• Sacred Heart College student gains A in Uni programme

Sacred Heart College student gains A in Uni programme

A Year 13 student at Sacred Heart College in Napier has got a head start on her tertiary studies by completing a university music paper, for which she received an A grade.

Eighteen-year-old Grace Mawson did the distance writing paper part of her music degree.

The paper is part of the University of Waikato’s Uni Start programme for year 12 and 13 students.

“I am one of the oldest in my year group and I wanted to get right into my degree so I could skip year 13 and then go to Waikato and do my degree.”

“But we decided against it and my compromise was doing a paper through their Uni Start programme. Talking with Mum and Mrs Neville-Foster last year, we decided that I would use this year as a preparation year for university.”

The paper she completed last term was a foundation paper on how to write at University.

The first assessment was three essays as part of an annotated writing portfolio and they were each different text types; explanation, classification, and argumentation. 

“For explanation, I did how to identify colourless organic solutions because I am good at answering those in chemistry. For my classification, I did chemistry again which was classifications of alcohols; primary, secondary and tertiary. Argumentation was on why euthanasia is unacceptable and how it impacts people around the patient, which is what we were doing in religion.” 

“The next assessment was a literature critique and then the final assignment we had to do was an essay on how fake news affects people’s beliefs.”

Grace says the programme's lectures were easy to follow and she could do them in her own time.

“It was reassuring to know that I am up to that level and it shows that I am ready for university.”

“I’m not doing another uni course this year but I am doing a few extra NCEA standards just to bring my grades up so I can try and get an excellence endorsement,” says Grace.

Grace is planning to do a Bachelor of Music at the University of Waikato next year and believe the Uni Start programme has helped her prepare for her tertiary education.

“I will also do electives in possibly chemistry and calculus because I am going to be a secondary teacher in music. But the chemistry and calculus electives will allow me to relieve those classes at High School level.”

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