St Paul’s Collegiate School student Hugo Brown has been awarded a scholarship valued at $50,000 to attend the University of Auckland where he plans to study engineering.
The 18-year-old, who is one of St Paul’s brightest students, was awarded the scholarship for his academic ability. One of the major deciding factors for the university was Brown’s selection for the New Zealand team that attended the International Chemistry Olympiad in Baku, Azerbaijan.
Brown’s science teacher Dr Jason McGrath says the examination for the Olympiad selection is by far the most “rigorous and in-depth examination of a secondary school students abilities in chemistry” and that it "goes well beyond the standard curriculum in scope and difficulty."
Brown and his team came home from the Olympiad with a bronze medal after competing against 80 countries.
In 2014, while in Year 12, Brown completed NCEA levels two and three – passing both with an excellence endorsement (the highest endorsement possible). He also sat and passed three NZQA Scholarship examinations (one with an outstanding endorsement). According to the NZQA website, only three percent of Year 13 students have the academic rigour to pass the examinations.
Instead of heading to university a year early, Brown decided to sit a first year university mathematics paper and work towards 10 NZQA Scholarship examinations. Depending on his results, Brown could be will be eligible for anywhere between $12,000 and $36,000 worth of funding towards his undergraduate degree in addition to the funding received through his scholarship.
