HSC Chemistry 2025: Students ‘confident’ after exam as more girls study the course
While some students branded it an ‘abomination’ on social media, these four girls conquered one of the HSC’s toughest exams, with plans to pursue STEM careers.
A growing number of girls are choosing to study HSC Chemistry, with four Mount St Benedict College students leaving Thursday’s exam confident and intent on staying in STEM.
More than 10,000 Year 12 students sat what’s often described as one of the more challenging HSC courses, and Thursday’s exam required students to be adept at maths as well as excellent communicators in explaining the theories behind their calculations.
The 2025 exam surprised many students with its theoretical focus and accessible multiple‑choice section, although an unusual spectroscopy question late in the paper caught some off guard.
“We’re feeling pretty good, it wasn’t that bad an exam,” one student said after emerging from the exam hall.
Social media reactions were mixed.
Students from Abbotsleigh in Wahroonga took to social media to call the exam an “abomination”, with others lamenting the difficulty of “finding the percentage of the chalk titration in that stupid chem exam”.
However, comments on a TikTok titled “POV we escaped the closed system” revealed others found it “easier than expected”.
Mount St Benedict’s College students Ashleigh Dougall, School Captain Simran Pandaram, Julia Patanjali and Aneisha Wanigatunga said they felt “confident” leaving the exam room. “We definitely felt very prepared going in, and so coming out we feel confident,” Simran said.
Ashleigh agreed: “Compared to our trials, we were prepared for it. There was no questions that completely stumped us. But I think overall it could have been worse,.”
The students praised the balance of the paper, particularly noting fewer challenging Module C calculations than expected.
“There wasn’t an excessive amount of Mod C hard calculations, which was nice and doable,” Aneisha said, adding that many students had time to spare for checking their work.
Multiple choice proved surprisingly accessible.
“Multiple choice usually is really hard in chemistry and I found the first 10 multiple choice were quite doable, so I was very confident going into the exam,” Simran said.
Julia noted the exam felt more straightforward than anticipated. “I feel like there was less cross-module-type questions so I think it was more straightforward than it could have been,” she said.
Mount St Benedict College Principal Michael Hanratty said: “Questions across the paper were easily matched to syllabus topics and the examiners avoided cross-topic questions,” aimed to “reduced the students’ cognitive load under pressure,” so they could focus on processing the equations and content for that area of the exam.
However, question 36, the second-last question, provided an unexpected challenge with its reversed format.
“I’ve never seen a question where it was like ‘write a seven-marker based on these spectros’ and then not giving us the data,” Aneisha said.
“It was different because usually they provide you with the data and then you make your own conclusions, but then this one it was the opposite of what you usually do,” Julia said.
“I’ve seen it once in a past paper but not for the HSC.”
Ashleigh said she was “happy there was no strict buffer questions because I don’t like buffer questions. I was happy that there was quite a few organic chem at the end, I liked those”. Simran agreed they were “quite theory organic chem as well which was really nice and a good way to end the paper”.
Mr Hanratty said that there was a “notable increase in interest in Chemistry … and increased interest across all STEM-style subjects” with an extra class for Chemistry needed at the school in the past three years.
All four students cited Chemistry’s balance of mathematics and theory as their motivation for choosing the subject, with future STEM careers in mind.
“I feel like we’re all women in STEM now, so it’s kind of good getting a look into the field of high school chemistry and I guess we will see where it takes us,” Aneisha said.
“We’re definitely staying in that science and STEM field,” Simran added.
The students credited extensive past paper practice for their preparedness.
“We felt really prepared because we have a great teacher and she obviously gave us heaps of resources. Especially past papers, everyone did the past papers,” Julia said.
Originally published as HSC Chemistry 2025: Students ‘confident’ after exam as more girls study the course
