QCAA Internal Assessments (IA1, IA2, IA3): How They're Marked (QCE)

Quick answer. In QCAA General subjects such as Biology, Mathematical Methods and English you complete three internal assessments, IA1, IA2 and IA3, in Units 3 and 4. Your school writes each one from the syllabus and QCAA endorses it before you sit it. Your teacher marks it against the syllabus's instrument-specific marking guide (ISMG), and QCAA then checks a sample of that marking in confirmation. Together the three are worth 50% of the subject result in the sciences and mathematics and 75% in the other subjects covered here. Adjustments for disability or illness (AARA), what happens if you miss a task, and how your teacher checks the work is yours are covered below.

This page describes the 2025 syllabuses, which apply to Units 3 and 4 for the 2026 Year 12 cohort for the first time. The subject-report figures used below describe the 2025 cohort, who were assessed under the 2019 syllabuses, so treat them as how the process behaves, not a forecast for your own results. Your subject's own page, such as QCAA Biology, carries the topic-level detail.

What are QCAA internal assessments?

An internal assessment (IA) is a task your school sets and your teacher marks, but the shape of it is fixed by the syllabus. Each General subject covered here has three of them across Units 3 and 4, plus an external assessment (EA) that QCAA sets and marks. QCAA calls each task an instrument.

Marks come straight from the marking guide. Each ISMG criterion gives a number of marks, and the total for the IA is the sum of them. The guideline QCAA publishes for calculating results adds that an assessment's maximum mark equals its weighting: one worth 35% is marked out of 35, one worth 25% out of 25. So the marks on your marked task are the percentage points it adds to your subject result.

Units 1 and 2 work differently. Your school designs and judges those assessments, makes an A to E unit judgment using reporting standards, and reports each unit to QCAA as satisfactory or unsatisfactory. Marks are not required for it. For how the internal and external results add up and what the exam is worth, see how to prepare for QCAA external exams.

What are IA1, IA2 and IA3 in each subject?

The numbers mean something different in every subject. The table gives the instrument and weighting from each 2025 syllabus.

Two things to take from it. IA1 is the data test in the sciences, but in English it is a speech and in Business an exam. And the mathematics and science internal splits differ (20/15/15 against 10/20/20) even though both subjects end on a 50% exam.

What is IA1?

In the sciences IA1 is the data test, worth 10%. It is supervised and individual, with 5 minutes of perusal and 60 minutes of working time, and it asks you to work with unseen data from Unit 3. It is marked on one criterion out of 10 using percentage cut-offs. The guides for Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Psychology go through it.

In the mathematics subjects IA1 is the problem-solving and modelling task, worth 20%. It is the one mathematics IA you prepare over time: students use 3 hours of class time plus their own time, and it is marked on four criteria (Formulate 4, Solve 7, Evaluate 5, Communicate 4 in Mathematical Methods). See the IA1 guides for General Mathematics, Mathematical Methods and Specialist Mathematics.

In the other subjects IA1 ranges from an exam (Business, Economics, Legal Studies, Literature) through a project (Accounting, Physical Education) to a spoken response (English) or a technical proposal (Digital Solutions). Read the IA1 row of your syllabus rather than assuming it matches a friend's subject.

What is IA2?

In the sciences IA2 is the student experiment, worth 20%: you modify an experiment, collect your own data and write up the investigation. The response is up to 2000 words or up to 11 minutes if multimodal, and the syllabuses recommend about 10 hours of class time. It is marked on four criteria worth 5 marks each (Forming, Finding, Analysing, and Interpreting and Evaluating combined). There is no separate Communication criterion. Guides: Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Psychology.

In the mathematics subjects IA2 is a supervised examination on Unit 3 topics, worth 15%: 5 minutes of perusal, 90 minutes of working time, and a formula book provided. IA3 is the same instrument on Unit 4, so one guide covers both: General Mathematics, Mathematical Methods, Specialist Mathematics.

Elsewhere IA2 is as likely to be a report or investigation (Business, Economics, Legal Studies, Physical Education), a written response (English) or a digital solution (Digital Solutions) as an exam.

What is IA3?

In the sciences IA3 is the research investigation, worth 20%, based on Unit 4. You evaluate a claim using secondary evidence rather than your own data, under the same length ceiling as IA2 (up to 2000 words or 11 minutes). Its four criteria are worth 5 marks each but are grouped differently from IA2: Forming and Finding combine into one criterion, and Interpreting and Evaluating stay separate. Guides: Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Psychology.

In the mathematics subjects IA3 is the Unit 4 examination described under IA2.

