What does it take to maintain a wam of above 90-95 in a hard course? (1 Viewer)

[idkkdi]

would a high WAM help in employment after uni ?

yes, but often the time spent could be better used elsewhere to increase your employability more

 

[Life'sHard]

would a high WAM help in employment after uni ?

I’m going to say experience would help more with employment than WAM. However if you are top 1% with 99 WAMS, employment should be no problems for you.

 

[Momentazeus]

Coming from someone who had a wam near 90 in their degree (adv science - chemistry major and math minor).

This kind of WAM is near impossible for 99% of people. I don't mean to put it in a way that hard work doesn't yield good results because it is an important factor in achieving high marks.

In the HSC you basically have the ability to spend all your time on school/study with very few people working a job and if they are it's only a few hours a week. In uni you will have to juggle around more things and so in my opinion based on you saying for the ordinary individual it's near impossible.

Firstly, you need to understand that the WAM mark is not like the HSC. There's no scaling or aligning that happens. The mark you get in most of the subjects is a raw mark. So say your final test was worth 100% of your grade and you score 80. That's your final mark you get so it will contribute 80 to your WAM. Unlike HSC where a 80 raw mark might mean you get like close to 90 HSC mark. So the number system is different. You can kind of think of a 75+ which is a distinction being the same as getting a band 6 in HSC. While a 85+ which is a high distinction would be like getting a mid band 6 and then 90+ is like getting a state rank equivalent mark.

Getting that kind of WAM even if you spend hours a day studying all comes down to a high level of intelligence, natural intuition and ability to think in the way the degree requires. Much of that you can't gain through just studying for hours. You either have it or you don't. That is because a WAM of 90-95 in most degrees after the 4 years will rank you at the very top of your cohort. Like basically you are top 5 of bigger degrees and for others you will be like top 3 or maybe even 1st.

From my own experience of ranking 1st in multiple subjects at uni, the mark to rank 1st in a subject from 2nd year onwards might only be a low 90. Even in one case I ranked first in a course with an 88. At the end of my degree I had the highest WAM in my course and that was an 89.3. So you can understand from this that the study hours component is not the main factor in it.

So basically getting a 90+ wam is harder than getting a 99.95? Also, how many hours a day do you study?

 

[idkkdi]

So basically getting a 90+ wam is harder than getting a 99.95? Also, how many hours a day do you study?

pure percentile wise it's probably easier.
but hsc is more 'gameable'

 

[jazz519]

would a high WAM help in employment after uni ?

In general having a high WAM will be beneficial for getting your first opportunity at an internship or job but after that the skills and experience you gain from working would be more important. So I wouldn't really focus all your energy on getting a high WAM and neglecting things like work experience

 

[AlwaysGrinding]

Coming from someone who had a wam near 90 in their degree (adv science - chemistry major and math minor).

This kind of WAM is near impossible for 99% of people. I don't mean to put it in a way that hard work doesn't yield good results because it is an important factor in achieving high marks.

In the HSC you basically have the ability to spend all your time on school/study with very few people working a job and if they are it's only a few hours a week. In uni you will have to juggle around more things and so in my opinion based on you saying for the ordinary individual it's near impossible.

Firstly, you need to understand that the WAM mark is not like the HSC. There's no scaling or aligning that happens. The mark you get in most of the subjects is a raw mark. So say your final test was worth 100% of your grade and you score 80. That's your final mark you get so it will contribute 80 to your WAM. Unlike HSC where a 80 raw mark might mean you get like close to 90 HSC mark. So the number system is different. You can kind of think of a 75+ which is a distinction being the same as getting a band 6 in HSC. While a 85+ which is a high distinction would be like getting a mid band 6 and then 90+ is like getting a state rank equivalent mark.

Getting that kind of WAM even if you spend hours a day studying all comes down to a high level of intelligence, natural intuition and ability to think in the way the degree requires. Much of that you can't gain through just studying for hours. You either have it or you don't. That is because a WAM of 90-95 in most degrees after the 4 years will rank you at the very top of your cohort. Like basically you are top 5 of bigger degrees and for others you will be like top 3 or maybe even 1st.

From my own experience of ranking 1st in multiple subjects at uni, the mark to rank 1st in a subject from 2nd year onwards might only be a low 90. Even in one case I ranked first in a course with an 88. At the end of my degree I had the highest WAM in my course and that was an 89.3. So you can understand from this that the study hours component is not the main factor in it.

Do they give ranks in uni courses?

 

[Momentazeus]

Yeah first year a decent amount of people can get a 85+ WAM since the courses are generally easier and there is more support available in terms of study notes, question booklets and things that are similar to how you can study for HSC exams. But yeah afterwards the difficulty to get that kind of mark really increases as they tend to not release many past papers and the content becomes harder. In most courses if you get a high distinction after 2nd year you are likely in the top 5%.

How many hours a day do you roughly study?

 

[jazz519]

So basically getting a 90+ wam is harder than getting a 99.95? Also, how many hours a day do you study?

