Years and years ago, when I did the HSC, your paperwork had on it 'matriculated to university' or not. If you failed English it was an automatic no HSC and no matriculation and no entry to university. Matriculated then didn't mean you were in just that you were eligible to apply to go to uni and we had a week to get that in before applications closed as results came on the first Monday in January of the first full week in January - this year it would have been on the 6th of instance but university notifications came out as now - end of the second full week of January (a major reason for getting results out to students earlier and also why you have to start the exams nearly a month earlier than we did - we started on Melbourne Cup Day when I did it.)
A bit of background for anyone interested - that is all this post is.