In the other subjects IA3 is the last of three differently shaped tasks, such as Legal Studies' analytical essay, Business's feasibility report or English's exam-conditions extended response.

What is an ISMG, the QCAA marking guide?

The instrument-specific marking guide (ISMG) is the table your teacher uses to mark an IA. It lists the criteria, the performance levels in each and the marks they carry. It is part of the syllabus PDF for your subject, and it is the same for every school.

Two documents are called a marking guide, and they are different things:

So when someone says "the QCAA marking guide" for an IA they mean the ISMG, and for an exam question they usually want the External Assessment Marking Guide.

The form of the ISMG changes with the instrument, which is why one study habit does not carry across:

• Band descriptors. Science IA2 and IA3, mathematics IA1 and most of the humanities and business IAs use criteria with levels of performance. In English, for example, all three ISMGs use Knowledge application, Organisation and development, and Textual features, with the mark split differing by instrument.
• A percentage ladder. Science IA1 and the mathematics IA2 and IA3 exams are marked by working out the percentage of marks you earned and reading the mark off a ladder (above 90% earns 10 out of 10 in the sciences, above 93% earns 15 out of 15 in the mathematics exams). Engineering's IA2 exam uses the same mechanism. The descriptors describe each band, but the percentage decides it.

QCAA's own examples show how strict the ladder is. A 6 out of 10 on a science data test is 60%, which is not greater than 60%, so it earns a 6 and not a 7. A mathematics exam scoring 42.5 out of 56 is 75.89% on the ladder.

What is endorsement?

Endorsement is QCAA approving the school's task before you sit it. QCAA's subject reports describe it as the quality assurance process based on validity and accessibility. In practice that means a reviewer checks that the task matches the syllabus's subject matter and assessment objectives, and that students can access what they are asked to do.

Many instruments are not endorsed at the first application. In the Chemistry 2025 cohort report, 41% of IA1 instruments, 90% of IA2 and 47% of IA3 were endorsed at that stage. In Mathematical Methods the figures were 83% for IA1, 46% for IA2 and 57% for IA3. The pattern differs by subject and instrument, so a friend's school can have had a smoother or rougher path to the same task.

The handbook says there is no conditional endorsement: an instrument is endorsed or it is not, and an instrument not endorsed after a second application goes to QCAA's chief endorser or an intervention officer for intervention. What matters for you: the version you sit is the endorsed one, and QCAA's Mathematical Methods report tells schools to administer the endorsed instrument without changes or modifications.

What is confirmation, and does QCAA check my teacher's marks?

Confirmation is QCAA checking the school's marking after the task is done. The reports describe it as the quality assurance process based on reliability. Teachers submit provisional criterion marks, QCAA uses those to choose which student responses the school must send in, and reviewers compare the samples with the ISMG. The reports say the samples are used "to make decisions about the cohort's results". The handbook gives minimum sample sizes by cohort: 5 or fewer students means everyone is sampled, 6 to 30 students means 5 responses, 31 to 99 means 8, 100 to 199 means 10 and 200 or more means 12. Confirmation takes place twice a year, so most students know their confirmed results before the external exams.

Agreement between provisional and confirmed marks is reported per instrument. In the Chemistry 2025 cohort report it was 100.00% for IA1, 78.28% for IA2 and 83.77% for IA3. In the Mathematical Methods report it was 95.77% for IA1 and 100% for IA2 and IA3. Those numbers describe samples reviewed, not every student.

What happens to individual marks is set out in the handbook. QCAA officers, supported by a rules-based algorithm, decide whether a pattern exists in a school's marking. If one does, QCAA can adjust criterion marks for every student in the cohort, sampled or not. Until confirmation finishes, your school's marks are provisional, and schools must tell families so when they report Units 3 and 4 achievement. Only the school can ask for a review of a confirmed result, typically within five days of the decision. A student or parent cannot ask directly, and the outcome can be higher, lower or unchanged. The "verification of information" request you can make after Year 12 is not a way around this: QCAA says it is not an opportunity to ask for a review or reassessment of any internal assessment.

Good marking leaves a trail. The reports commend marking where ticks and crosses showed where evidence matched the marking scheme and follow-through marks were annotated, and the Mathematical Methods report recommends showing the full percentage calculation on the ISMG, as in the 42.5 out of 56 example. If you want to understand how your own work was marked, ask your teacher to point you to those annotations.

What does your school's assessment policy decide?

QCAA's handbook is written for schools, and it requires each school to have a written assessment policy covering things like due dates, drafts, response length, authentication and how AARA work. So some details differ between schools. The limits below apply to all of them.