It's not really comparable since it's based on different things. I was just giving that as a description of a 90 mark in hsc is not the same as a 90 mark in uni due to no scaling and aligning being present. Some degrees it's harder to get higher WAMs than others just do to how the marking works or the amount of assignments/exams which eliminates the possibility to get 100%. Like for instance in science degrees you have multiple components like labs, lab reports, quizzes, mid term exams, assignments and the final exam so it's not really possible to get marks higher than 96 because there are too many components that you can lose marks in. But just generally speaking its very difficult just like in the HSC its hard to get 99.95 ATAR.

I graduated already so I don't really remember exactly how much I was studying a day since my previous year was an honours research year, so i haven't done the conventional classes study and go lectures thing since 2 years ago. Personally I never kept a track of that kind of thing or focused on I need to aim to study a certain amount of hours a day. The amount of hours just fluctuated based on what assignments, lab reports or exams I had coming up. Other than the time spent to complete those tasks for the majority of the semester I wasn't doing extra study outside of that other than attending the usual lectures or tutorial classes. Only when it came closer to the exam time like 2 weeks before would I start studying more.

 

[jazz519]

Do they give ranks in uni courses?

No but I won some awards and medals based on top performance in a subject or year so that's how I know I came top in those subjects/the highest WAM for the degree that year.

 

[Momentazeus]

No but I won some awards and medals based on top performance in a subject or year so that's how I know I came top in those subjects/the highest WAM for the degree that year.

Do all first in courses get medals or is it just something some courses do?

 

[pikachu975]

ok but how hard is a 7.0 gpa, which is 85+ for everything right?

Not sure if any unis still use GPA, but even if they do you can just write WAM on your resume anyway. That's what I did when MQ was still using GPA because I had an 85+ WAM but had a credit etc.

In terms of how hard 85+ is, my WAM is just below 85 in actuarial MQ and I've basically crammed for every single final exam since it's so hard to stay up to date (except for first sem I studied well in advance). Even though the actuarial subjects are still really hard at MQ, I will say that the non-actuarial subjects are definitely easier than UNSW, e.g. the intro to accounting, intro to comp sci, so those helped WAM boost. But on the other hand I heard UNSW macroeconomics was playing a game + a full multiple choice exam (forgot, this was years ago) so that maybe balances out?

Even though I said cramming is possible, that mostly depends on your natural ability.

Also another key note is that even if your ATAR is high, you go into uni and find some ultra geniuses, especially international students LOL because I often find myself thinking "how on earth did someone possibly ever get that mark in this hard exam" after results get released.

 

[jazz519]

Do all first in courses get medals or is it just something some courses do?

I can only speak for UNSW as I'm not aware of what kind of system goes on at other unis but you can probably find this easily through a quick search as the prizes/awards available are usually published on some website. It depends on the school and what they offer.

In the school of chemistry for most courses they had a first place prize for top performance and for overall top performance in the year which was the medal (so like you got the top average WAM across the 3-4 chemistry subjects for 2nd year, 3rd year).

Other courses like physics don't offer it for an individual subject but for top performance across the 3-4 subjects in each year of physics.

It just depends on what the faculty and school decide to have as awards.

 

[Epicman69]

Not sure if any unis still use GPA, but even if they do you can just write WAM on your resume anyway. That's what I did when MQ was still using GPA because I had an 85+ WAM but had a credit etc.

In terms of how hard 85+ is, my WAM is just below 85 in actuarial MQ and I've basically crammed for every single final exam since it's so hard to stay up to date (except for first sem I studied well in advance). Even though the actuarial subjects are still really hard at MQ, I will say that the non-actuarial subjects are definitely easier than UNSW, e.g. the intro to accounting, intro to comp sci, so those helped WAM boost. But on the other hand I heard UNSW macroeconomics was playing a game + a full multiple choice exam (forgot, this was years ago) so that maybe balances out?

Even though I said cramming is possible, that mostly depends on your natural ability.

Also another key note is that even if your ATAR is high, you go into uni and find some ultra geniuses, especially international students LOL because I often find myself thinking "how on earth did someone possibly ever get that mark in this hard exam" after results get released.

Oh no I wanted to know for GPA since I wanna apply for post grad med if I don't manage to make undergrad med.

 

[idkkdi]

Oh no I wanted to know for GPA since I wanna apply for post grad med if I don't manage to make undergrad med.

genuinely depends a lot on the courses you choose. some courses just give less hd's.

 

[Momentazeus]

genuinely depends a lot on the courses you choose. some courses just give less hd's.

What do you think the hardest course at uni would be where you could still get high?

 

[Epicman69]

genuinely depends a lot on the courses you choose. some courses just give less hd's.

Is comp sci hard for a 7.0 gpa at unsw?

 

[idkkdi]

What do you think the hardest course at uni would be where you could still get high?

too hard to answer

Is comp sci hard for a 7.0 gpa at unsw?

yes

 

[Epicman69]

too hard to answer

yes

I should phrase my question better, what I meant to say was is it achievable or has it been done by people before?

 

[idkkdi]

I should phrase my question better, what I meant to say was is it achievable or has it been done by people before?

of course