Hard work pays off, even after lockdown

Many Christchurch students were celebrating success when they received their NCEA results yesterday, despite the disruption caused by last year’s Covid-19 lockdown.

In late March last year, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced the country was going into level 4 lockdown, meaning schools were closed and learning moved online.

They reopened in late April under level 3, but students were urged to work and learn from home if they could.

Despite the many challenges, Canterbury students still managed to achieve good grades across NCEA levels 1, 2 and 3.

Linwood College student Caitlin Templeton hopes to work in environmental science when she completes her studies.

The 16-year-old is well on her way, with seven NCEA level 1 excellence grades, including in maths, science and geography.

‘‘I was absolutely stoked; there were a couple of them that I wasn’t expecting,’’ she said.

She did not feel the lockdown had a negative impact on her studies.

‘‘It was an adjustment to get used to, but I did OK.’’

Fellow Linwood College student Mario Cvetkoski received an overall excellence endorsement in his level 3 NCEA grades, having studied calculus, physics, chemistry, English literature and visual arts in his final year of high school.

The lockdown brought an ‘‘added stress’’ but taught him how to learn on his own and become self-motivated, he said.

The 18-year-old plans to study industrial product design at University of Canterbury (UC).

Across the city, Cashmere High School student Julius Hlavac received an overall excellence grade. ‘‘I did well in level 3 English, as well as biology and physics,’’ he said.

The 17-year-old said there were ‘‘advantages and disadvantages’’ to studying online during the lockdown.

‘‘There were less distractions, but also it was a lot harder to motivate yourself.’’

He hoped to continue with strong grades in year 13, before studying engineering at UC.

Cashmere High’s new head boy, Will Hanlon, completed NCEA level 2 in 2020, and was ‘‘pretty stoked’’ with his results.

‘‘I got a merit in one exam and the rest were excellence,’’ he said.

Staff at the school worked hard to ensure online learning went smoothly, he said.

ALDEN WILLIAMS/STUFF Linwood College student Mario Cvetkoski is one of many Christchurch students to achieve strong NCEA grades, despite the challenges 2020 threw up.