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Lachie Gwynne survived a horror speedway racing crash to be one of 892 students honoured in the SACE Merit list. SEARCH ALL THE NAMES HERE
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Lachie Gwynne refused to let a high speed racing crash, that left him with crushed vertebrae and ongoing pain, define his final year of school.
A speedway racer since he was 12, he was competing in Mildura last Easter in the AMCA Nationals category – V8s producing 400 horsepower as they hurl around dirt oval tracks – in which he’d already had three wins at senior level.
“In the feature race, in the fourth lap, a car contacted me and sent me into the wall at about 140km/h, and I started rolling and another car T-boned me from underneath,” the St Michael’s College graduate says.
“That’s what crushed my vertebrae and turned the car into a pretzel.
“There was so much force from the accident that my feet broke the solid metal pedals.”
His left ankle was mangled: “Two Lego-sized pieces were completely broken off so they had to put a couple of screws in.”
But his spine was the bigger concern.
“The two really severe ones (vertebrae) are in the lower back, right at the bottom of the spine.
“I still get day to day pain. Sitting down or bending down is not easy.”
Spinal surgery was deemed too risky, but Lachie spent a fortnight in hospital and another two weeks bedridden at home, losing 10kg, before he went against doctors’ recommendations and headed back to St Michael’s.
Having lost his dad, himself a speedway racer, to a heart condition in 2015, he was determined to be strong for his mum.
“The worst thing was sitting there and feeling sorry for myself and finding excuses all the time. I thought ‘you know what? Stuff it. I want to go to school’.”
“St Michael’s was great and understood what I was going through.
“Getting involved and trying to help others helped take the pain away.”
Within weeks of the crash, he was helping organise a quiz night fundraiser for St Michael’s sister schools in Papua New Guinea and Pakistan, and he also mentored younger refugee students in an English as a second language program.
“I was an active college leader, organising events and running assemblies, masses, fundraisers,” he says. So much so that he won an award for outstanding contribution to the college. Outside of school, he volunteered at the Supercars event at The Bend.
Lachie had to battle pain through his exams, as sitting down for long periods wasn’t easy, yet he achieved two SACE Merits, a Governor of SA Commendation and a 99.4 ATAR.
He was bound for Melbourne before receiving a scholarship from Adelaide University to stay in SA and study mechanical engineering with an aerospace major. He’s been keen on the space industry since going on a subsidised tour of the US through education consultancy Crimson, visiting NASA, Google and Stamford University.
In the meantime his recovery is progressing. He started hydrotherapy in June and is now doing light weights.
“I’ve been told to take a break from racing for now, if not forever, because of the risk to my spine,” he says.
“You’ve got to do what’s best for yourself and listen to your body sometimes.
“(But) I’m sure I’ll return to it eventually.”
CASSIE CROMIE
Banksia Park International High School
Cassie Cromie’s “driving force” was her desire to graduate with her friends.
That looked far from likely early last year, when she was struck down with a debilitating condition called costochondritis, which causes chest pain.
She’d had it before, and it usually lasted a couple of weeks. But not this time.
“For the first semester I couldn’t go to school because it hurt so much to move or breathe,” the Banksia Park International High School graduate says.
“The lasting nerve damage meant that pain signals were being sent to my brain even though there wasn’t actually ongoing inflammation, so I found my first semester was spent mostly at home trying to readjust to life. Most days I had a pain rating about an eight out of 10.”
Through a range of therapies she was able to return to school in second semester, albeit just an hour a day at first. She was encouraged to take things slowly and finish her SACE this year, but Cassie wasn’t having any of that.
“I may have been a little stubborn but I wanted to be there with my peers and graduate with them,” she says.
“It was very questionable for a long time whether I would or not.
“I did Year 12 in one semester, which was interesting to say the least.
“If you are determined, you can do so much. You have to find your driving force.”
Along the way she made a smart move to switch from one maths subject to a less demanding one to manage her workload.
