Mount Gambier’s class of 2020 share the lessons learned in a graduating year marred by COVID-19
From ruined gap year plans to the uncertainty of applying to interstate universities, Mount Gambier’s class of 2020 has refused to give up amid COVID-19.
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Mount Gambier’s class of 2020 have struggled with COVID-19 enforced online learning, realised their gap year plans were ruined and questioned the reality of attending university interstate for their dream course.
As they enter exams, four local Year 12 students reflect on the lessons they learned and positives they have taken out of the disruptive year.
RYLAN WARD – GRANT HIGH SCHOOL
Long before COVID-19 hit Rylan Ward had his eyes set on moving to Melbourne for university and the events of 2020 have not derailed that plan.
Working towards his dream degree – engineering at Monash University – the Grant High School student has hit the books studying specialist maths, mathematical methods, chemistry, physics and English.
“It will challenge me, I’m interested in maths and science and it’s down that path,” Rylan said.
“It’s one of the top engineering universities in Australia and I have a mate doing engineering there and he said that it was good, so I thought I’d give it a shot.”
The 18 year old said he was interested in mechanical, civil or electrical engineering and had a backup plan to studying remotely and had applied to South Australia universities too.
Choosing to learn on campus whenever possible, Rylan said it had been an interesting year.
“We started off pretty normal and then when COVID started ramping up a bit we saw a lot people not come to school or do online,” he said.
“I know for me, it sort of impacted my work ethic a little.
“When we got back into it, it was a bit of a struggle like getting back into the groove of things.”
In the end though Rylan said the extra one-on-one teaching was a benefit come exam time.
“I haven’t felt too pressured,” he said.
“I’ve had quite a lot of time to prepare and my hardest subject are later on so it gives me a bit more time for those.”
JESSICA SNELL – TENISON WOODS COLLEGE
An academic course load, school captain duties and a part time job are a lot to juggle for most Year 12s but Jessica Snell also had the challenges of a pandemic to contend with.
From a few weeks of remote learning to presenting video assemblies rather than full school affairs, the Tenison Woods College captain is taking the positives out of the lessons of 2020.
“We have missed out on quite a few things this year,” Jessica said.
“At the time we were probably obviously a little bit disheartened that we couldn’t do a few things but looking at it now probably it was almost beneficial because it meant we had less distractions to try and complete our studies.
“There was a little period we had to do online learning. That was a little bit of a difference to try and adapt to because we hadn’t done anything like that before and it was not only us as students who were learning how to learn online, but our teachers also learning how to teach online.
“I am probably someone who prefers more face-to-face teaching, I just find that I’m more engaged when I’m learning that way.”
With one exam down and two to go, the finish line is in sight and Jessica said her top tip for future Year 12s was to take breaks when things get stressful.
“It just goes so quickly,” she said.
“I did my first exam on Monday and I’ve got two more to go and then I’m finished year 12 and finished school and it feels like only yesterday that we were just starting.”
But Jessica is not quite ready to leave Tenison Woods College behind and plans to go a gap year completing a traineeship in public relations at the school in 2021.
“Then the following year, I’ll hopefully go off to uni, depending on what ATAR I get at the end of this year,” she said.
“I’d love to do nutrition and dietetics at Flinders in Adelaide, but that’s 90.1 so it’s quite a high ATAR to try to achieve but we’ll wait and see how I go.”
CAITLIN AND TONEYA CARRAILL – MOUNT GAMBIER HIGH SCHOOL
The Carraill twins may have started Year 12 with the same goal but they have now both decided to go in different directions.
Hoping to study veterinary science, Caitlin and Toneya picked all the same subjects, something they said has kept them motivated.
Inspired by her research project Caitlin now plans to study a double degree in exercise and sport science and food nutritional science.
“I focused my research project on how a plant based diet can affect physical health and I’m really interested in physical health now,” Caitlin said.
While after tossing up between veterinary science, not going to university and marine biology, Toneya has decided to study agriculture science with the hope of taking over the family farm their Pop.
“I think I always sort of just kept coming back to (veterinary science) because it was something that would have been considered easy for me because I’ve grown up with animal and I never really thought of anything else I wanted to do so I just always fell back on that,” Toneya said.
“Dad’s not really interested in farming so Pop’s probably happy that someone in the family wants to take it on.”
Among around 20 Year 12 students who continued learning on campus, they agreed the smaller class sizes had benefits.
“That definitely helped being able to talk to the teachers a bit more because there wasn’t as many students in class,” Caitlin said.
While the Carraill twins said the interruptions to their studies were limited, the pandemic has halted their plan to work as counsellors at Camp America during a gap year.
It also temporarily sidelined them from a long list of sporting commitments and both were disappointed to miss out on a number of inter-school sporting activities in their finals year.
“Netball we got a shortened season it was just a 10 week season instead of 16 weeks, and we only had one week of finals which was the grand final when we usually have three,” Toneya said.
“Swimming got cancelled for a month or two. We were doing Zoom training sessions, exercises and stuff that would help build muscle and that for swimming.”