Amaan Merchant in Top 10 in NZ for Scholarship results

Samina, Amaan and Mohib Merchant

Former WHS student Amaan Merchant in Top 10 in NZ for Scholarship results.

Amaan Merchant obtained four ‘Oustanding’ results in last year’s scholarship exams and three Scholarship passes, making him one of the top 10 students in New Zealand. He was part of a great scholarship result for Wanganui High School, which is celebrating a total of 23 scholarships, with six in English and four in Biology. Principal Garry Olver is understandably very happy seeing it as “an outstanding result” putting the decile four Wanganui High School on a par with the top decile schools in Auckland. He believes that it also shows how all the schools in Wanganui compete favourably on the national scene.

Amaan’s ‘Outstanding’ subjects were – Statistics, Physics, Chemistry and Economics and his regular Scholarship passes were in Calculus, Music and Earth and Space Science. To get outstanding you have to be at the very top and the number of awards is dependent on how many students sit that subject. The fewer the students, the fewer the awards.

Earth Science is not actually taught at Wanganui High School and likewise at most secondary schools in the country. It was when an ex High School teacher, now at Collegiate, offered High School students the chance to join in on special evening tutorials he was running for Physics that the opportunity came up. Amaan decided to study Earth Science in his ‘spare’ time as there were no set classes or tutorials. Fortunately he had a break of five days before that exam and was able to give it his full concentration.

While Amaan plays contemporary guitar, his music studies focused on Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto 5, which he had to analyse and put into the context of Bach’s life and music.

Asked why he was so successful, apart from inheriting some excellent genes, Amaan said the solid teaching by his mother from an early age especially in maths, provided the foundation. He remembers all the good teachers and although he had Mr Carvell at St Johns Hill School for only one term, Amaan found him to be especially helpful.

He praises High School for “recognizing when you have potential and pushing you to achieve it.” In year nine maths, when he and another student finished work early, they would be given extra. By the end of the year they learnt that they had passed year 10. Likewise if you do well at year 10 Science, you study level 2 Science the following year, says Amaan.

His parents praise his motivation and his maturity to study without being reminded. He was also on the Council’s Youth Committee from July 2011 to the present .He relaxes by socialising with friends, playing his guitar and doing judo.

On February 21, Amaan will be going to Auckland University to study commerce and science with the possibility of working in business and finance when he graduates. With his scholarship successes, he will probably find university work a breeze.

(River City Press 11/2/16)