She achieved an ATAR of 86.45, remarkable given the condensed time frame of her study and the fact the pain hasn’t gone away.
“Most days I’m at a seven or an eight but I push through. You learn to accommodate it,” she says.
“There’s nothing that can be done and we don’t know whether it will fix itself over time.”
The kind of drive that led to her graduation is also evident in her achievements outside study. Before the condition struck, as a Tea Tree Gully Council volunteer, she led a youth leadership forum in Roxby Downs.
She graduated not just with great academic results, but with a range of leadership, teamwork and “global citizenship” awards.
Since school finished, she has been house sitting to help a family friend who broke a leg, and is off to Sydney to be a nanny for the daughters of family friends for three weeks.
She aims to start a biomedical science degree this year and eventually become
a paediatrician.
ELIJAH SMITH
Kapunda High School
Elijah Smith had to grow up quickly when he was in Year 9, after his dad had a
debilitating stroke.
Elijah and his brother suddenly had to take responsibility for the household – cooking, cleaning, paying bills and other tasks.
In a “bittersweet” way, such early maturity meant he was better prepared for Year 12 than most.
“Year 9 me was not a happy me but it has got better,” the former Kapunda High School student says candidly.
“Social interaction is more difficult when you have more responsibilities.
“There’s no point complaining about it. You just have to deal with it. I’m not going to get a dad without a stroke back. I needed to step up as a person, as a member of the family.”
Elijah’s supermarket shifts have been needed to help supplement the family income.
But despite his responsibilities, he has both achieved academic excellence (a SACE Merit for Society and Culture, 99.8 ATAR) and taken part in a range of political and social campaigns.
“Throughout Year 12 and my schooling I loved the idea of getting involved. It meant I was very busy most of the time,” he says.
He took part in state and national United Nations youth conferences and the National Schools Constitutional Convention, and last year was a key player in the School Strike 4 Climate movement.
For that he was a marshall for the rally outside State Parliament in September, helping to keep 18,000 people “safe and engaged”.
And through involvement with the climate movement he has helped raise thousands of dollars for the Red Cross disaster relief.
Recognising his broad range of community engagement activities, Elijah was a winner in the Education Minister’s Children’s Week Awards.
He says coming from a low socioeconomic household whose fortunes were hit by his dad’s stroke fuelled “the fire under my belly to pursue a political path”.
He will head to Canberra next month to start a public policy degree at Australian National University with a view to working for non-government organisations or charities.
Elijah praised the Youth Opportunities Association (SA) for the emotional and scholarship support it had provided him.
He also acknowledged the NDIS had improved his dad’s situation.
HANNAH BROWN
St Peter’s Girls’ School
Hannah Brown’s Year 12 results show she took the advice of former governor-general Sir Peter Cosgrove to heart, after she interviewed him in front of hundreds of her fellow students.
“He said a lot about believing in your own abilities,” the St Peter’s Girls’ School graduate recalls of his visit last year.
An accomplished singer and performer, Hannah wasn’t too nervous about conducting the question and answer session with the former chief of the Defence Force.
“I’d had a lot of exposure to public speaking, which prepared me for something like that,” she says. “I guess as deputy head prefect that’s something we had to do quite a lot.
“We ran assemblies every week and hosted activities for the middle and senior school.”
Clearly nerves never got the better of her in exam time either, because she achieved four SACE Merits, a Governor of SA Commendation, and an ATAR of 99.6.
Hannah, 18, has taken singing lessons since she was in Year 3 but “really got into it” when she went to St Peter’s Girls in Year 7.
“It’s a real passion of mine,” she says.
“I do lots of things but I do love musical theatre. But I love jazz as well.”
She performed a number of times at the Generations in Jazz Festival, both as part of a jazz choir that last year won its division, and with a vocal quintet.
Combining her Year 12 studies with a job at Baker’s Delight and school netball, Hannah says she used walks and runs with her family to clear her mind between
study sessions.
Through her school, she also volunteered since Year 10 at the Mary Magdalene Centre, helping to prepare and serve food, and chatting with clients.
