Whether you're a parent or a student, NCEA can be a bit confusing. Since it takes three years to complete and determines your prospects after high school, you should probably learn more about it and how everything works. Have no fear - this article will tell you the key things that you need to know.
NCEA is the name of a pathway that many students take through high school. It was developed by NZQA, the New Zealand education board and is in widespread use in New Zealand. Being a local programme, it is recognised nationally not only for University entrance but also for alternatives such as Polytechnics and workplace training.
There are alternatives such as Cambridge (CAIE) and International Baccalaureate (IB), but NCEA remains the most common one for students in New Zealand as it's meant to be available at every school in the country.
NCEA is a three-part, three-year program with one part being taken each year.
Some schools allow for accelerated or alternative way to take different levels of NCEA at different times, which we will talk about later.
In Year 11 you study roughly five NCEA Level 1 subjects e.g.
The of subjects you are required to sit at each level is determined by your school.
In Year 12, you generally take five new subjects at NCEA Level 2. These subjects could be a continuation of your Level 1 subjects, or they could be new subjects altogether if your you meet the grade requirements of your school e.g.
Same story in Year 13 - you pick another five subjects at NCEA Level 3. Often less.
The subjects are designed so that there is continuation between different levels. For example, NCEA Level 2 Maths is a harder version of NCEA Level 1 Maths and directly draws on the material that you studied at Level 1.
If you didn't take a subject at Level 1 or 2, you could still pick it up at a later Level. However, you need permission from your school to do so.
The following subjects are compulsory as they form the minimum requirements to get into University in New Zealand. Getting a good enough result for these subjects will fulfill your Numeracy and Literacy requirements
In many schools, Physical Education is a required subject. In religious schools, Religious Studies may be compulsory. Schools may have their own additional requirements regarding the subjects you choose at each level.
Aside from these, you are free to choose whatever subjects you wish depending on the availability of classes at your school. For subjects at Level 2 and 3, your school may require that you do sufficiently well for that subject at the lower levels. Aside from Numeracy and Literacy requirements, University entrance is determined by your results at Level 3 so make sure you keep that in mind. Pick subjects to reflect what you are planning to study at University, but keep your options open.
To understand NCEA properly, you really need to understand what these two words mean.
Every subject that you take is broken into a number of different standards – each standard will cover a core topic within that subject. For example, Maths might contain things like Algebra and Geometry. Each subject will typically have between 4 to 8 standards.
There are four possible grades for each standard – Not Achieved, Achieved, Merit, and Excellence.
Not all standards within a subject are created equal; each standard is worth a number of credits, typically around 3 to 6.
If you attain an Achieved for a standard that is worth 3 credits, then you gain 3 Achieved credits. If you attain an Excellence for a standard worth 5 credits, then you get 5 Excellence credits. All these individual credits forms the basis of your overall grade for that subject, and goes towards your overall grade for the year.
Below is an example of the results one of our students attained
This student has attained 9 Achieved Credits, 7 Merit Credits, and 5 Excellence Credits for NCEA Level 1 Science. If you get a "Not achieved", you don't get any credits for that standard.
Note that each school will decide which standards to include in their subjects from a large pool of potential standards. The standards you take may differ from someone in another school. For example, one school may not offer the Integration standard in their Level 3 Calculus class. This is another way that NCEA allows flexibility in the system, for better or worse!
To pass the year level, you will need a minimum of 60 credits across all subjects, it doesn’t matter whether these are achieved, merit or excellent credits. If you meet this requirement, then your transcript will say that you've attained e.g. National Certificate of Educational Achievement (Level 1).
To make things easier for you, you can include any number of credits from higher NCEA Levels to help you pass each level so:
You can obtain these credits over more than one year if needed - there's no time limit! To pass each level, you'll also need to pass the Literacy and Numeracy requirements. These are very simple to achieve:
You'll usually get these credits through NCEA Level 1 Maths and English - there's usually no need to worry here!
Stuff that looks good on your CV
In the previous section, we talked about how if you get enough credits for a Level, then you attain for example National Certificate of Educational Achievement (Level 1) - however you can get fancy titles added on to the end of this.
If you gain a minimum of 50 merit or excellence credits from subjects from that level or levels above, you'll get an overall certificate endorsement for that Level. These are very important overall grades for your CV.
E.g. if you get at least 50 Excellence credits for NCEA Level 1, 2, or 3 subjects, you'll receive “National Certificate of Educational Achievement (Level 1) achieved with Excellence”
If you do well in a subject - gaining at least 14 merit or excellence credits, this will be shown on your transcript as a “course endorsement”. This recognises that you've done well in a subject.
NCEA is assessed through a combination of internal and external assessments throughout the whole year. Each internal assessment will cover one standard where as the external exam will typically assess two to three standards together. Every standard is either an internal or external assessment.
Internal assessments are created and marked by the schools themselves – teachers will adhere to NZQA guidelines but they have quite a bit of flexibility in how they interpret these guidelines. They can be take-home assignments or they can be sat in test conditions at school.
Internal assessments vary widely between subjects and schools and there is no definitive structure that these may come in. Although these are marked by the teachers themselves, roughly 10% these are further checked by NZQA assessment checkers to try and make sure most schools and teachers are marking to the same degree of difficulty.
Many schools also offer students the opportunity to review their mistakes and re-sit their internals.
Externals are a lot more uniform as the assessments are created and marked by NZQA. Held at the end of the year around November/December, they usually come in 3 hr timeslots and usually assess 2-3 standards in one go. These are your more typical exams.
We've got more information about how external examinations work and how to prepare for them HERE.
As part of NCEA, you will get your marked exam scripts returned to you. If you feel like the result you've received is not correct or fair, you have the opportunity to apply to have your results either reviewed or reconsidered. You need to pay a fee for this.
With any luck, you will study hard and gain the credits you need get into your chosen University and degree! Beyond basic numeracy and literacy requirements, University entrance for NCEA students is determined solely by the amount and quality (Achieved/Merit/Excellence) of Level 3 credits.
You can learn more about the exact requirements for University Entrance in New Zealand HERE.
However, university scholarships and grants are often granted to students based on their results in Year 12. For most students, these will be the NCEA Level 2 results and maybe some Level 3 results if your school has an accelerate program!
Article by Jimmy Li, edited by Nick Wright
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