Vlad Barbu joined thousands of students around the country rushing to check NCEA results yesterday. Photo Jaime Pitt-MackayMid Canterbury high school students joined nearly 160,000 other students from around the country when they logged on to find out their NCEA Exam results yesterday

At 7am yesterday the electronic floodgates opened as students around the country accessed the NZQA website to view the results of the previous year’s hard work.

For Year 13 Ashburton College student Vlad Barbu, this was his third year discovering his exams results but this did not ease his nerves. The night before was a restless one. “I didn’t sleep much because I was really nervous and worried,” he said

He checked his results early in the morning while getting ready for work and hadn’t set a special alarm to be an early bird to view his results.

Barbu said he was looking for the all-important 50 excellence credits that would give him level three excellence endorsed and a scholarship towards university.

Studying a Bachelor of Science and double-majoring in Statistics and Finance awaits Barbu at university so merit endorsements in German, Calculus, Chemistry, Economics and an Excellence endorsement in Statistics is something he is very proud of, and hopes will help him at university.

The nationwide error that was made in the level three statistics exam was certainly something that played on Barbu’s mind in the period between the exam and the results being released.

“I was scared about how they would mark it and whether it would affect if I got excellence on the paper which was something I really needed,” said Barbu

Barbu will not have to endure another period waiting for scholarship exam results, unlike other Year 13 students who will be waiting until next month to discover their fate.

By Jaime Pitt-MacKay © The Ashburton Guardian - 18 January 2017