A technical glitch left Ballarat schools scrambling to support dozens of VCE students who received their ATAR five days earlier than expected.
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More than 2000 VCE students across the state received results ahead of the planned release date on Wednesday, sparking an independent investigation.
The Courier understands students from Ballarat High School, Ballarat Clarendon College, Ballarat Grammar, Damascus College and Lorete College were impacted.
Ballarat High School student Amity Musgrove said she heard about the glitch via Facebook on Wednesday evening and decided to see if she could attain her score.
“I had already signed up but people were sending messages (to the Victorian Tertiary Admissions Centre) again, so I sent in my VTAC ID and my PIN and it sent back my ATAR,” Ms Musgrove said. “I was lucky that I was happy with my score, but a lot of people were posting about how disappointed they were.”
Ballarat Clarendon College principal David Shepherd said two students had contacted the school after receiving their results early. He said “everything was under control”.
“We’ve taught the students that these things happen and everything doesn’t always go to plan.”
Mount Clear Secondary College principal Lynita Taylor said the school understood none of its students had been affected, but urged any concerned students to contact staff immediately.
Despite early speculation, VTAC confirmed early on Thursday morning the results sent to students were accurate.
Education minister James Merlino apologised for the blunder, saying the result release was limited to a number of students who registered to receive results via text message.
“To the students and their families, this is obviously a serious error that has been made,” Mr Merlino said.
“I can assure parents, their students, their schools that there will be a thorough independent investigation to determine what went wrong and how it happened, so it won’t happen again.”
Salmat Digital's chief operating officer Ian Harris told Fairfax Media the company had provided the SMS service "for more than 10 years", but said the incident was "extremely regrettable".
Suzanne Connelly, a spokeswoman for VCAT and VCAA said the SMS service had been tested extensively in the past few weeks, and none of the problems reported by more than 2000 students had been replicated.
"They [Salmat] shut it down as quickly as they could on Wednesday night.”
