Cobram Anglican Grammar School students Cadence Pang and Lachlan Tatnall have been declared Victoria’s top International Competitions and Assessments for Schools competitors in the categories of Year 11 mathematics and Year 3 English respectively.
The two students achieved the honour by beating all other Victorian students who entered in their categories.
Despite the accolade, Cadence was humble about the whole event.
“Well, I’m very grateful for this award. Yeah, I was not expecting that,” she said.
Cadence is an ICAS veteran, having entered annually since Year 2, and has previously competed in, among others, the categories of maths, science, digital technologies and English.
She often achieves distinctions and high distinctions.
The Year 11 student, who has aspirations of becoming a doctor, has always loved maths.
“I really enjoy numbers and the way they work, and my teacher Mrs Smith and also Mr Smith (maths teachers at Cobram Anglican Grammar School), they’ve really helped me with my maths skills, developing them over the years,” Cadence said.
For the Year 11 maths test, Cadence had to answer questions related to algebra, counting and methods probability, among a range of topics.
She described the test as hard.
A love of reading led Lachlan to enter the Year 3 English category, and he described the feeling of winning as great.
School ICAS co-ordinator Melonie Smith was thrilled by the achievement of the two students.
Mrs Smith has been involved in the school’s ICAS entries for the past 20 years.
She estimates that about 30 students each year choose to enter the competition, with maths being particularly popular.
The school’s students have performed well historically, with the school winning ICAS Award Winning School for 2021 along with three medals.
The school has a strong possibility of winning the 2022 award as well.
One of the joys for Mrs Smith is to watch the students who enter over multiple year levels grow academically from the experience. She believes the school’s participation in ICAS gives the students another opportunity to become the best they can be.
“We always aim to give our kids all the tools they need to be successful,” Mrs Smith said.
Every year around 41 countries, including Australia, New Zealand, China, India, Malaysia, Singapore, South Africa and the United States, participate in the ICAS competition.