“I find that a really nice experience because there are a lot of regulars that I’ve got
to know.”
After a family holiday in Vietnam, Hannah hopes to study medicine this year, staying in Adelaide for university if possible.
“I’m excited to hear about that. Fingers crossed it all goes well,” she says.
“If I have to, I’d be happy to move interstate.”
ARCHER NEWTON
Rostrevor College
Archer Newton makes money in his sleep.
He uses servers to make new games that build on the ever-popular virtual world of Minecraft, including Hunger Games-style ones where it’s survival of the fittest. He creates the environments and codes the rules within them.
People pay to play. And because most of them are in the US, they’re doing it at night, SA-time.
“Most of my money comes in the night so it’s always a surprise waking up to see how much people have spent,” Archer, 18, says. “I’m literally making money in my sleep.”
In a good month, the Rostrevor College graduate rakes in more than $4000, and he’s “ramping it up now school’s over”.
“I might get a real job, but I’m pretty happy with this at the moment,” he says.
But it’s not without its administrative demands, which get him out of bed early.
“I wake up to a few hundred messages every day. I pay some people to deal with most of them, but some I have to deal with myself.”
Archer’s brother introduced him to Minecraft when he was nine, as an alternative to violent games.
He saw the potential to make money and taught himself how to code from YouTube videos. As well as making his own games, he takes commissions to code for other people’s.
His skills improved during Year 12, when he took on some university-level study
in coding.
“There’s definitely things I missed out on by (teaching) myself. I knew none of the theory which was the harder part of uni for me (last) year.
“Now I can make better code and save time.”
Earning a “passive income” from a venture that’s not too time-consuming meant Archer could also concentrate on achieving top academic results (four SACE Merits, 99.9 ATAR, Governor of SA Commendation) and pursuing his passion for music. He’s played guitar for 12 years and has featured at the Generations in Jazz Festival.
He volunteers at Hampstead Rehabilitation Centre, helping patients with woodwork and playing cards.
“It’s really good to bond with them ... because they often talk about how bored they are.”
Archer plans to study medicine, a direction he’s been heading in since his father was seriously ill in 2016 and 2017.
ISOBEL FISCHER
Banksia Park International High School
If Isobel Fischer ever looked bleary-eyed in her Year 12 classes, she had good reason.
Sometimes the 17-year-old went straight from working a full night shift at an aged care home, where she clocked up to 30 hours a week, into a full day at school at Banksia Park International High.
Isobel’s ambitions to enter the aged care sector and become a nurse were inspired in many ways by her late mum, a disability and aged housing officer, who lost a battle with cancer five
years ago.
“I always remember the amazing care my mum received from the nurses during her time in hospital,” Isobel says.
Isobel did a Certificate III in Individual Support in Year 11 and loved her work placement in a nursing home, so won herself a job as an aged care nursing assistant.
“This job was really, really hard. I started working one to two shifts a week but then they started ringing me to pick up more shifts because they were understaffed and I didn’t want to let the residents down,” she says.
“Sometimes I worked 48-hour fortnights, doing late shifts or night shifts. If I had homework I would do it in my lunch break at work. If I had done a full night shift I would then go and do a full day at school.
“But I love (it). It’s like looking after one hundred of your own grandmothers
and grandads.”
But Isobel has concerns about aged care standards, so much so that she appeared on national television in October after sending a video question to the ABC’s Q&A.
She opened up a national debate by asking whether government regulations were needed to force centres to improve the quality of meals, saying some spent just $6 per resident a day on food. She has seen “half a hamburger patty served to residents for their main evening meal”.
In response, panellist and SA culinary icon Maggie Beer, who has trained hundreds of aged care cooks in the hope of raising food quality, said some had daily budgets of as little as $4.50 per resident, which should be raised to $10.50.
“And at $6 or $7 a day, you can only have processed foods and … frozen foods, and so it’s impossible to give the (adequate) quality,” Beer said.
