The entire board of Victoria’s Curriculum and Assessment Authority (VCAA) has been sacked, after questions for the 2024 VCE exam were leaked.
A Government-commissioned review into the leak has this week handed down the first tranche of findings into how the incident occurred. It found a “lack of appropriate Board-level oversight” was a key factor.
The State Government says the review will “safeguard” this year’s exams and restore “confidence” among “students, families, and schools.”
Exam scandal
Ahead of VCE exams, the VCAA publishes sample questions and study guides to help school leavers prepare.
It also publishes “cover pages” for the final exams, which include details like the allocated reading time and sections of the paper.
Last year, questions for some exams were found to be hidden within digital cover pages. Students were able to find these questions by selecting the text on the cover pages and then copying and pasting that text elsewhere.
According to the review of the VCAA, students accessed the material around 6,000 times.
The leak affected 65 of the 116 VCE exams, including legal studies, Australian politics, and business management.
The VCAA was made aware of the hidden questions in mid-October and removed the impacted cover sheets from its website.
Reccommendations
Overall, the review found the VCAA had “poor management capabilities”, poor risk management processes, and a lack of oversight of the exam development process from the board.
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It handed down eight “specific and implementable” recommendations ahead of this year’s exams. These included scrapping sample pages and appointing a senior executive director to oversee the entire exam process.
The second report will cover staffing and resourcing, internal culture, and structure.
Comments
Victorian Education Minister Ben Carroll supported the dismissal of the VCAA board, saying last year’s exam failures were “not good enough and let down tens of thousands of students”.
An interim board and an independent monitor have been appointed to oversee this year’s exams.
Shadow Education Minister Jess Wilson said last year’s “debacle... catastrophically failed” students, and accused the government of failing to implement adequate safeguards.
Issues
Last year was the third in a row where VCE exams had issues.
In 2022, Monash University maths professors flagged “major errors” in the high-level maths exams.
In 2023, a review was launched after the VCE maths exams included a wrongly labelled graph, and multiple questions on topics not covered in the course.
Shortly after last year’s mistakes became public, then-VCAA CEO Kylie White resigned.
