We’re not paying much attention to the cleaning up of the VCE exam screw-up. Not because it is unimportant but, the clean up being an admin issue rather than a maths issue, because we are not likely to have much to offer. There are still puzzling aspects to this screw-up, seemingly which no reporter has addressed, but maybe it doesn’t matter now. Awfully, VCAA CEO Kylie White is gone, courtesy of a typical Murdoch crusade and typical Liberal cluelessness, and the rest doesn’t much interest us. Yesterday, however, there was a worrying oddity.
It would seem that Minister Carroll and acting VCAA CEO, Marcia Devlin, held a press conference yesterday. We couldn’t locate any vision,* but both The Age and the Herald Sun had reports, with subtly different angles. The reader should try to guess which excerpt is from which newspaper:
The full list of compromised VCE exams will finally be revealed … “It’s days away,” Education Minister Ben Carroll said on Monday …
Full list of compromised VCE exams still ‘days away’
State govt yet to reveal full list of 56 compromised VCE exams
Tricky one, wasn’t it? Yes, Susie “simply doing the job” O’Brien is still simply doing the job.
No big deal. Murdoch will do what Murdoch does. What was concerning was another part of the Herald Sun‘s report:
The outside subject experts will be drawn from peak teaching bodies including the Victorian Commercial Teachers Association, the Mathematical Association of Victoria, Master Teachers-in-Residence at the Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership, as well as representatives from universities. They will look at all marks to “identify anomalies”, analyse discrepancies and if needed, look at how that answer compares to the student’s other answers.
it is not entirely clear what these “subject experts” will be doing but there are good reasons to doubt that they will be subject experts, and it is reasonable to fear that VCAA is reverting to very bad form. The Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership – aka Merlino’s Mansion – is a pretty weird place to look for mathematics experts (or, for that matter, teaching experts), and the Mathematical Association of Victoria is a very traditional and very bad place to look. The incestuous relationship between VCAA and MAV and their mutually reinforcing arrogance is one of the key reasons why the VCE mathematics exams have been so bad for so long.
Why go hunting at VATL and MAV? We can only guess, but we have a reasonable guess. Marcia Devlin is the CEO of VATL. As well, the COO of VATL is Peter Saffin who, prior to that, was CEO of the MAV. In which capacity Saffin shone.**
We’re only guessing, and even if we’re guessing correctly it is not clear how much it matters for the purposes of the exam clean up. It is not clear how relevant subject expertise is to this clean up. But it all makes us very nervous.
*) It would appear that local TV news covered the media conference.
**) See also Saffin’s insightful comments on the 2022 exam errors.
How do you detect anomaly in the complex numbers question…beyond me
Principal of some Mornington Peninsula school on the radio about how students may not get to their preferred uni course because, imagine only, of the complex number question…
I yelled to myself in the car , driving, “they should not get to uni if they cannot do this question”
> How do you detect anomaly in the complex numbers question…beyond me
They likely won’t identify that question as an anomaly. What’s your point?
> I yelled to myself in the car , driving, “they should not get to uni if they cannot do this question”
You may be interested in reading Srsly VCAA’s comment on https://mathematicalcrap.com/2024/11/14/vcaas-screw-up-and-susies-beat-up/. I think that makes a very strong argument to back up the Mornington Peninsula principal’s claims
EDIT: I’m very much looking forward to the release of the list of compromised exams. Currently it’s unclear whether the leaks impacted other Mathematical exams (including the Spec CAS exam), which could explain MAV’s involvement in the investigation
Nothing explains MAV’s involvement except VCAA returning to the nitwits they know.
Here’s VCAA’s letter to students (which Susie’s paragraph seems to have been copy-pasted from): https://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/sites/default/files/Documents/vce/assessment/22November2024Lettertostudents.pdf
Thanks very much, Jay.
I am very curious about a few things:
1. Do you think this process would have occurred if it hadn’t been for Susie O’Brian’s reporting?
2. If not, do you believe this process is the right thing to do, or do you think it’s a bad decision that VCAA have been forced to make?
3. Do you stand by your comments that Susie’s story was a “beat-up”?
I am very curious whether you imagined I would let your snarky “I’m very curious about a few things” lead-in pass by without comment. Jay, I’ve had to put up with self-serving bullshit from Dr. Mike and Kermond and so, and anyway, I’m not in the mood. Watch your tone.
Now, to your off-topic questions:
1. Yes.
As I wrote in reply to Kermond, this was always going to explode. To generalise your question, however, if O’Brien hadn’t exploded it then someone else would have and, yes, that explosion obviously changed how VCAA are dealing with the screw-up.
