A two‑hour outage of the NAPLAN online system on 11 March forced Year 5, 7 and 9 pupils in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland to retake the writing exam. ACARA will not adjust marks, but results will include a caveat about possible impact. An independent review is underway, reigniting calls to scrap the writing component.
Students across the eastern states of Australia were forced to sit NAPLAN writing examinations twice after an online platform failure disrupted the original test on 11 March.
The outage, which began at approximately 9:30 a.m. and lasted for two hours, affected Year 5, Year 7 and Year 9 pupils in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland. Those students were required to complete a make‑up test later in the day or, in many cases, the following day, while their peers in Western Australia completed the assessment without incident.
The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) chief executive Stephen Gniel told a Senate estimates hearing that the agency will not adjust any marks as a result of the disruption. He explained that the variation in student experiences - ranging from heightened stress to the opportunity to reflect on the task before a resit - makes it impossible to apply a uniform correction.
"One student may have been advantaged by the extra time to think and plan, while another may have been unsettled overnight and performed worse," Gniel said. Consequently, the results that are due to be sent to parents from July will be accompanied by a specific caveat noting that the technical failure could have influenced outcomes in either direction. An independent review has been commissioned by Education Services Australia, the Commonwealth‑owned operator responsible for the online testing infrastructure.
The review follows internal investigations that concluded the outage was not caused by a capacity shortfall but rather by a failure of a single component within the platform, which had been outsourced to a third‑party provider. While the review is ongoing, ACARA is undertaking a separate analysis to determine the overall quality and longitudinal validity of the data collected under these compromised conditions.
The incident has reignited a broader debate about the relevance of NAPLAN, which was introduced in 2008 under former Education Minister Julia Gillard. Teacher unions and school leaders have repeatedly questioned the test's value, and this month the Australian Government Primary Principals Association called for the immediate removal of the writing component, citing recurring technical glitches and the limited pedagogical benefit of a high‑stakes writing assessment.
The association argues that the skill of composing letters, emails, articles or essays is better evaluated through classroom‑based tasks rather than a single national exam. Federal Education Minister Jason Clare responded to the call for an overhaul by saying that any decision to alter or eliminate the writing section would be based on advice from ACARA. Gniel clarified that ACARA has not been asked to provide policy recommendations to ministers regarding the structure of NAPLAN.
As the independent review progresses, stakeholders will be watching closely to see whether the findings prompt reforms to the testing platform, the assessment design, or both, as the nation grapples with how best to measure literacy outcomes in a digitally dependent education system
NAPLAN Online Testing Outage Australian Curriculum Assessment And Reporting Writing Assessment Debate Independent Review
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NAPLAN Writing Exam Disruption: No Mark Adjustments for Students Affected by Online Platform CrashStudents in years 5, 7, and 9 across eastern states experienced a significant disruption during the NAPLAN writing exams in March, with the online platform crashing for about two hours. The Australian Curriculum and Reporting Authority (ACARA) confirmed that students had to retake the exam, but no mark adjustments will be made. Results will be sent to parents in July, accompanied by a caveat detailing the disruption. An independent review has been commissioned to assess the quality of test data and its longitudinal value. The NAPLAN test, introduced in 2008, has faced criticism from various groups, including teacher unions. Recently, the Australian Government Primary Principals Association proposed removing the writing section due to 'significant problems' in the past two years. Federal Education Minister Jason Clare has not yet provided a response to this proposal, pending advice from ACARA.
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