Cape Town - As the Covid-19 pandemic demotivated and derailed many 2022 matric candidates in different ways, 18-year-old Kate Vineall believes ballet dance is what kept her sane in the midst of the stressful workload.
The pupil at St Cyprian's School for Girls in Oranjezicht obtained 9 distinctions.
Vineall along with three other fellow matrics, Gia Antoni, Emma-Beth Peters and Janneke van der Walt also made it to the Independent Examination Board’s (IEB) national top achievers list.
Her school also celebrated a 100% bachelor’s degree pass rate and 256 subject distinctions.
“I was very nervous to see my results. I didn't know what to expect and never anticipated that I would not only be among the top performers in my school but also nationally.
“Because the year was very stressful due to the workload and catch-up we had to do.
The best thing was to find a routine that would work for me and consistently work hard. While I relied on my support system and friends and family, dancing helped me,” said Vineall.
She said at some point she would be tired and saw she needed to take care of her mental health.
“Ballet has always been my passion and first love, I've been doing it since I was 4 years old. As a ‘break’ I would go ballet dancing and this assisted me a lot to distress. It got me through matric and I would encourage the class of 2023 that when they feel fatigue or discourage they must find that thing that gives them hope or makes them feel whole. I’m looking forward to my next journey and I’m proud of myself,” said Vineall.
She is hoping to study medicine at UCT.
For Reddam House Atlantic Seaboard’s Mila Za who obtained seven distinctions, maths was the subject that gave her a sleepless night on Tuesday as she waited to see her results.
“Grade 10 is where you learn the basics which will assist in the next grades, especially matric. When Covid-19 hit and we had to learn online it was the worst thing that could have happened to me. It was extremely hard to understand most of the maths problems.
“That set me back quite a bit as a person who was already struggling with the subject.
It was worse in matric, my confidence was low, I would always be scared to write a test and be anxious but I told myself I won’t give up,” said Za.
On Wednesday she learnt that she was among pupils at Reddam House Cape Town schools that did exceptionally well.
“Even though maths is the only subject I didn’t get a distinction in, I still passed better than I expected and it is the most incredible thing.”
Malaika Delport who achieved six distinctions said matrics were affected in terms of the technical and logical subjects.
“Not only did I take maths but also physical sciences and online learning was truly not effective. We knew the structure of traditional learning so having to adapt to online learning was a bit of a struggle for many of us.
“We also realised the importance of social interaction at school to effectively learn, having face-to-face interaction. Although our teachers and school did their best, Covid-19 was demotivating especially for those who lost loved ones or were severely sick. The impact was evident when we got to matric but we pushed and worked hard to get here.”
Reddam House Cape Town schools in Constantia Valley, Atlantic Seaboard, and Durbanville also achieved a 100% pass rate and with 144 matrics obtaining 401 distinctions.
A total of 99 pupils also made it to the IEB national top achievers lists.
Cape Times