Release of results huge logistical exercise

The summer months are a busy time of year for NZQA with the release of secondary school results to students.

Over 150,000 students (including the 136,000 who sat external examinations) had their results notices posted out to them from 17 January. More than 7700 students who entered Scholarship examinations had their results posted a month later, from 16 February.

Results were also made available via the secure learner login on the Qualifications Authority website.

It's a huge logistical exercise to achieve this, with the Result Notices posted a week earlier than last year.

The Authority's call centre processed a huge number of calls following the results release. At the peak, there were over 200 calls coming in per half hour, and one day (17 January), the centre received over 2,000 calls and answered over 1,000 emails.

At the same time, our secure website had one of it's busiest days ever, with around 40,000 candidates logging in to view their results, in the 24-hour period from 7am, Wednesday 17 January to 7am, Thursday 18 January.

Scholarship

Of the more than 7700 students who entered Scholarship examinations, 1906 will receive scholarship awards worth a total of nearly $3.2 million over the next three years.

In total, 2916 Scholarships were awarded across 27 subjects, including 331 Outstanding Scholarships. Last year 2728 Scholarships were awarded including 332 Outstanding Scholarships.

Scholarship Technical Advisory Group chair Professor Gary Hawke said Scholarships were awarded to about 3 percent of year 13 students studying a subject at level 3, provided they have met the standard.

"Performance across all subjects was strong and met the target of around 3 percent in the large majority of subjects."

Where subjects have fewer than 1,000 year 13 students studying at level 3, discretion is permitted in the number of Scholarships awarded.

The subjects with the greatest number of Scholarships awarded were English (382) and Statistics and Modelling (366) while the subject with the lowest number of Scholarships was Latin (4). There are 27 top subject scholars.