2. No strong opinion.
I have no idea how or why VCAA decided on the initial strategy, which seemed clearly untenable. I’m also not going to make guesses how or why VCAA decided on that initial strategy, although it is very reasonable to ask. I have not looked beyond the news reports of how VCAA is now dealing with the screw-up. My only opinion, the purpose of this post, which you ignored, is that if this strategy involves obtaining “subject matter experts” from VATL and MAV then there is a healthy dose of cluelessness in VCAA right now.
3. Yes.
What I wrote was,
“[Susie’s initial story] is also, at least in the case of Specialist Mathematics, a beat up.”
(Emphasis added)
You seem to have inadvertently left off the fourth question:
“Are you getting pissed off with people ignoring the damage done by Kylie White’s resignation?”
4. Yes.
Whatever else, Susie “just doing the job” O’Brien’s reporting was, hand in with that archetypal idiotic Liberal wrecker Jess Wilson’s whining, a vicious and manipulative crusade to get Kylie White. Which succeeded. And which, as already evidence by the VATL-MAV crap, will almost certainly do damage far greater than this year’s screw-up. And about which O’Brien, and seemingly you, don’t give a shit.
Spare me your “Oh, if it weren’t for Susie” sanctimony.
Apologies, I was genuinely curious and did not intend for that first line to have a snarky tone
Before I respond, I want to get out of the way that the leaks were a BIG deal. Extremely poor cybersecurity processes lead to confidential government information being leaked. The specific information that leaked is irrelevant-we wouldn’t stand for a major bank leaking information like this. I’d go so far as to say that there’s no distinction between this leak and the Optus data breach, apart from the specific information that was leaked. We can all agree this was a genuine mistake, but that excuse didn’t cut it for Optus and doesn’t cut it for VCAA
However, none of this is Kylie White’s fault. The blame falls entirely on VCAA’s IT department, who likely never flagged any issues to Kylie until after the leak happened.
Kylie was an amazing VCAA CEO. It is my understanding that she was responsible for implementing Bennett’s recommendations, as well as the partnership with Monash University. Both of those things greatly improved the quality of this year’s exams, and afaik there weren’t any errors on them (excluding the 2 errors in Foundation Maths, which is still a vast improvement from last year).
I think the question comes down to transparency. I believe VCAA had a strong ethical obligation to be transparent about the leaks, but they also had to balance that with their obligation to not further damage the integrity of the exams. It is indefensible that Susie publicised the leaks during the exam period (and even published leaked questions from upcoming exams). However, it appears that VCAA was planning to sweep the leaks under the rug, something which, in my view, would be equally indefensible. If VCAA released documentation showing that they were planning to reveal the leaks after the exam period finished, I would say that Kylie should 100% have remained as VCAA’s CEO. However, in the absence of that documentation, I think it’s pretty likely that VCAA weren’t planning to ever reveal the leaks. That would ultimately have been Kylie’s decision, and I believe it would be a significant misjudgment that would make her position no longer tenable. I’m sad to see her go, and I hope VCAA don’t return to their pre-Kylie bullshit, but I would hate for someone involved in such a major cover-up to remain as VCAA’s CEO.
And no, I don’t think it would have necessarily exploded without Susie’s article. After all, as far as I recall, the 2022 math exam errors didn’t blow up until after the 2023 exams. But, once again, Susie’s actions significantly impacted the last week of examinations, and were completely indefensible
Thanks, Jay. We can be friends again.
I agree with most (but not all) of what you say. In particular, it is obvious that the leaks were a big deal. This is true, in and of itself, even without consideration of the advantage gained by students. To that end, O’Brien’s reporting, even if disgraceful, was important.
I think you are clearly wrong: this was *always* going to explode (which is not to minimise the credit to O’Brien for exploding it). The 2022 errors were different in that they were deniable. (They shouldn’t have been but they were.) This year’s screw-up was not.
You are saying that VCAA’s initial strategy was White’s decision, but you are guessing. The Minister knew very early on of the leaks, and my guess is that he knew immediately.
That’s a really good point. It was likely Carroll’s decision, and not White’s. In that case, I agree that Kylie White should have remained as VCAA’s CEO. It is an unfortunate reality that in our society, the CEO is always held accountable for everything, even stuff they hd nothing to do with. The leaks were a big deal, but it seems White handled them in the best way possible, and I agree it didn’t make sense for her to step down. People say that VCAA shouldn’t have given students compromised exams, and I initially agreed with that, but ultimately there’s no practical alternative. The exams couldn’t possibly have been rewritten in that timeframe, and absolutely no one would have wanted them to be delayed. VCAA definitely should have had backup exams, and they clearly didn’t, but that’s definitely a long time policy, and people can’t expect the new CEO to change that, nor would White have been able to justify the significant cost of creating those backups.
