Come this time of year you can generally expect a whole heap of HSC bashing dominating the media, your social media feeds and broader discussion. The debates against are well-rehearsed, and to be perfectly honest, old.
I remember them from when I was doing my year 12 exams almost 20 years ago. You know the drill: it’s too stressful, arbitrary, too much focus is put on it, no-one will ever ask you your ATAR ever again, and of course, how can we possibly expect a 17 or 18-year-old to make a decision about their career path?
Out come the standard articles and tweets: I did poorly on my HSC and now I’m a CEO, and of course, I’m a CEO and I’ve never asked my tens of hundreds of employees their HSC mark, and lastly, Why can’t we let kids be kids?
WATCH: Mia Freedman discuss how there is life after your Year 12 exams. Post continues below.
Don’t get me wrong: they are all very valid points, albeit tired ones.
I don’t disagree with them, but I do think they need a refresh. I also think the old system needs an advocate. Because as much as there are a lot of things wrong about the HSC, there are also a lot of things right about it that rarely get surfaced. There are a lot of empowering and inspiring things about the HSC that never get acknowledged.
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I definitely think that there is a line between ensuring teens don’t think it’s the end of the world if they don’t get the right score and telling them not to bother trying. I guess the articles that probably are missing are the people who bombed out and took alternative pathways. I didn’t get the score I was hoping for in school as I was having a really bad time at home with my dad’s mental health and ended up living in poverty with my mother and having to move mid-exams. I ended up getting into the course I wanted by transferring after acing the first year of my arts degree.
The thing is, this author states herself that her growth mindset was likely instilled in her from her parents/her upbringing. So the HSC didn't give her those qualities of resilience, determination, drive to succeed etc. It may have rewarded and reinforced them, but those qualities were already there.