HSC Distinction Courses (1 Viewer)

[priesty]

Hi all,

I'm in year 11 and have almost finished the HSC Chemistry course (I've been accelerated). The other day the D.P walked in and was telling us of the Distinction courses (Cosmology, Philosophy, Comparative Literature)....

Now, i have the option of doing it, and I need some feedback from those who migh have already done these?? I'm thinking about doing Philosophy - partly because I have no idea what Cosmology and C.L is about....

Does anyone have any information that could offer bout these? How much work does it involve etc etc etc EVERYTHING that you know about it would be great to help me form a decision.

Thanks

 

[ujuphleg]

To do a Distinction Course you'll need:

1. 85 or above in the course you are accelerating in
2. Approval from your principal.

Philosophy takes you through basic Metaphysics (Reality) etc. and a few other things. Comparative Literature is just that - comparing literature, but I've been told that you should have a good grasp of other languages for that. Cosmology is all about time, space, big bang, etc.

You have readings and "residentials" where for a 3 weekends you meet with the students from all over the state and have a weekend where you have classes etc.

More information can be found here

and the Syllabus for all Distinction Courses can be found here

Be warned: They are hard, and you need a great deal of self motivation to keep you up with the workload over the year. If you aren't a person who can work well on their own, these subjects aren't for you. Additionally, if you have no interest in them, the same golden rule applies - play your strengths, work hard and scaling won't effect you because you will have got the best mark possible.

Best wishes.

 

[Jago]

I wish i could've done cosmology, except you need to do 3u maths, and i only did 2 :/

 

[kami]

There are no prerequisites other than acceleration and reccomendation - you don't need to do maths at all if you want to do cosmology - though I'd think you'd be in an extremely tough spot. I don't think the specific score thing is correct(I might be wrong though...its been a while since I looked into it) either as standards are different for each course, 85 in one may not be 85 in the other. I suspect that the above two conditions were something imposed by the principal in order to get a reccomendation rather than a rule from the Board.

 

[jynxe]

I'm doing Philosophy this year and I loved it.

I wasn't even really an accelerant. I accelerated in Maths and English (4 Maths and 3 English) at my old school, but in Yr11 I changed schools, so I stopped the accelerated courses and just did them normally.

I just got my teacher to write a letter supporting my application and they let me do it.

Work wise: the easiest 2 units of my HSC.

In philo you do 4 short essays (500-750 words each), one 2-hour exam, and 2 longer essays (2000 words each), spread out over 3 terms.

The time taken to write the essays isn't actually that much, but to do well you have to do quite a bit of thinking before (and as) you write the essays, so they're logical and coherent and well argued.

Cosmology, from what I've seen, is much more work, but less thinking.

 

[fantasia]

i did philosophy back in 2004, it was pretty rewarding and actually was one of my favourite subjects that i did for the hsc. It's different to other subjects that you'd normally do at school, its alot more interesting and the way you learn it is pretty cool too. Like going to the residentials, having little tutorials and stuff.

but yeh the social part of it was pretty good too, meeting new and extremely bright/talented people, people that i still see around at uni.

if you do philosophy.. it's not much work in terms of homework and assignments and stuff.. but you would have to go through readings/think/understand them and come up with arguments and stuff.

my friends who did cosmo almost died from the workload.