The National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) is the main national qualification for secondary school students in New Zealand. NCEAs are recognised by employers, and used for selection by universities and polytechnics, both in New Zealand and overseas. Students at Heretaunga College can study towards NCEA level 1, 2, 3 and Scholarship.
How does it work?
Each year, students study a number of courses or subjects.
In each subject, skills and knowledge are assessed against a number of standards. For example, a Mathematics standard could be: Apply numeric reasoning in solving problems.
Schools use a range of internal and external assessments to measure how well students meet these standards.
When a student achieves a standard, they gain a number of credits. Students must achieve a certain number of credits to gain an NCEA certificate.
There are threelevels of NCEA Certificate, depending on the difficulty of the standards achieved. In general, students work through levels 1 to 3 in years 11 to 13 at school.
Students are recognised for high achievement at each level by gaining NCEA with Merit or NCEA with Excellence. High achievement in a course is also recognised.
