Subjects in secondary schools

Three approaches have been followed to identify where the subject terms commonly used in secondary schools might differ significantly from those we use here at VUW:

Visit to the websites of Wellington secondary schools identified a number of Yr13 or Level 3 subjects that we may not have an obvious mapping to;
Obtain a data extract from the Ministry of Education that maps all the NZQA standards to a standardised subject list and these subjects to the curriculum learning areas; and
Keywords extracted from the main standards and resources listed for the New Zealand Association of Computer and Digital and Information Technology Teachers (NZACDITT).

Based on these three sources I believe that the main area we need to focus on is the digital technologies space. All other areas are reasonably well covered, as in the terms used in school match to terms we use, so long as we offer this subject. As well as the suggested mappings in the following sections I suggest that we map Digital technology(ies) to Computers and technology and to Design

Website survey

Despite most secondary schools having similar subjects it appears that the earlier schools in this list have more mismatches. This is because each mismatched subject has been listed only the first time it was encountered.

Allowing for areas that VUW does not profess to teach, the main weak area to work on labelling/mapping is that of digital technologies.

Each school subject is followed by the suggested Victoria subject for a keyword mapping:

Tawa College

Visual culture = Art History, Media Studies, Philosophy, Media Design
Drama = Theatre, Film,
Business = Economics, Finance, Management,
Earth and space science = Geophysics – Solid Earth, Geophysics – Meteorology, Geology, Geography,
Legal studies = Law, Commercial Law
Tourism = Tourism management
Digital technology - wood/metal = Industrial Design
Design and visual communications = Communication Design, Media Design
Digital design - information technology = Interaction Design, Information Systems
Digital computer science and information technology = Software Engineering, Computer Science, Electronic and Computer System Engineering, Information Systems

Wellington College

Calculus = Mathematics, Physics, Applied Physics,
Digital technology media = Media Design, Communication Design, Media Design
Digital technology science =Software Engineering, Computer Science, Electronic and Computer System Engineering, Information Systems

Wellington High School

Moving image culture = Film, Media Studies, Theatre, Media Design
Journalism = Media Studies, Writing (Academic and Professional), Creative Writing, Communication Design

Wellington Girls College

Modern Mandarin = Chinese, Asian Studies
Digital design technology = Interaction Design, Information Systems
Product and spatial design technology = Industrial design

Wellington East Girls College

Computer studies = Information Studies, Computer Science

St Pats, Onslow College, Newlands College, Samuel Marsden, Scots, St Catherines, and St Marys

Nothing new

Subject and standard mapping

Although the list of all standards is exhaustive (over 45,000 there are only a few areas where the subjects appear to be mismatched to those we offer, mainly in the digital technologies area.

Digital technologies standards (NZACDITT pointing to NZQA)

Relational database = Computers and technology
Digital media = Design
Computer science = Computer science
Computer programme = Computers and technology
Electronic environments = Digital engineering
Electronic and embedded system = Digital engineering