• One draft. Teachers give feedback on one complete or near-complete draft, in the mode the syllabus requires. The handbook calls this "a consultative process, not a marking process", and the feedback must not compromise the authenticity of your work.
• Length ceilings. A length is either a range or a maximum. If you go over, your school can mark only up to the limit, or let you (not your teacher) cut the response down. It cannot take off marks as a penalty, for example 2 marks, or allow a 10% tolerance on a range. You cannot cut down an exam response. Written exams use time, not words.
• What counts as words. Headings, subheadings, quotations, and abbreviations, units and chemical formulas all count. Equations, calculations, raw or processed data, reference lists, in-text citations and appendixes do not.
• Due dates. Schools set them, make them clear in advance and apply them consistently. Excursions, school or representative sport and artistic representation can be approved absences. For an approved absence on an exam day, the school offers a comparable exam before the due date, and other tasks are still due on or before the due date. Family holidays are not eligible.
• Provisional marks. Everything your school awards for a General subject IA is provisional until QCAA confirms it.
• The ISMG is the target. It cannot be changed or modified by a school, so write to its criteria and not only to the task sheet.
• Conditions are part of the instrument. A supervised exam has set perusal and working times. Perusal time is reading only, with no notes. Planning time, where the task gives it, lets you make notes on planning paper, with no calculators, and those notes are not graded.

What if you do not hand something in?

Schools cannot lower a mark as a penalty for non-submission. For a task that is not an exam, your school marks whatever evidence of your response it collected on or before the due date in the required mode, such as a draft. A zero on a criterion is only possible if you produced some evidence in the mode of the task. Writing your name on an exam paper is not a response. If you miss an internal exam on the due date with no AARA or approved absence, you get NR (not rated) and you do not sit it, or a comparable exam, later. An NR on any one instrument means NR for the whole Units 3 and 4 pair, so there is no subject result.

How do teachers check an IA is your own work?

The handbook says accurate judgments can only be made on responses authenticated as yours. Teachers can set class time for drafting, collect progressive samples, interview you at checkpoints or after submission, compare group responses, run final text responses through plagiarism-detection software, and cross-mark. You may be asked to sign a declaration of authenticity, submit your draft and take part in an interview.

Academic misconduct in the handbook's table includes:

• using unauthorised equipment, materials or AI in a supervised assessment
• creating work with AI and not attributing it, or listing false references generated by AI
• using a translator, including an online one
• paying for or trading a response (contract cheating), and collusion
• duplicating work you already submitted in any subject (self-plagiarism)
• letting a tutor, parent or carer complete or contribute significantly to the response

The table says it is not exhaustive. Schools must teach responsible AI use and address AI explicitly in their policy, so your school's rules on what AI use is allowed in a given task are the ones to follow.

If your teacher cannot establish that a response is yours, it cannot be used to make a judgment. The school should give you a chance to show it is yours and judge the parts that are identifiably yours. If authorship still cannot be established, the result can be NR, and you do not complete the assessment again. Where group work is allowed, such as in the science IA2 and IA3, the syllabus lists which parts may be done as a group, and QCAA's Chemistry report commends tasks that included ways to authenticate individual student work.

To get a QCE you also need to complete an academic integrity course. From 2026 this is a QCE requirement. QCAA's online course takes about an hour through the Student Portal on the myQCE website, and a school or third-party equivalent also counts. It does not apply to anyone who finished, or was scheduled to finish, Year 12 before August 2026. How the QCE works has the rest of the requirements.

What are AARA, and who decides them?

AARA stands for access arrangements and reasonable adjustments. They exist so a student whose disability, medical condition or other circumstance affects reading, responding or taking part can do the assessment on the same basis as other students. QCAA's factsheet says they are decided case by case, on the evidence and the functional impact, and that the same diagnosis can lead to different arrangements for different students.

Three principles limit them. AARA cannot be used to make up for learning that has not occurred, and cannot exempt you from a subject's requirements. The ISMG and the standards are not modified. And schools must consult you or your parents or carers before making adjustments.

Who decides depends on the adjustment:

Having an arrangement in Unit 1 or 2 does not guarantee the same one in Units 3 and 4. The factsheet's examples include a computer or assistive technology for illegible handwriting, where, without a formal diagnosis, the school must submit several handwriting samples. It says the list is examples, not a prescription.

