Personal Interest Project advice for Society and Culture

All PIPs must be developed and produced by the student under the supervision of the Society and Culture teacher. Schools must have procedures in place to ensure the effective supervision of the development of work by the students. If the teacher is unable to verify that the work a student is submitting has been entirely developed and written by themselves, the teacher should complete the Non-certification form (available on Schools Online in Memos and Documents), including an explanation of why the teacher believes this to be the case. The student should also complete this form, where they can refute or verify the allegations.

Any topics which students wish to consider that may be viewed as unethical or controversial must be discussed with their teacher. If in doubt, teachers should consult appropriate senior school staff. Students should be aware that activities that may be illegal or dangerous, such as underage drinking or sexual activity, are very difficult to research in an ethical manner, and may lead the student to conduct research which is considered inappropriate or unethical.

The project can be made personal by referring to micro, meso and macro perspectives on the topic being researched. Students can write in the first person (e.g. ‘I think…’, ‘I believe…’, ‘In my experience...’). Using cultural experiences about family, school and peer groups can be a way of personalising the PIP, but these issues need to be referred to objectively and appropriately. No issues that raise concerns about ethical or safety issues of the student or anyone being referred to in the PIP should be expressed in the PIP, as it is not the forum to express these personal issues. This also detracts from the level of social and cultural literacy being demonstrated by the student in the PIP.

There are numerous possibilities but whatever a student chooses has to be explained and justified as to why it offers a cross-cultural perspective that is different to their own perspective on the issue or topic. This could include comparing different ethnic or cultural groups, looking at a subculture, comparing males and females in terms of some cultural differences, class or socioeconomic differences.

A knowledge and understanding of continuity and/or change should be integrated throughout the PIP. This can be done by considering viewpoints from different generations or reference to the past, present and future.

There is no recommended number of research methods for the PIP in the syllabus. However, it is recommended that students use appropriate qualitative and quantitative primary research and secondary research to support their topic or their research findings.

The balance of primary and secondary research should be determined by the student for the topic being studied and should always be linked to the topic and justified in terms of the choice of research methods.

There are no syllabus recommendations on the number of concepts to be included in the PIP. However, students do need to integrate the fundamental concepts throughout the PIP. It is also recommended that other specialised concepts are integrated throughout the PIP to highlight the social and cultural literacy and the application of Society and Culture concepts in the PIP.

There is no requirement to use chapters in the PIP. The PIP will be assessed on such things as its clarity, coherence, evidence of effective communication and structure. Incorporating accurate and appropriate language and, where applicable, graphic forms also form part of this assessment as well.

No, all projects must be written reports, submitted electronically in PDF format.

Students may wish to include graphs and other representations of research data in their PIPs. This is encouraged provided they are integrated into the text. Students should avoid the use of pictures merely to illustrate their PIP. Items such as images and tables should only be included if they are relevant to the PIP and are effectively integrated into, and analysed within, the text of the project.

Students must be aware that any material included in an appendix will not be considered by the markers in the marking process. Any material from primary research that is considered essential to the PIP should be included in the central material, where it will be considered in the marking process.

No. Students can use fellow students at the school in their research process, but they must not use the names of those students, the names of teachers, or the name of the school at any point in their project.

Yes. The syllabus mandates the word count for each section of the PIP.

The syllabus does not prescribe a referencing system but does recommend using a consistent and correctly formatted referencing system throughout the PIP. The Harvard (in-text citations) or Oxford (footnoting) methods.

All resources used in the PIP. These include all secondary research sources such as books, articles and websites, and all resources used for the primary research, including interviews and focus groups. There should be an acknowledgement of how they assisted in the research. It needs to be an annotated resource list which means that comments on usefulness, reliability, bias and validity must be included. Resources could be organised by type and sub-type eg: primary resources: interviews, questionnaire, focus groups and secondary resources: newspaper articles, websites, journals.

The Log should not be presented as a diary-style entry of activities associated with writing the PIP. It should be written as an analysis of the ‘processes’ of choosing, designing and developing the topic. Then the Log should highlight the processes of researching, writing and editing the PIP. It need not necessarily show the sequence of research steps but should show how the topic was developed. The Log is specifically about the process of research and does not need to mention the findings or content in the PIP.

Students are not granted extensions by NESA and the due date is final and cannot be changed.

There is no special consideration granted by NESA for technology failure on the submission date so it is highly recommended that students always back up their work throughout the process of writing the PIP.