3-year ATAR scaling trends — what's moving
Which Australian senior secondary subjects are scaling harder year-on-year, which are softening, and which are rock-stable. Computed from 202 subject-year observations across UAC, VTAC, QTAC, and TISC annual scaling reports.
"Delta" is the change in scaled mean from the first year to the last year shown. Positive delta means the subject's scaled mean rose — usually because more high-achieving students chose the subject, lifting the cohort average. Negative delta means it fell. A delta of 0 to ±0.3 is essentially noise.
NSW + VIC + QLD use a 0–50 scale; WA uses 0–100. Do not compare deltas across states directly — a +1.0 in NSW is much bigger than a +1.0 in WA.
NSW HSC — biggest moves over 2 years (2022–2024)
Source: UAC annual scaling reports. 33 subjects with comparable scaling data across the period; the biggest movers are below.
Rising scalers (candidature strengthening)
| Subject | 2022 mean | 2024 mean | Delta |
|---|---|---|---|
| Investigating Science | 19.4 | 20.3 | +0.9 |
| English Advanced | 32.1 | 32.7 | +0.6 |
| Mathematics Advanced | 31.7 | 32.0 | +0.3 |
| Studies of Religion I | 27.3 | 27.6 | +0.3 |
| Textiles & Design | 23.0 | 23.3 | +0.3 |
Falling scalers (candidature weakening)
| Subject | 2022 mean | 2024 mean | Delta |
|---|---|---|---|
| Science Extension | 33.8 | 32.2 | -1.6 |
| Agriculture | 20.0 | 18.6 | -1.4 |
| Dance | 24.6 | 23.4 | -1.2 |
| Aboriginal Studies | 16.0 | 15.1 | -0.9 |
| Music Extension | 36.6 | 35.8 | -0.8 |
| History Extension | 33.6 | 32.9 | -0.7 |
VIC VCE — biggest moves over 2 years (2022–2024)
Source: VTAC annual scaling reports. 64 subjects with comparable scaling data across the period; the biggest movers are below.
Rising scalers (candidature strengthening)
| Subject | 2022 mean | 2024 mean | Delta |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sinhala | 33.9 | 36.9 | +3.0 |
| Australian Politics | 30.0 | 32.2 | +2.2 |
| Chinese Language Culture and Society | 32.9 | 34.8 | +1.9 |
| Karen | 25.4 | 27.2 | +1.8 |
| Persian | 27.9 | 29.4 | +1.5 |
| Chinese Second Language | 39.5 | 40.6 | +1.1 |
Falling scalers (candidature weakening)
| Subject | 2022 mean | 2024 mean | Delta |
|---|---|---|---|
| Punjabi | 35.7 | 33.1 | -2.6 |
| Industry and Enterprise | 24.7 | 22.1 | -2.6 |
| Auslan | 31.7 | 29.6 | -2.1 |
| Korean Second Language | 38.3 | 36.2 | -2.1 |
| Hebrew | 42.5 | 40.5 | -2.0 |
| Russian | 36.3 | 34.3 | -2.0 |
QLD QCE — biggest moves over 2 years (2022–2024)
Source: QTAC annual scaling reports. 42 subjects with comparable scaling data across the period; the biggest movers are below.
Rising scalers (candidature strengthening)
| Subject | 2022 mean | 2024 mean | Delta |
|---|---|---|---|
| Engineering | 80.67 | 84.71 | +4.0 |
| Digital Solutions | 76.25 | 79.35 | +3.1 |
| Accounting | 76.22 | 79.25 | +3.0 |
| Geography | 68.13 | 70.98 | +2.9 |
| English as an Additional Language | 66.78 | 69.59 | +2.8 |
| Agricultural Science | 55.72 | 58.37 | +2.6 |
Falling scalers (candidature weakening)
| Subject | 2022 mean | 2024 mean | Delta |
|---|---|---|---|
| Spanish | 91.42 | 80.57 | -10.9 |
| Dance | 61.51 | 56.51 | -5.0 |
| Music Extension (Performance) | 80.63 | 75.73 | -4.9 |
| Music | 75.92 | 72.23 | -3.7 |
| Aerospace Systems | 69.13 | 66.52 | -2.6 |
| Italian | 91.32 | 89.29 | -2.0 |
WA WACE — biggest moves over 1 year (2023–2024)
Source: TISC annual scaling reports. 63 subjects with comparable scaling data across the period; the biggest movers are below.
Rising scalers (candidature strengthening)
| Subject | 2023 mean | 2024 mean | Delta |
|---|---|---|---|
| Korean: Background Language | 56.7 | 66.9 | +10.2 |
| Sinhala | 52.2 | 62.4 | +10.2 |
| Integrated Science | 44.6 | 51.3 | +6.7 |
| Outdoor Education | 49.0 | 53.9 | +4.9 |
| Russian | 60.4 | 64.9 | +4.5 |
| Aviation | 52.1 | 55.8 | +3.7 |
Falling scalers (candidature weakening)
| Subject | 2023 mean | 2024 mean | Delta |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vietnamese | 64.8 | 53.7 | -11.1 |
| Persian | 64.2 | 55.4 | -8.8 |
| German: Background Language | 71.0 | 62.2 | -8.8 |
| French: Background Language | 71.8 | 66.2 | -5.6 |
| Auslan | 69.7 | 65.1 | -4.6 |
| Japanese: Background Language | 60.5 | 55.9 | -4.6 |
Methodology
Year-over-year deltas use the published per-subject scaled means from each state's tertiary admissions centre annual report:
- NSW HSC: UAC Table A3 across 2022, 2023, 2024.
- VIC VCE: VTAC scaling reports for 2022, 2023, 2024.
- QLD QCE: QTAC ATAR reports 2022, 2023, 2024. Values shown are scaled median (P50).
- WA WACE: TISC scaled-mark statistics for 2023 and 2024. WA shows only 2 years because TISC's 2022 PDF is at a different URL than we use.
Where a subject was renamed, split, or had different name formatting across years, we match by exact subject name (case-sensitive, with a small set of well-known aliases). Subjects that appear in only one year are excluded from the trend tables. See all sources.
Caveats
- Three years is a short window. A subject that rose +1.5 over 3 years could easily revert in 2025. Trends here are descriptive of the recent past, not predictive.
- Pandemic noise. 2022 results were the first post-pandemic cohort in most states; some of the movement reflects unusual cohort composition that year rather than structural change.
- Small subjects are noisier. Subjects with fewer than 200 students per year show larger year-to-year swings.
- For per-subject detail with a written narrative of the trend, click the subject name to go to its dedicated scaling page.
For journalists
This page (and the underlying data) is CC-BY licensed for journalistic reuse. The biggest movers above are publishable as-is. If you need a specific year-over-year cut not shown here, email the editor at hello@tutoring.net.au.