Is ATAR calculated by the raw external marks solely, without your school assessment (internal) marks? I did an accelerated course for geography with 90 aligned external and 95 internal with 93 being the final HSC mark. Using the ATAR calculators, 93 is pretty good with an atar equivalent of ~98.7. But given geography scales pretty bad and the raw mark of 90 internal I assume will be a lot lower in percentile, will this greatly affect my Atar? For example, will a 93 achieved by 93 internal 93 external be a lot better than a 90 and 95 in terms of Atar, even though both get 93 HSC?
I'm sorry OP, but your wording is confusing so I'll interpret your question in 2 ways and answer them both.
First of all OP, you
did not receive a "raw mark" of 90 for Geography. That mark was scaled to 90 - in reality your "raw mark" was probably in the 70s or 80s. I think you understand that but you did say "raw mark of 90 internal". Hence why there's a bit of confusion in the replies.
Also, ATAR is definitely
not calculated by "raw external marks solely". If ATAR was calculated by "raw external marks solely", then what would be the point of school assessments and internal marks? It's calculated by scaling your
HSC marks (A 50/50 mix of internal
scaled (school) marks and your external HSC
scaled mark) accordingly, to a final score of 500 (for 10 units - 50 marks/unit). Certain scores will correlate to certain ATARs. Certain subjects scale differently, but
don't assume "geography scales bad" hence "My ATAR is going to be bad".
OP's question (version 1): "Does rounding up a HSC mark, for example a 92.5 to a 93, make any difference to ATAR compared to someone who got a 93 on the dot?"
Answer: No. NESA's "Report on the Scaling of the 2021 HSC" states that "For each course, students receive three marks — an examination mark, a school assessment mark and an HSC mark — all of which have been aligned to NESA’s published standards
and rounded to whole numbers". Hence your HSC marks are submitted to UAC (who calculate your ATAR) as whole numbers only.
OP's question (version 2): "Does your internal mark
directly affect your ATAR?" (that is, for the same HSC mark, does a lower internal mark lead to a a lower aggregate score/ATAR).
Answer: No. All that matters is your HSC mark. There should also be no difference between a higher and lower internal mark if your HSC mark is the same. The internal mark does
not directly affect your ATAR - only when it is averaged with your external exam mark to form your
HSC mark.
Either way, all that matters is the HSC mark on your HSC results table. Look at your HSC mark and ignore the rest (for the sake of ATAR calculation).
Keep in mind as you accelerated Geography in 2021, your HSC mark will be compared to those who also completed it in 2021 - this means Talent 100's ATAR calculator (if it uses 2021 data) is likely very accurate and you have done extremely well. All you need to input in the calculator is your
HSC mark. Nothing else.