Isobel aims to study nursing at Adelaide University this year.
MITCHELL ODEGAARD
Salisbury High School
If you shop at Hollywood Plaza, you’ve probably heard Mitchell Odegaard over the PA system at Target.
But more importantly, he’s been making his voice count in Aboriginal education circles.
Mitchell received a standing ovation for his address to a conference on indigenous education at Adelaide Oval in 2018, speaking about all the opportunities he has made the most of, and urging others to do the same.
The Salisbury High School graduate, who won the Governor of SA Commendation – Aboriginal SACE award, says he’s been on half a dozen or so STEM (science, technology, engineering, maths) camps.
He’s taken part in South Australian Aboriginal Secondary Training Academy programs, including the Aboriginal Power Cup run with the Port Adelaide Football Club, and the new STEM academy operated with Adelaide University. And he’s benefited from both the uni’s Karnkanthi mentoring, tutoring and financial support program, and from an Education Department STEM scholarship.
He did his SACE Research Project on the potential for STEM to help “close the gap” in indigenous education outcomes.
But the project left him convinced that there are some indigenous students who “didn’t get that opportunity (I’ve had) or didn’t take it”. Now that he’s finished high school, he’s imploring teachers to educate themselves on these sorts of programs, to help students get through the application processes, and to even give them a firm push in the right direction if needed.
Mitchell, 18, will do the Engineering Pathway Program at Adelaide University this year and intends to move into a civil engineering degree in 2021.
“I got accepted as an intern starting early (this) year at KBR (engineering firm Kellogg Brown & Root),” he says. “I’ll be working as a casual in all my uni breaks for the next couple of years.”
Through Year 12 he worked up to 20 hours a week at Target, and he also does some work alongside his dad at Australian Clutch Services at Wingfield.
“I’m just trying to save heaps before uni,” he says.
A highlight of his 2019 was his Salisbury Football Club team winning the B-grade premiership.
RIYA MENON
Norwood Morialta High School
Riya Menon can stand in the sun for 45 minutes with a fly on her face and not flinch.
That military discipline, which she learned in the Australian Air Force Cadets, turned out to be a great asset for Year 12.
Riya, who was school captain at Norwood Morialta High, became interested in the defence forces when her dad joined the Army Reserves three years ago, which made her realise there was more to life than looking out for No. 1.
She learned a lot about focus, teamwork and following orders in the cadets sessions at the Hampstead Barracks.
“That taught me a lot of discipline and focus (I brought) to my studies,” she says. “You learn how to manage all those tasks.”
The 18-year-old from Ridgehaven, who achieved three SACE Merits, an ATAR of 99.1 and a Governor of SA Commendation, has grand career ambitions.
Firstly she’s off to Australian National University to study law and international security, which will take five years.
“I’m hoping perhaps to be recruited by the Federal Government or intelligence services that eventually would take me towards the United Nations,” she says.
“Ultimately I think my goal is Harvard University for my masters (in law).
“I’ve always wanted to go to an Ivy League school.”
Originally from India, Riya’s family came to Sydney when she was nine, later moving to Melbourne, and then Adelaide in 2015.
She balanced her studies with a significant tutoring workload, including two middle school students in Sydney whom she teaches online each week over Skype.
She tutors two primary students face-to-face at home, and is also an assistant instructor at the Modbury centre of tutoring service Kumon Australia, helping students in Years 2 to 10
with English.
She’ll keep working at Kumon over summer and hopes to transfer to one of its centres in Canberra when she moves there.
In her role as school captain, she was busy organising charity fundraisers and events.
She became a confident public speaker, addressing assemblies and governing council meetings.
DANTE MCDONALD
Eynesbury Senior College
The problem with the university entrance system, Dante McDonald says, is the “strong link” between students’ ATARs and their postcodes.
In other words, it tends to advantage the wealthy.
That’s why he championed a Bill in the YMCA SA’s 2019 Youth Parliament for the establishment of a subsidised tutoring service for high school students from low socio-economic backgrounds.
