Review into 2024 VCE blunder finds staff were rushing to make up for missed deadlines

ABC NEWS (Australia)

The education minister has sacked the entire board of the Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority following the 2024 exam debacle. A total of 65 VCE exams were compromised with questions leaked online before students sat the test, The government has accepted all the recommendations from a review into the blunders, but it will take more than a year to fully implement them.

Transcript

00:00VCE graduate Caitlin Nguyen is forging ahead with a double degree at Monash University

00:09after all five of her exams were compromised last year.

00:13I do remember feeling quite worried because I was unsure about what was going to happen.

00:19The Education Minister is still dealing with the fallout after 65 exams were affected,

00:25today announcing the first results of a major review.

00:28The status quo of the VCAA will no longer cut it.

00:32The Minister says he's accepted all eight recommendations,

00:36which include disbanding the entire VCAA board and installing an interim board,

00:42the appointment of a new chief executive, a collection of back-up exams in case of errors,

00:48and the removal of cover sheets from student access.

00:51This was an unmitigated, unauthorised process that was undertaken and that has led to where we are today.

01:01So there will be no exam cover sheets going forward.

01:04The review found the cover sheet error followed production delays, which caused staff to fall behind.

01:10It concertinated at that point and as a result something was done that shouldn't have been done.

01:18Some of the uploaded covers contained transparent text, which could be viewed when pasted into a text editor.

01:25The last three years of the VCE have seen errors and while the government says it wants students to have full confidence in the process,

01:32the lead reviewer says human error will always be a factor.

01:36The likelihood of issues this year are as diminished as they could possibly be.

01:45It wasn't the first time, it wasn't the second, it was the third time it happened in this state.

01:49The review should have been done after the first so we didn't have the third occasion of students missing out on the opportunities

01:54and facing the extra stress during their exams.

01:56But Katelyn is satisfied to put the debacle behind her.

02:00I believe they've learnt their lesson.

02:02The second stage of the review is expected to be released later this year.

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