In 2020, NAPLAN testing was cancelled due to the COVID-19 impact on schooling in Australia.  At PMACS, the Mathematics Department was planning to use the NAPLAN data to make a more informed decision on the effectiveness of Maths Pathway as a learning platform at our school.  As an alternative, the Year 9 students were given a past NAPLAN Numeracy test towards the end of term 2 and the Mathematics Department has used their results as a standard for comparison.

The results from this test was used as a benchmark to determine how much value has been added to our current Year 9’s since their Year 7 NAPLAN.  Maths Pathway was implemented directly after the NAPLAN tests in 2018, so having some Year 9 NAPLAN data was an important comparison tool for this cohort.

The results indicate that the improvement in the average for this cohort of students over the past two years has been greater than any other cohort for several years.  In addition, PMACS would have attained the highest percentage of students achieving band 9 and 10, correspondingly, a lower percentage of students below the national minimum.

The Mathematics Department is confident that Maths Pathway has in no way disadvantaged any student.  The data implies that our current Year 9 students have improved in all areas of Mathematics and Numeracy since their last NAPLAN in 2018 (Year 7) and at a greater growth rate than comparable years.  Thus, the Mathematics Department is pleased to announce that it will continue to use Maths Pathway in the foreseeable future in our Year 7 – 10 Mathematics classes.

Wendy Hurst

Head of Mathematics