Be smart when writing supplementary matric exams

Dear grade 12 pupil of 2024

If you failed the grade 12 final exam, your statement of results will say “the candidate does not quality for the National Senior Certificate” (NSC).

This is deceptive. You failed. It is a reality you share with thousands of others, and it is not a shame. You can do something about it.

Unfortunately, there is no one answer since it depends on how you failed.

Let me walk you through some scenarios.

You failed two subjects but passed everything else including home language (40% minimum).

Let’s say you got 27% for business studies but 15% for mathematical literacy.

You need one subject to pass. I suggest you leave mathematical literacy where it is; it is highly unlikely you will get 30% because that means doubling your marks ahead of the supplementary examination in June.

Put all your energy into moving business studies from 27% to 30% so that you pass and achieve the certificate.

Better a matric pass, however obtained, than nothing at all.

But get a top tutor in business studies to help you. Simply studying on your own is unlikely to move the needle to a pass, especially since the supplementary exam is often experienced as tougher than the final exam was.

Study till this subject comes out of your ears. Focus and lean heavily on the tutor.

After the June supplementary exam, and assuming you pass then, find a job to earn some money, and do your homework on study options you might qualify for, and which pique your interest, for example, photography and tourism at a technical college — and apply in time.

Then, blow the lights out in your initial certificate or diploma studies — do so well that you might then qualify for degree studies at a university.

In other words, failing is not the end of the world when you are so young at 17 or 18 years of age.

If you passed poorly, once again take a hard look at your percentage (or code) achieved for each subject and do your sums.

Let’s say you passed all your subjects but only obtained 50% in mathematics, but a BCom or BSc degree requires 60%.

Then re-do mathematics following the advice shared earlier: get a good tutor and aim for 70%.

Work tirelessly ahead of the supplementary exam to do even better than your minimum goals.

Then reapply for the commerce or science degree you want to do.

However, be realistic. You are not going to do electrical engineering or architecture with those marks, even if you passed.

Do not lie to yourself and do not let your parents give you the impression that you can qualify for top fields given the thousands of students with better results than yours who are on waiting lists or simply do not get in with 70s and 80s in fields such as medicine.

Then the really bad news. Let’s consider the Cape Town universities as a case in point.

If you apply with less than stellar NSC results to Stellenbosch or UCT, where the entry level admissions standards are much higher than at CPUT or UWC, then you are not paying attention.

At least apply to all universities and hope for the best but the hard truth is that CPUT or UWC might give you a shot at admission but not the other two, simply because there are thousands more students with A and B aggregate passes applying to the elite universities.

Nobody tells you this because they do not want to offend you or their sister universities, but we need to face up to the facts here.

This does not mean that CPUT or UWC are lesser universities. Heavens no.

But it does mean that in public perception, the four universities are not regarded equally.

Again, not the end of the world, you can study at UWC and do so well that you can find admission to the top universities in the world.

Get your foot in the door and then outperform your peers.

No route through higher education is a cul de sac, provided you are prepared to work hard.

At the other end of the performance spectacle, let me repeat what I have said before.

Students with seven or nine distinctions out of high school are seldom brilliant university students who become giants in academia, industry and medicine.

They owe their impressive results largely to memory and mastery of the examination game and, in most cases, money.

What they have not learnt is healthy doses of critical thinking, imaginative solutions to problems, and the unleashing of the creative mind.

That is what you can achieve even though you started more slowly than others.