The tutors would be university students, and the service would be paid for by government and unis.
Youth Parliament members are split into committees who work up ideas into Bills over a few months. Then, for a week in the July school holidays, they take over the State Parliament building and debate their proposals.
“Ours passed both houses by two or three votes,” Dante says. “It was really, really enjoyable. It was probably the highlight of my schooling. I’d like to work in politics but I wouldn’t like to be like our politicians.”
Another highlight was his role in Eynesbury Senior College’s victories in the 2018 and 2019 Mock Trial Competition run by the Law Society.
Last year he was his team’s lead barrister and won the competition’s Best Barrister award, for which he won an internship in the chambers of Chief Justice Chris Kourakis.
He got to watch all the proceedings over which Mr Kourakis presided for a week, and to produce case summaries to help him prepare for a coming speech – useful for someone going into a law degree this year.
And since exams finished, he’s worked in his grandfather’s water broking office preparing documents and a submission for the ACCC’s water rights inquiry.
Depending on scholarship results, Dante, 18, will either head to Australian National University in Canberra to study law alongside a combined politics, philosophy and economics degree, or Adelaide University to study law and arts.
The Southern Tigers district basketballer is also a longtime referee, picking up the whistle when he was just 12. He’s worked in a cafe too.
Dante has also volunteered on the digital youth committee of anti-violence, pro-healthy relationships organisation The Line, having input into its various online campaigns.
CAITLIN STOCKMAN
Burra Community School
If you hear someone call out “Bear!” in the Barossa this year, don’t worry, it won’t be an escaped zoo animal. Not even a misidentified koala.
It’ll be former Burra Community School student Caitlin Stockman calling for her beloved cat, named Bear.
Caitlin is moving from the family farm near Burra to the Barossa so she can spend a gap year working in wineries or other hospitality jobs.
“I’m going to live with my nanna in Tanunda as a stepping stone to moving out of home. I get to bring my cat with me,” the 17-year-old says.
“After that, I have got into secondary teaching at the University of Adelaide.
“That will happen in 2021. I really want to be able to support myself as much as I can. Hence the gap year to work and save money.”
While two-year-old Bear is coming along for the adventure, Caitlin will leave another 11 cats and three dogs behind. So it’s hardly surprising that her major work for her SACE Communication Products 1 subject was in pet photography.
Pictures are a passion for Caitlin, who also convened the photography competition for the Burra Show the past few years. Last year it had more than 200 entries.
She had plenty of other things on her plate as her school’s head prefect and student representative council president, plus umpiring and coaching netball in the Net Set Go program for five to eight-year-olds.
She’s also worked in a cafe in Burra for four years.
“I was pretty good with time management (in Year 12). Past years I’ve been shocking with stress but this year (2019) I did really well,” she says.
“I had three calendars and two diaries and planned things out really well.”
Caitlin, who will be the first in her family to go to university, managed an ATAR of 96.65 and a Governor of SA Commendation.
After studying Spanish through Open Access College in Year 11, for her SACE Research Project she looked at how multilingual people function at a “much higher” cognitive level than others.
JENNIFER PRITCHARD
Glossop High School
She’s only 18, but Jennifer Pritchard has already mapped out how she’s going to transition from one career path to another.
The Glossop High School graduate wants to become a personal trainer, but hasn’t found any local study options for that in the Riverland.
So she’s going to leverage skills she gained from the vocational commercial cookery courses she did as part of her SACE, to get more paid work and save for a car.
Then she can drive herself to Adelaide or Mildura for modules of a personal
training course.
Jennifer, who has a mild intellectual disability, was the recipient of the Governor of SA Commendation for Excellence in Modified SACE.
“I feel happy and excited. I worked pretty hard,” she says of the award.
According to the SACE Board, modified subjects for students with disabilities are “highly individualised subjects in which curriculum and assessment are designed around development of one or more SACE capabilities and personal learning goals … appropriate for the student”.