Some reasons do not qualify: unfamiliarity with English, teacher absence, avoidable matters such as misreading a timetable, timetable clashes, matters of your own choosing such as family holidays or sporting events, and mistakes by the school. Representing your school, district, state or country in sport or the arts is handled differently, as a school-approved absence under your school's policy. Schools submit QCAA-approved requests by set dates. For a long-term condition, the request for Units 3 and 4 internal assessments must go in by the time you finish Units 1 and 2, and the request for the external exams by the end of Term 1 of Year 12, so raise it with your school early. If QCAA refuses a QCAA-approved request, you can ask for a review, which your school lodges in writing within 14 days of the decision.

What if you are sick or something goes wrong?

For an internal assessment, your school handles it first. If illness or misadventure is established, the handbook says a comparable assessment or an extension should be used. A comparable assessment is a different version of an exam with the same ISMG, similar subject matter, complexity and conditions. The decision can be made before, during or immediately after the session. You cannot be exempted from the assessment.

If you have not finished by the date provisional marks are due, your school records NYA (not yet administered) and later replaces it with your mark. For the 2026 cohort, QCAA told schools that NYA results for General subject IAs must be resolved by 26 November 2026. An application to QCAA is only for when all the school's options are used up, for example when there is no more time for an extension.

What counts. Illness can be a temporary condition such as an infectious disease, or a worsening of an existing one. Misadventure means something unforeseen and beyond your control, such as a bereavement, a car accident or flooding. QCAA says family holidays, sporting events and misreading the exam timetable or instructions are not misadventure.

Evidence. For medical circumstances QCAA wants a report from an independent health professional giving the diagnosis, the date and duration, and the probable effect on timed assessment. A note that only says "unfit for duty" is not enough. Reports from a pharmacy or generated online without a doctor consultation are not accepted, though telehealth works if a doctor consultation occurred. For non-medical circumstances, it wants written evidence from an independent person such as a social worker, police officer, solicitor, member of the clergy or funeral director.

External exams. There are no comparable exams, extensions or resits. QCAA advises students to attend every external exam but does not expect you to attend against written medical advice. If you can sit with an adjustment such as a computer or rest breaks, the school arranges that and no illness and misadventure application is made. Otherwise the school applies for students who cannot attend, who sit but believe their performance was significantly and adversely affected, or who have to abandon the exam. Applications can go in from 14 days before the external assessment period to no more than 7 days after your final exam. If you are unwell during the exam, tell the supervisor as soon as you can.

An approved applicant gets a "fair and expected" external result, calculated statistically from students with the same internal results, whether or not they sat the exam. QCAA's factsheet describes this only as statistical analysis and gives no formula. This is one reason your IA results matter: they are the starting point for that calculation. For the exam itself, see how to prepare for QCAA external exams.

Common mistakes

• Treating "IA1" as one kind of task. A data test, a modelling task and a speech all carry the same label. Check the table above, then your own syllabus.
• Reading the task sheet but not the ISMG. The task sheet says what to do, and the ISMG says what earns marks. They are in different documents.
• Confusing the two marking guides. An ISMG will not tell you what a full-mark exam answer looks like. The External Assessment Marking Guide covers exam questions.
• Expecting QCAA to re-mark everything. Confirmation reviews samples, so the best protection for your own mark is work that clearly shows how it meets the ISMG.
• Treating a family holiday or a misread timetable as grounds for an extension. QCAA lists both as not eligible.
• Expecting AARA to cover content you have not learnt. They change how you take part in assessment, not what you are assessed on.
• Waiting until the last week to raise a condition. QCAA-approved requests are due by set dates. For a long-term condition and your internal assessments, that is by the end of Units 1 and 2.
• Assuming Year 11 tasks feed into your mark. In the syllabuses checked, Units 1 and 2 results are reported by reporting standards and do not become IA marks.

Before you submit an IA

• Have I read the ISMG for this instrument in my syllabus, not just the task sheet?
• Do I know whether it is marked by criteria bands or by a percentage ladder?
• Am I inside the stated ceiling (words, minutes) or time allowed?
• Is this my one almost complete draft, and do I know the date feedback is given?
• Could someone see from my working where each mark was earned?
• Do I know my school's policy on drafts, AI and declarations, and the date it wants each of them?
• If something goes wrong on the day, do I know who at school to tell?

Practising for internal assessments

The exam-style IAs, which are the science data tests and the mathematics examinations, test the same skills as the external exam, so questions written in that style are good practice. AusGrader currently offers marked past-paper questions for most QCE subjects, including every subject in the first two rows of the table. Start from your subject page, for example QCAA Biology or QCAA Mathematical Methods, or from the QCE hub. For the IA you write over weeks, the subject guides linked in each section above are the next step.