Hard work and determination pay off for Helderkruin top achiever
The Helderkruin resident agrees that the pandemic and the constant load-shedding were the biggest challenges.
Despite the matric class of 2022 doing the last two and half years of their schooling under intermittent Covid-19 lockdowns and regulations, school closures, and various difficulties, including curriculum trimming, 18-year-old Vuyo Angura kept his head up and still emerged victorious.
Like most of the 2022 matric top achievers, the Helderkruin resident agrees that the pandemic and the constant load-shedding were the biggest challenges.
Despite his challenges, the St Benedict’s College matriculant told the Record that he dug deep to stay motivated, worked hard, and committed to being at the top against all odds.
The star learner who is currently at res (House Tau) in the University of Pretoria achieved an incredible five distinctions.
Collectively his school achieved a total of 273 distinctions with 12 boys among the country’s highest academic achievers and the school upholding its 100% pass rate for an unparalleled 48th consecutive year.
Vuyo who joined the school in Grade 10 is described by his teachers as observant, open-minded, reserved, decisive, tenacious, persistent, thorough, and spontaneous.
He plans to study Mechanical Engineering at the University of Pretoria and an eventual master’s in aerospace engineering abroad.
“As a child, I was always interested in cars and the machinery behind them, this love eventually moved to aircraft and finally spacecraft – which complimented my fascination with space,” explained Vuyo.
St Benedict’s College awarded Vuyo with Senior Academic Full Colours, he achieved certificates for participating in the second round of the South African Mathematics Olympiad and in Grade 12 he was awarded the College Bilingualism Award for a distinction for home language (English).
The differences between government and independent schools seemed to reflect in their matric results, with the IEB confirming a 98.42% pass rate in 2022, a slight uptick from 98.39% recorded in 2021.
In contrast, The Department of Basic Education released the final National Senior Certificate results for the 2022 matric year showing a 3.7 percentage point increase in the pass rate to 80.1%.
The top three independent boys’ school achievers included St John’s College, Hilton, and St Benedict’s College.
