L3 Probability Concepts Past Papers
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AS91585Probability Concepts past exam papers
Every NZQA exam for AS91585 (Apply probability concepts in solving problems) from 2013 to 2025, with its marking schedule, and from 2020 the examiners’ report, which says where students lost marks.
Papers by year
2020Archived copy
2019Archived copy
2018Archived copy
2017Archived copy
2016Archived copy
2015Archived copy
2014Archived copy
2013Archived copy
Marked student answers at each grade (NZQA exemplars), 2024: Achievement · Merit · Excellence.
What the examiners keep saying
Say what a ratio of probabilities means with “times as likely”. A ratio of 1.5 means 1.5 times as likely, or 50% more likely. Students keep mixing these up, and explaining the ratio in context is Excellence work.
Reports: 2021–2025Know the tests for mutually exclusive, independent and complementary events, and don’t confuse mutually exclusive with independent. Pick the test that suits the information, write it out with probabilities, then say in context what the result means.
Reports: 2021–2025Before you calculate, decide whether the question wants a conditional probability. The reports flag this year after year.
Reports: 2021–2025When you’re given a claim, say clearly whether the evidence supports it and back that up with calculations. Words alone don’t earn the grade.
Reports: 2021–2025Be able to describe how you would run a simulation, tell apart the true probability, a model estimate and an experimental estimate, and say which is most reliable and why. Answers on this were weak in 2024 and 2025.
Reports: 2021–2025Organise the information first in a two-way table, a tree or a Venn diagram. Completing a Venn diagram and using it has been listed at Merit since 2023.
Reports: 2021–2025Use number sense: probabilities lie between 0 and 1, a full table of probabilities adds to 1, 0.25 is not 0.25%, and calculator answers in standard form need reading carefully.
Reports: 2022–2025Learn to read an eikosogram. In 2023 most students didn’t realise that its values are conditional probabilities.
Report: 2023
How to use these papers
- Start with the most recent papers. They are the closest to this year’s exam.
- Sit a whole paper without notes, then mark it with its schedule. The schedule shows what earns Achievement, Merit and Excellence in each part, not only the answer.
- After marking, read that year’s examiners’ report to see where other students lost marks.
- Check the 2026 assessment specification for what this year’s exam covers. An older paper can include something that has since changed.
About the older papers
NZQA takes papers off its website after five years. The older ones here are NZQA’s own files as saved by the Internet Archive, a non-profit library of the web, so they can be slow to open. We could only find the examiners’ reports from 2020 on.
Practise each topic in AS91585 with worked answers.
Open the Probability Concepts question bank →