Different state has different requirements for universities. Today, I am going to talk about the difference between Victoria and Queensland.

So in Queensland, they are using a system called Overall Position, which stands for “OP”. It is measured from 1 to 25, where 1 is the highest and 25 is the lowest. However, they are changing the system into “Atar” which stands for Australian Tertiary Admission Rank. Atar is similar to OP, but it is a rank, not a mark.

This one of the reasons why I changed from Queensland to Victoria, from Sunshine Coast to Melbourne. Since they are changing this year, I am going to be the first group of students that are doing Atar in Queensland. The teachers might not teach well, because it will be their first year too.

For me right now, I am doing VCE, The Victorian Certificate of Education. Good thing for doing VCE, you can do VCE subject when you are in year 10. (Since the course starts in year 11) So that you don’t have to do 6 subjects when you are in year 12, you will feel less stressed because you have already taken the exam when you’re in year 11!

And here’s the Con (in my opinion me lol). In my school that I am currently studying right now, the international officer had put me in a VCE Chinese subject. The Chinese Class is taught in Putonghua but I am from Macau, my first language is Cantonese and it is not as same as Putonghua. The pronunciation, the character and even though the grammar has a big difference among them. I have talked to that officer and she knew that my situation but she still asked me to do it. This VCE Chinese Class in taught as first language, and there are only Chinese students joining the class instead with the local ones. I came to Australia to study my English, not my Chinese. It’s ridiculous for me to do Chinese as first language instead of English!

At last, I changed it. But I heard it from my friend saying that the reason why that officer is forcing people to do Chinese FL is that when you are applying the exam, the fees are expensive and that officer can take around 20% of the fee per each student.

Studying an extra language is good too because you will get bonus points when you have finished the VCE exam. I found out that international students are required to do English as additional language (EAL) instead of first language. English and EAL are teaching similar content but if you are doing EAL, you can get more help from the teacher. I can understand about that but still, I want to it as first language and I am allowed to do it when I was Queensland.

If you don’t wish to do either VCE or Atar, there’s are two options for you. They are Tafe and International Baccalaureate(ib). Ib is a diploma that is worldwide approved, if you have an ib diploma with good results, you can go to any university. However, it is difficult.

Unfortunately, the ib schools in Melbourne do not accept international students:(

As a result, Queensland education cares about the student’s interest and the Victoria education care about the student’s results. Every school have it’s own pros and cons, and so as its education!