Which topic carries the most marks in the VCE Legal Studies external exam?

The people and the law-makers carries 27.7% of the marks across the 6 VCAA papers from 2020 to 2025, ahead of The Victorian civil justice system on 26.2%.

How are marks split between question types in the VCE Legal Studies exam?

Short answer carries 98.3% of the marks and extended response carries 1.7% of the marks, measured across 6 papers and 480 marks from 2020 to 2025.

Has the topic balance changed in recent VCE Legal Studies papers?

Yes. The people and the law-makers moved up 8.7 percentage points, The Victorian civil justice system moved down 3.9 percentage points and The people and reform moved down 5.4 percentage points between the 2020 to 2022 and 2023 to 2025 papers.

How many past papers is this VCE Legal Studies analysis based on?

6 VCAA external papers from 2020 to 2025, covering 51 questions and 480 marks. 0.0% of those marks carry no dot-point mapping and sit outside the percentages.

VCE Legal Studies most tested topics

Across the six VCAA Legal Studies external papers from 2020 to 2025, The people and the law-makers leads on 27.7% and The people and reform trails on 20.6%, with the rest between them. At dot-point level 3.2.21 carries 5.0% of paper marks, and nine of the 85 dot points that the board assesses externally have not appeared in one of these papers. Every percentage below covers the 100.0% of marks that map to a study design dot point.

Computed from 6 VCAA Legal Studies external papers, 2020 to 2025: 51 questions, 100 question parts and 480 marks.

Unit, topic and dot-point shares below are of the 480 marks that map to a dot point, so each of those tables adds to 100%. 94 of the 100 parts are assessed against more than one dot point, and their 462 marks are divided evenly between the dot points they cover.

What these papers are

Year	Exam	Questions	Marks
2025	Exam	8	80
2024	Exam	7	80
2023	Exam	10	80
2022	Exam	8	80
2021	Exam	8	80
2020	Exam	10	80

Marks by unit

Unit	Share of marks
Unit 3: Rights and justice	51.7%
Unit 4: The people, the law and reform	48.3%

Marks by topic

Topic	Share of marks	Papers it appears in	Years
The people and the law-makers	27.7%	6 of 6	6 of 6
The Victorian civil justice system	26.2%	6 of 6	6 of 6
The Victorian criminal justice system	25.5%	6 of 6	6 of 6
The people and reform	20.6%	6 of 6	6 of 6

Marks by dot point

Dot-point numbers and wording are VCAA's own. Where a dot point is written as a list, its items run together here separated by semicolons.

Dot point	Content	Topic	Share of marks	Papers
3.2.21	synthesise and apply legal principles and information to actual and/or hypothetical scenarios	The Victorian civil justice system	5.0%	5 of 6
3.1.25	synthesise and apply legal principles and information to actual and/or hypothetical scenarios	The Victorian criminal justice system	4.9%	6 of 6
4.1.19	synthesise and apply legal principles to actual and/or hypothetical scenarios	The people and the law-makers	3.5%	5 of 6
4.1.18	evaluate the means by which the Australian Constitution acts as a check on parliament in law-making	The people and the law-makers	3.4%	6 of 6
4.1.6	the means by which the Australian Constitution acts as a check on parliament in law-making, including the role of the High Court in protecting the principle of representative government; the separation of the legislative, executive and judicial powers; the express protection of rights	The people and the law-makers	3.4%	6 of 6
4.1.17	discuss the ability of parliament and the courts to make law	The people and the law-makers	3.1%	5 of 6
3.2.17	discuss the appropriateness of class actions, methods and institutions used to resolve a civil dispute	The Victorian civil justice system	2.9%	5 of 6
4.1.5	factors that affect the ability of parliament to make law, including the bicameral structure of parliament; international pressures; the representative nature of parliament	The people and the law-makers	2.7%	6 of 6
4.2.20	synthesise and apply legal principles to actual and/or hypothetical scenarios	The people and reform	2.6%	4 of 6
3.2.20	evaluate the ability of the civil justice system to achieve the principles of justice during a civil dispute	The Victorian civil justice system	2.6%	4 of 6
3.2.6	the roles of key personnel in a civil dispute, including the judge or magistrate (including the role of case management), the jury, and the parties	The Victorian civil justice system	2.6%	4 of 6
3.1.5	the principles of justice: fairness, equality and access	The Victorian criminal justice system	2.1%	5 of 6
3.2.15	analyse factors to consider when initiating a civil claim	The Victorian civil justice system	2.0%	5 of 6
3.2.2	factors to consider before initiating a civil claim, including costs, limitation of actions and enforcement issues	The Victorian civil justice system	2.0%	5 of 6
3.1.24	evaluate the ability of the criminal justice system to achieve the principles of justice during a criminal case	The Victorian criminal justice system	2.0%	5 of 6
3.1.23	discuss the ability of sanctions to achieve their purposes	The Victorian criminal justice system	1.7%	5 of 6
4.2.14	explain the reasons for law reform and constitutional reform, using examples	The people and reform	1.7%	5 of 6
4.1.9	factors that affect the ability of courts to make law, including the doctrine of precedent; judicial conservatism and judicial activism; costs and time in bringing a case to court; the requirement for standing	The people and the law-makers	1.6%	4 of 6
4.2.19	evaluate the ability of law reform bodies to influence a change in the law, using recent examples	The people and reform	1.6%	4 of 6
4.1.7	the reasons for, and effects of, statutory interpretation	The people and the law-makers	1.6%	4 of 6

These 20 dot points carry 53.0% of the paper marks between them. Another 56 assessed dot points share the rest, and 9 of the 85 externally assessable dot points have not been assessed in any of these 6 papers. Content that has not appeared is still examinable.

What has moved between papers

Comparing the 2020 to 2022 papers with the 2023 to 2025 papers, three topics have moved by more than 3.0 percentage points.

Topic	2020 to 2022 share	2023 to 2025 share	Movement
The people and the law-makers	23.4%	32.1%	up 8.7 points
The Victorian civil justice system	28.1%	24.2%	down 3.9 points
The people and reform	23.3%	17.9%	down 5.4 points

How the papers are built

Short answer carries 98.3% of the marks across these 6 papers.

Question type	Share of marks	Marks	Parts
Short answer	98.3%	472	99
Extended response	1.7%	8	1

Verb	Share of marks	Marks	Parts
explain	32.7%	157	38
discuss	27.7%	133	20
analyse	16.0%	77	14
evaluate	9.4%	45	6
justify	8.3%	40	7
outline	3.3%	16	7
describe	2.1%	10	3
identify	1.7%	8	2

What these percentages do not tell you

Where to practise

Every topic above links to its own page of real VCAA questions with marking criteria and average scores attached: The people and the law-makers, The Victorian civil justice system, The Victorian criminal justice system and The people and reform. For the full question bank start at VCE Legal Studies.

Syllabus and assessment material referenced in this guide is reproduced by permission, © VCAA. See our VCAA licensing notice. The VCAA does not endorse or make any warranties regarding this study resource. VCE® is a registered trademark of the VCAA.