Jennifer did a host of them, ranging from Business and Enterprise to Creative Arts.
She’s also a fixture at Crossfit Riverland in Berri, where work experience turned into a part-time job as an assistant on Fridays, setting up for different workout programs, handing out water bottles and cleaning.
Jennifer says talking to clients has been a good way of building her confidence and making friends.
She also volunteered at Berri Primary, reading and playing games with young students, and did work experience by helping with physical education classes at Barmera Primary School.
She also plays Aussie Rules for Barmera-Monash Football Club.
Mum Teresa is justifiably proud of Jennifer’s achievements, and grateful to the staff at Glossop High.
“They were really supportive and very helpful when she needed it,” she says.
In 2019, 296 students with intellectual disabilities studied at least one modified subject on the way to completing their SACE, up from 239 the previous year.
BEN HEARD,
King’s Baptist Grammar School
We all know the adage that practice makes perfect, but Ben Heard takes it to heart – in the case of his maths exams, to extreme levels.
The 18-year-old collected more than 100 past papers, not just from SA, but New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia too, ahead of his two Stage 2 SACE maths exams, both of which he did while in Year 11.
“I just figured I’ve got 24 hours in a day,” the King’s Baptist Grammar School graduate says.
“I thought I might as well spend as much time in the last few weeks to do as many practice exams as I can.”
So thorough was his preparation that he also created mini online textbooks full of topic summaries that his former teachers now use with their Year 12 classes.
It’s hard to argue with Ben’s methods when you look at his results.
He achieved SACE Merits in Specialist Mathematics and Mathematical Methods, a 99.8 ATAR and a Governor of SA Commendation.
What’s more, he aced two first-year uni maths subjects via Adelaide University’s Headstart program, scoring high distinctions for both – equivalent to a 20/20 SACE subject result.
But the Mawson Lakes teen’s school life wasn’t all about maths.
Early last year he and a group of schoolmates organised a 24-hour ping-pong-a-thon.
They live streamed it on Facebook as a fundraiser for United Way SA.
They took requests and dares to dance and sing as they played all day and all night.
“It was a very fun 24 hours of no sleep, junk food and raising money,” Ben says.
They raised $1100 to buy books for disadvantaged children and presented their fundraising results at their school formal, which doubled as a charity ball.
Through the Base Church in Paralowie, Ben’s family
has been integral to the running of the Hope Village orphanage and school in Sumatra, Indonesia.
Ben has made several trips there, running some physical education lessons at the school, while one of his regular duties at home is to write newsletters for donors.
“It’s been a pretty big part of my life growing up,” he says.
Over summer he’s teaching himself about accounting and bookkeeping, so he can take over that part of the charity work from his mum.
Then he will embark on a double degree in environmental engineering and science at Adelaide University.
CHARLOTTE ZHANG
Pembroke School
When Year 12 results were released, Charlotte Zhang spent the evening studying again – ready to take her learner driver’s licence test the next day.
It was the one thing she hadn’t had time to swot for but, like her SACE exams, she passed with flying colours.
“I was pretty stressed through the ‘give way’ questions because I knew you had to get all of them right to pass,” she says.
“After that it was all fine.”
The Pembroke School graduate is among the last of her circle to start driving, but she has a plan to fund her first car by setting up a tutoring business with friends.
She’ll be mentoring Year 11s and 12s this year in many of the subjects in which she excelled – Chemistry, Physics, two maths subjects and the Research Project.
Within a week of posting an ad last month, 15 students had registered interest in Charlotte’s tutoring services.
That’s not surprising, given the 17-year-old took on nine Year 12-level subjects over three years, starting with Biology when she was in Year 10. She achieved SACE Merits in six of them, the highest possible ATAR of 99.95 and a Governor of SA Commendation.
With five Merits already in the bag by the end of Year 11, she was able to devote plenty of time last year to studying for the University Clinical Aptitude Test needed to win a place in a medical degree. She faces another week’s wait for university offers.
