qwerty1
- New study designs
It was a bit intimidating but what I've noticed is that people tend to have over detailed study for new study designs. There will be genuinely new content, content from previous study designs (but not most recent), and a lot of content from the most recent one too. It's not an entirely new thing - just modifications (extent of which varies with subject)
- Favourite subject
Has to be biology. For me biology also had special emotional meaning to me because my bio 34 teacher was also my year 9 science teacher. In year 9 I was trying to claw my way out of some pretty strong depressive symptoms and this was reflected in things like straight up not doing a bunch of homework (and instead doing nothing feeling guilty about it). So my teacher for year 9 science talked to me about while I had the potential to be good at VCE I was not going to be with the behaviours I was having then. Part way through bio 34 she told me she hoped I'd be the first student at the school to get an A on the exam since it went to one exam for the whole year. I got a 47 study score in bio, breaking my school's study score record at the time. After that, not only did my confidence improve and belief in what I could achieve but I also noticed peers setting higher goals as well. So even aside from my love of biology generally that was very special for me.
- Biggest regret
Wayyyy too much stress. Like honestly the amount of time spent feeling hopeless after a bad SAC score or something.
ducktails
Apply anyway, you might be able to scrape in on ATAR through adjustments (or higher performance than you expect) and when they're looking at how you interview compared to say a 99 ATAR student they won't hold it against you. Just make sure you also consider what your back up preferences are (as you would for any course) - even after ATAR concerns GC is competitive. Make sure you get the supplementary form in on time so that you can be considered if you do meet the ATAR cut-off.
