Dannevirke High School Students' achievements recognised after tough year

Dannevirke High School Dux for 2020 Pippa Smyth.

Dannevirke High School Dux for 2020 was awarded to Pippa Smyth in a ceremony that celebrated some amazing achievements despite adversity.

The year was extremely difficult for Dannevirke High School but it endured through the lockdown and the tragic loss of three much-loved students in a crash.

Principal Di Carter paid tribute to the hard work of staff and students to promote academic, sporting and cultural achievement with reduced schooling, and the glittering prizegiving was a tribute to their efforts.

"Our staff demonstrate day after day, the difference that commitment makes in the education of your sons and daughters."

Pippa has attended Dannevirke High School for the past five years, fully involving herself in sporting, leadership and academic challenges, concluding her final year as Netball A and Equestrian Team captains, a prefect and Dux, following five years of consistently being in the top three of her year group.

She was top student in level three biology, chemistry, maths with statistics, physics and was first equal in maths with calculus.

In the sporting arena she was awarded a Year 13 Sports Plaque for winning at least four championship trophies in her five years at school and the JC Whibley Cup for Athletic and Scholastic Achievement for Girls.

As a prefect she gained a Service Award and was one of a select few across the school to achieve a 100 per cent Attendance Award for 2020.

Pippa will study animal science on an undergraduate scholarship at Massey University next year.

Head girl Chantelle Monteith was Proxime Accessit, runner-up to Dux, in a close battle with Pippa.

For the Walker family, after receiving numerous subject awards, Stephanie and Cameron were awarded Sports Woman and Sports Man of the Year for their involvement in athletics, particularly distance running, cricket and netball.

Stephanie was named Sports Person of 2020 and as a prefect also gained the Year 13 Stuart Atkinson Cup for Outstanding Service to the School and the Elise Stephens Memorial Scholarship to help finance university study.

Deputy head boy James Mollison won the Year 13 Derek Stratford Memorial Cup for character, athletics and scholarship, while prefect Clare Seatter won the Exemplar Award as "the student all other students should aspire to be like".

Top in each form level academic awards went to: Year 9 Taj Chapman-Peters; Year 10 William Southgate; Year 11 Sophie Southgate; and Year 12 Anne Barrow.

Special senior awards: David Ennor Cup for Year 11 all-round academic, sporting and cultural excellence Rylee Murphy; Year 12 academic, sporting and cultural contribution, Caleb McCutcheon.