by Tanya Steele
Healesville High School students competed online at the Education Perfect World Languages Championship this month where the school finished 10th in Japanese for Victoria, out of 246 schools in the state.
Special mention and congratulations went to a group of students at the school, who together placed highly in the competition.
Lily received the Emerald award and she came first in the school and 50th in the world, placing her in the top 1.5 per cent across all languages.
The year nine student said it doesn’t feel real at this stage, the competition had the students competing with over 2,500 other schools and 200,000 students.
“It feels like just a number,” she said.
“My family was happy, I can tell you that much.”
Amelia placed second in the school, Grace third and Olivia and Sarah achieved their bronze certificate.
Lily likes the way the Japanese alphabet is set up.
“In the Japanese alphabet, once you learn what’s called a character, it doesn’t change how it sounds in English,” she said.
Assistant Principal Matthew Donald was happy about the results.
“We’re ecstatic that they’ve done such a great job because to achieve the standards they’ve got to that requires that extended effort and a really consistent approach to competition,” he said.
“It’s not just a one off thing, it’s a great example of endeavour.”
The school answered over 49,000 questions, requiring commitment outside the classroom and equaled around 65 hours of time spent studying.
“There’s no way to achieve that without putting the effort and time in so they deserve their moment in the sun,” Mr Donald said.
Japanese Language teacher Ashleigh Katsi was also immensely proud of the students for their dedication.
“I’m so proud of my student’s, they just take things on and run with it,” she said.
The long weekend meant the students had a later start to the week long competition and Ms Katsi was keen to make sure the school competes every year going forward.
“We hope for even better next year,” she said.
The students all agreed they enjoyed language as a topic and would continue to study it in the future.