(Yes, this does contradict stuff I’ve previously said. People don’t deserve to have an opinion if they aren’t open-minded in the face of strong counter-arguments)
I don’t know if it was “likely” Carroll’s decision. I’m just saying it is murky.
Exactly who is responsible for the decision is something we are unlikely to ever find out. However a successful politician generally makes sure that their fingerprints are not on potentially very difficult decisions. It would have been almost unthinkable for the minister not to have been briefed as soon as the issue was discovered. A sensible minister would then put it back on the bureaucracy to devise a solution and then maintained maximum pressure for the bureaucracy to solve the issue without him intervening, particularly in any written form.
I still don’t understand why all stops were not pulled out to change the exams. Given the pre-existing notoriety of VCAA issues, in the age of modern communications, it is almost unthinkable that this would have not become an issue that was broadly covered. It would have been a strategic mistake to have thought otherwise. Previous bosses of mine would have cleared their diaries for days and then micro managed the crisis, perhaps by personally seeing to changes to each individual exam. However I don’t know the details of how VCAA operates and it’s often the technical details that are the killer in such situations.
Add to that the fact that it appears that VCAA has been underfunded for years, and morale is low, and there will be people not happy with the changes that were being made and you have a recipe for increased likelihood of mistakes.
I disagree with the notion that someone should not have resigned. Unfortunately in the modern world it is the bureaucrat who resigns (whether or not it was the Minister who is actually responsible). Previously, it would have been the minister, on the basis that the person in charge takes responsibility. This was the old honour culture if you call it that of Westminster ministerial responsibility. That is gone, and now we have a situation where people with power have virtually no accountability whatsoever. This is a huge broad societal issue and if you have any questions about this simply Google the word robodebt.
Of more interest now, is perhaps where things go. The previous CEO pushed an organisation already under stress further by making changes, likely without additional resources. That’s very tricky. It will be in the minister’s interests to get this off the front page next year and certainly by the next election in 2026. So presumably the minister is looking for a low risk strategy, and as Victoria is basically broke they won’t be many more funds. The next basic sign we will see is who the CEO is. Quite possibly VCAA will be even further bureaucratised with all sorts of sign offs before anything of any risk can be done. This often comes at the price of quality which is far less visible. We’ll see.
> I still don’t understand why all stops were not pulled out to change the exams.
They were, according to https://www.heraldsun.com.au/victoria-education/vcaa-staff-forced-to-play-along-with-leaked-exam-question-scandal/news-story/a74da8ffd0057cbe21fe741752e6cef3
Interesting thanks Jay. I’m afraid in my book all stops out means centralised crisis management from the very top, with staff working long hours but senior staff doing even longer hours.
All stops were out. Any suggestion otherwise is simply Murdoch bullshit.
“Google the word robodebt.” Are you suggesting some comparison between the conduct of White and that of Campbell/Leon?
“I disagree with the notion that someone should not have resigned.” This is meaningless. Who should have resigned?
Personally I think that the head of VCAA’s IT department should resign, unless there’s a head of cyber security, in which case they should resign.
It seems crazy for anyone to resign if the issue was outside the scope of their job. Cybersecurity definitely wasn’t in Kylie White’s job description, so why should she resign?
Maybe I wasn’t very clear Marty. There is no comparison. The point I was making is that if something as shocking as robodebt has no consequences for the politicians, then something as small as this will obviously have no consequences for them.
The minister should have resigned. After all the government has been in power for over 10 years. It created the environment in which these errors and mistakes occurred. Kylie White was given a very very difficult job, noting that VCAA was already a weak organisation and she was supposed to change it in a very short time frame without additional resources.
If the articles are to be believed, then her error would appear to be thinking that this could be swept under the carpet.
Ok thanks. I think your last sentence is false.
In what way Marty?
1) The articles are not to be believed without further evidence, and certainly not the article that Jay pointed out. 2) You do not know that it was White’s error.
True Marty – sounds like a real loss of her.
I was wondering why VCAA hasn’t yet released the marking guide for mathematics exams since part of the independent review was to “Publish the final version of the Marking Guide used to assess students’
performance on the VCAA website within 5 days of the end of the marking of
each Mathematics examination. ” It is also indicated that it will be published on December 4th (today) but as of now it hasn’t been released.
https://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/administration/schooladministration/notices/2024/Pages/126.aspx
Perhaps it is being held back because of the examination leaks?
I would suggest it is obvious why.
According to the Herald Sun’s recent article, marking has been completed. Isn’t the marking guide just what the assessors used to assess the exams? Which I guess is independent of the adjustments due to leaks since that has a separate statistical process.
Oh for fuck’s sake. So what? VCAA is obviously busy.