Our data and methodology

The rules, before the sources

• Every figure shows its survey or collection year, right where you read it.
• Anything estimated carries a visible “Estimate” flag.
• Where data is suppressed or missing we say “not reported”. We never show a zero in its place, and we never derive around a figure the source suppressed.
• Figures that are true of a whole university, not one course, are labelled whole-of-university wherever we show them to you.
• We refresh from each source's new release, and the year labels update with it.

Where each kind of information comes from

The two entry figures

Each course shows two lowest figures where the university publishes both. The lowest rank that got an offer is the ATAR plus any adjustment factors: the selection rank the offer was made on. The lowest ATAR that got an offer, before adjustments, sits lower wherever adjustments lifted a student over the line. Universities publish entry figures in different ways (guaranteed entry scores, indicative ranks and selection ranks), and they are not the same thing. Ours are neither a cut-off nor a guarantee: they are the lowest rank and the lowest ATAR that actually received an offer in the year shown, as published through Course Seeker. Where a university publishes only the ATAR before adjustments, the course shows that alone and says so.

When we suggest another course, this is the rule

On a course page where your ATAR puts you in the Possible or A reach band, we may point you at one other course where your band is better. The rule is fixed, it is the same for every student and every university, and no university can pay to appear there or to be left out. That is the only reason a suggestion like this is worth anything.

1. It must be in the same study area.
2. It must be in a state you told us you would study in. If you have not told us, it must be in the same state as the course you are looking at, or be an online course, which you can do from anywhere.
3. Of those, the one where your entry band is best.
4. If several tie, the one whose median admitted rank is closest to your ATAR, because the median is what getting in usually looks like.
5. If nothing qualifies, we show nothing. We do not fill the space.

It is a suggestion about entry, not about quality. It says a course is more likely to be open to you, and nothing at all about whether it suits you better.

What we make ourselves

The fit score, the entry bands, the plain-English course descriptions and the “Why this match?” explanations are My Shortlist's own work, computed from the figures above and what you told us about yourself. The method is described on our independence page, and every match can show you the real numbers behind it. We publish no student reviews, because we have no way to verify them. Distances are straight-line from the place you pick, rounded rather than falsely precise, and the cost-vs-earnings comparison is our own multiplication with the working shown beside the sourced figures it uses.

How the fit labels work

Underneath, fit is a number out of 100. We don't show it to you, because it would mislead more than it explains: once entry came out of it, the whole range across a typical set of matches sits between about 56 and 70, so 70 reads like a mediocre mark when it is in fact a top result, and 78 against 77 looks like a real difference when the figures behind it cannot support one. It is also a second number sitting next to your ATAR, which is the opposite of what this site is for.

Fit is worked out for your own list, not against every course in Australia. Within 4 points of your best match is a strong fit, within 10 is a good fit, and beyond that is some fit. When everything on your list is within about 5 points we show no labels at all, because there is nothing real to separate them.

The thresholds were set by measuring ten realistic students across ten study areas and 129 university results: at 4 and 10 points all three labels get used, and no label ends up covering most of a list, which would make it meaningless. Fit never includes your ATAR, and nobody can pay to change it.

What the fit score is built from

Five things, and only the ones you have actually told us about. Graduate outcomes, teaching quality and student experience come from the QILT surveys for your study area. Cost is what the degree costs in total. Location and study mode only count once you have told us where and how you want to study – otherwise they would be the same on every course and would just make the ranking look more considered than it is. The two things you rank as mattering most count for more than the rest.

Cost only counts if you rank it. If you do not tell us cost matters to you, it has no effect on your order at all. That is deliberate: a three-year degree costs less than a five-year one, so counting cost for everybody would quietly push shorter degrees up every student’s list, including students who never mentioned money. What you said matters is what your order is built from.

Cost is the whole degree, not the yearly rate. A three-year degree and a five-year one at the same yearly rate are not the same price, and comparing the yearly figure said they were. We compare the total across the courses on your list, so “cheaper” means cheaper than the others you are actually looking at. Where every course on your list costs exactly the same – which happens, because the government sets the rate by field of study – cost is switched off rather than counted, and the option to rank it says why.

Where a figure is about the whole university

QILT does not publish every measure for every study area at every university. Where your study area is not published, we use the figure for the whole university, across every subject. It is real data, but it is weaker evidence about the course you are looking at, so we do three things with it rather than pretend it is the same.

• It counts for less. A measure resting on a whole-of-university figure carries three quarters of its normal weight in the score. The quarter it gives up is not handed to anything else: it just means there is less evidence here.
• It is labelled. Where it sits behind the thing you ranked first, the match says so, with an “Across all of {university}” tag on the reason.
• It cannot earn a top label. See below.

What “Strong fit” is measured against

A fit label compares a course with the others in your own list, not with every course in Australia. Strong fit means it scores close to the best match in your results, Good fit a little further back, and Some fit further again. Change one answer and the same course can change label, because the list it is compared with has changed.

In numbers: each course gets a score out of 100. Within 4 points of your top score is Strong fit, within 10 is Good fit. A course cannot be Strong fit if it is weak on what you ranked first, or if that figure is borrowed from the whole university.

When we hold a course back from “Strong fit”

A course is not a strong fit for you if the thing you said matters most is either middling or resting on a whole-of-university figure – however well it does on everything else. In that case the label stops at “Good fit”, and because the list is ordered by label before score, the course moves down with it. We would rather under-claim than tell you a course is a strong fit on the strength of a number that is not about it.

What we don't know about you counts for nothing

We ask three questions: where you want to study, how you want to study, and what matters most to you. You can skip any of them, and skipping is not the same as saying you don't mind. A question you skipped, or were never asked, is left out of the calculation entirely and the remaining parts are re-weighted to fill the gap. We never assume an answer on your behalf and then describe it back to you as something you told us.

If you skipped all three, we don't show a fit label at all. Your matches are ordered by whether you can get in, which is the only thing we can honestly say about you at that point, and the page says so. Answering “anywhere” or “no preference” is a real answer and does count – it is being asked nothing that counts for nothing.

How we pick the “you'd have a better chance here” links

When a course is a reach or a possible for you, we sometimes show up to two other courses where your entry band is better. This is about getting in, not about which course is better, and no university can pay to appear here or anywhere else on this site. If nothing qualifies, we show nothing rather than filling the space.

The first link is the nearest like-for-like. Same study area; the study mode you asked for, or this course's mode if you haven't told us; the states you asked for, or this course's state if you haven't. Among those, we take a course whose name is the same kind of degree first, then the best entry band, then the one whose median admitted rank is closest to your ATAR.

The second link is the most open to you, and it only appears when it is a different course with a better band than the first. It widens where, not how: any state, and online courses wherever they are, because you can study those from anywhere. It will never offer you a study mode you told us you didn't want – an on-campus course in another city is not more open to you, whatever its entry rank says. Every link names its mode and its place before you click it.

No endorsement

QILT, the Social Research Centre, the Department of Education, the tertiary admissions centres and the universities whose public information we display do not endorse My Shortlist. Attribution of a source never implies its approval of how we use it, and the match score should never be read as a ranking published by any of them – QILT deliberately does not rank, and the score is ours alone.

Found an error?

If a figure looks wrong, use “Spotted a wrong figure?” on the course page, or tell us at hello@myshortlist.au and we will check it against the source and correct it. Honest data is the product; we would rather fix a number than defend it.