What is an ENTER / ATAR score?

[to be completed]

How is the ENTER / ATAR score calculated?

Basically, the process used to calculate an ENTER / ATAR score is as follows:

  1. Each of your study scores is scaled (adjusted up or down depending on the strength of competition amongst the cohort of students studying the subject that year).
  2. The scores are added together to form a number called an "aggregate". The aggregate consists of:
    • Scaled score in an English subject (can be English, ESL [English as a Second Language], English Language or Literature). Note that doing an English subject is compulsory in VCE.
    • The next three highest scaled scores. These combined with the English subject are referred to as the "Primary 4"
    • 10% of any 5th or 6th scaled scores.
  3. Students are then ranked in order of aggregates. The student with the lowest aggregate on one end, and the student with the highest aggregate on the other end.

The ENTER / ATAR score is a percentile, and represents how many students got a lower aggregate than you. For example, if your ENTER score is 80, that means that your aggregate was higher than 80% of students. 99.95 is the highest ENTER / ATAR available, and means that your aggregate was the highest in the state (and hence you were better than 99.95% of other students).

Updates/Changes

  • 7th November 2007 — Initial prototype online.
  • 18th November 2007 — Started working on this "About" page.
  • 29th December 2007 — Updated scaling data for 2007.
  • 19th January 2009 — Updated scaling data for 2008.
  • 28th February 2010 — Updated scaling data for 2009.
  • 6th June 2010 — Now displays historical data (2007 and 2008) as well as the latest.