz519]

Well first off you need to consider what you want to do after high school in university. If the ATAR for the course you want isn't a 99 then it isn't as necessary to have that ATAR. I got a very high ATAR and ended up doing a degree that had around 96 ATAR cut off but many people got in with 90 ATARs due to bonus points. After the HSC literally no one will care what mark you got there. I won't lie yes it was helpful for me getting that very high ATAR because I was able to get scholarships and such but apart from that a higher ATAR doesn't mean you are gonna do better in uni, because the way uni exams and content is structured is very different and not so reliant on repeating problems over and over like the HSC does, because they want you to critically think in uni rather than follow a rote learning approach that you can get away with in HSC.

Also, this is a bit harsh to say but how can you guarantee that by repeating you will get a 99+ ATAR, the factors that go into getting such a mark are not always how much work or study you put in, but there is some level of natural ability that goes into that. I say this not to put you down, but as a person who has tutored HSC students for a couple of years, I have not yet seen a student make improvements from 80 to 99 ATAR. I have seen students who came to me initially and I would predict would get around 80-85 and ended up getting 94-95, but beyond that large improvement which still requires so much effort is difficult. The reason it is difficult is that improving in one subject is not hard but if you want to get a 99+ ATAR you need to improve in all subjects

It is true that maybe your mental state has influenced some of your marks, for this is you need to try find some support group like friends to talk to about your problems. If you keep the feelings and thoughts bottled up inside its easy to go into a certain mindset and hard to break out of that. By talking to people you will get advice from them as well as probably feel better overall. In terms of your parents, I know it can embarrassing admitting to your parents you are having problems, and you feel like they will be angry at you, but most parents if you just tell them what you are going through they will be understanding as that is the important thing to parents that you are safe and happy over marks

So what I'm trying to say is instead of repeating and assuming you are going to get a bad ATAR already, your marks aren't that bad and can be certainly improved just start studying hard and putting in the effort now and try to improve your marks overall. Going from what you think is a 80 ATAR to 90+ ATAR mid year into your HSC is not impossible and can be done with hardwork and dedication. If you don't get into the uni course you want, you can in most cases just complete a year in uni where you do some subjects and transfer into a different course