Charlotte has been playing piano since she was five and practised classical pieces (Chopin’s her favourite) to wind down from study.
“(Adelaide University) has a medical students’ orchestra, so I’ll be doing that if I get in there,” she says.”
Her SACE Research Project that she completed last year had a medical theme, on the extent that clinical depression increases the risk of heart disease.
Before Year 12 began she attended the National Youth Science Forum in Brisbane, building and programming robots. If she can do that, reverse parallel parking should be a doddle.
JACK KELTON
Sacred Heart College
The privatisation of the space industry is radically accelerating the rate of technological progress, Jack Kelton says, and he wants to get on board.
At Sacred Heart College, Jack did his SACE Research Project on the pros and cons of the privateers.
He interviewed SA astronaut Andy Thomas as well as relatives working in the satellite game.
He concluded that while there are risks, such as conflicts of interest and putting cost management above ethics, breakthroughs made by private space companies in just the past few years show how crucial they are to the industry.
Jack, 18, will this year begin mechanical engineering and computer science degrees at Adelaide University and is looking at majoring in aerospace.
He certainly has the aptitude, having done mostly STEM subjects for his SACE plus some first-year uni computer science subjects through Adelaide University’s Headstart program.
He received a Governor of SA Commendation and his ATAR was 99.5.
Before Year 12 began, Jack and his mates became entrepreneurs in a very modern way, producing 3D-printed accessories and selling them through Instagram.
“We made little rings and things like that you could wear, and little toys you could play with,” he says. “We made a little catapult. A few people bought them.
“We ended up making a few hundred bucks.”
And Jack had plenty else outside of study to keep him occupied through the year.
He is a lifeguard at the SA Aquatic and Leisure Centre at Oaklands Park and is also a surf lifesaver at Glenelg, having begun as a nipper in the under-7s.
And he volunteers with his grandparents doing catering for Vinnies.
He played Aussie Rules for Sacred Heart but has also developed a passion for a very different kind of football – gridiron – joining the Marion City Chiefs and then making a state team.
“I’d always watched it on TV and played the PS4 games,” he says.
“We went to Sydney and played against all the other states and won a couple of games, so that was good.
“I was a receiver. I got a few catches over there, which was good fun.”
VICTORIA MOULARADELLIS
Wilderness School
How do you use your SACE Research Project to make yourself smarter for every other subject?
By doing it on how Year 12s can improve their learning.
That’s what Victoria Moularadellis did, showing the kind of nous that has also made her a young entrepreneur within the Kingston Estate wine family.
“I thought learning about memory in Year 12 would be useful,” she says of the Research Project about neuroplasticity and learning.
“It’s a lot to do with eating healthily and exercising really” – and eating blueberries, doing brain training, and following the old adage that memory is like a muscle that grows the more you use it.
All that seemed to work well for the Wilderness School graduate who achieved three SACE Merits, a 99.9 ATAR and a Governor of SA Commendation.
During Year 12 she was also helping to run Kingston Estate’s Mo Sisters label with her twin sister Emma, 17, and older sister Lauren, 19.
Targeted at young female drinkers, it’s already exported to many parts of the US.
“It’s nothing like the (Kingston Estate) brand has done before,” she says. “It’s sold to major retailers over there and it will be launched in Australia next year.
“The varietals are very much towards their taste (young women), and it’s as much about marketing and packaging.”
The wine work occupied her for up to 10 hours a week in Year 12.
Victoria will further set herself up for a business career by pursuing law and economics degrees at Adelaide University.
At school she was sports captain, responsible for organising sports day, the swimming carnival, and the “intercol” weekends of matches against rivals Seymour College.
She also did a lot of coaching and mentoring of younger students in
touch footy and netball, all of which led to her
winning an Australian Olympic Change Maker award from the Australian Olympic Committee.
One legacy she will leave at Wilderness is its student media team, which she founded when she was in Year 7. The team films school events and makes a commemorative video for Year 12s each year.
