KEY POINTS:
Exam markers are working out how to deal with a mistake in a maths paper sat by 30,600 students so no student's marks are affected - a task one principal says is mission impossible.
Yesterday's NCEA level two maths exam contained a graph in which the x and y axes were accidentally swapped. Students were asked to calculate the shaded area inside the curve in the graph.
The Qualifications Authority said the error would be taken into account in marking so no students were disadvantaged.
NZQA was unable to say exactly how that would be done, but a spokesman said the markers would be aware of the error and evaluate how to take it into account after they had seen how students approached it.
Avondale College principal Brent Lewis said it would be unfair to give credits for the question to any student, because some would notice the swap and others would not.
He said if students had answered it without noticing the swap over then their answer was technically incorrect and it showed they had not read the question correctly.
He expected the brighter students would be most disadvantaged because they would notice it and get confused.
"In reality there is no way you can give credit for any answer to that question. Further, when this happens kids sometimes end up like possums in the headlights.
"They get stuck staring at it and panic and go into meltdown.
"It's not the marks attached to just that question, and the intelligent and capable are more likely to have noticed it and to be disadvantaged," Mr Lewis said.
Last week there were two other minor errors in NCEA exams, including a page-numbering mistake in a Level 2 Media Studies standard and a heading error in a Level 1 Accounting standard.
"These have been identified and no candidate will be disadvantaged during the marking process," said NZQA head Bali Haque.
