The pain of juvenile arthritis racked her joints and she had trouble just getting to school many days, let alone concentrating in class and remembering the content she was being taught.

And during exam time doctors were testing a new medication on her that caused severe side effects.

But with the support of her family, friends, the Royal Children’s Hospital rheumatology department and Loreto College, Rachel managed to hang in and not just complete her VCE, but receive an ATAR that will give her the options she wants for her future.

“I’ve had juvenile arthritis through my whole high school years, and I had a lot of difficulty just with attendance,” she said.

“I missed a lot of days and had a lot of school work to catch up on, and during class I had quite a bit of difficulty concentrating because of the pain.

“I dropped one subject during the year, and I was very close to pulling the pin and saying I can’t do it any more,” she said.

Rachel hopes her ATAR will secure a place in a Bachelor of Arts degree at Monash or Melbourne and eventually she would like to work in museum curating or politics, but her immediate plans are for some “me” time.

“I’m going to take a gap year next year and try to get my health back on track,” she said.

“I’m going to do some part time work and do things I wasn’t able to do in year 12, do some exercise, yoga and other holistic things to help get my health back.”

Mum Sue was emotional, relieved and proud that her daughter had overcome so much to be able to celebrate VCE success with her classmates.

“I’m relieved and very happy for Rachel that she has opportunity in her future so that she can look forward,” she said.

Mount Clear College student Liam Berrigan took a slightly different route to achieve his 93.9 ATAR – he did an extra year of VCE.

Unhappy with his 85.55 ATAR last year, which was not enough to get him in to his dream degree of a Bachelor of Science (Advanced Research) at Monash University, he opted to do a third year of VCE to improve his marks.

“I’ve always loved physics and understanding how things work and what’s really out there in the universe,” he said.

“And my curiosity would be at home among research and trying to find out as much as I can.”

Having effectively skipped year nine as part of Mount Clear’s Select Entry Accelerated Learning Program (SEALP), Liam is actually graduating with his same-aged peers.

And now he has nine VCE subjects under his belt.

“Last year I did five year 12 subjects – chemistry, philosophy, VET hospitality, English language and maths methods – and this year I did further maths, physics, specialist maths, literature and English language again to improve the score.”

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Although the clearly-in score for his dream course at Monash is 95, Liam only needed to score 90 to be guaranteed a place under the Monash Guarantee for regional schools.

Knowing what he would be in for during a repeat VCE year “didn’t make it any more fun”.

“It’s always good to know what you are in for because the workload the first time around it was a bit of an adjustment to make, but the second time around you know what you are in for and can pace yourself throughout the year.”