Year 12 student Radhika (aka Sonnet) Pandit received an ATAR of 99.65, the highest of any student at , despite missing two months of school due to a potentially fatal illness. She told Matt Hewson her story of success over adversity.
Academic excellence is nothing new for Matthew Flinders Girls Secondary College (MFG) year 12 student Sonnet Pandit.
Last year while in year 11, Sonnet completed Unit 3/4 subject Extended Investigation, for which she received a subject score of 48, the second highest in Victoria.
She was also the recipient of the 2023 Deakin Young Influencer of the Year Award scholarship, and later received the Premier’s VCE Award for her Extended Investigation score.
She had high hopes for year 12, initially aiming for an ATAR of 98.5, but she did not count on missing two months of school due to a life-threatening illness.
Since 2022 Sonnet has lived with the rare gastro-vascular disorder superior mesenteric artery (SMA) syndrome, whose symptoms include nausea, pain and frequent vomiting.
However, this year Sonnet’s condition quickly and unexpectedly deteriorated.
“It got really bad this year… I was vomiting around 40 times a day up until August,” Sonnet said.
“I became very underweight, I was 44 (kg) and then I was 39; my weight was going down very rapidly.
“It became life-threatening, so they had to admit me (to hospital) in August so I could survive. They put in a feeding tube so I could gain weight and up my nutrition.”
Sonnet’s doctors wanted her to defer year 12 and her parents agreed. Many students would have happily done so, but not Sonnet.
“I think it came down to the fact that I really do love learning, and I felt that if I did not complete year 12 this year, I didn’t know what else I would do, to be honest,” she said.
“Learning is very beneficial to my mental health… being cooped up at home alone and not having a social life would have been more depressing to me.
“When I go to school and exercise myself intellectually I feel much happier. I felt that learning was important to nurture me mentally so I could get better physically.”
Sonnet, who preferred to study four hours a day, agreed to reduce her study time during periods where she was particularly ill.
She said the stigma of having a feeding tube and thus looking different had also been stressful.
“When I had the tube put in it was helpful, but it was distressing at the same time,” Sonnet said.
“People would stare at me in public, and that was a mental burden in itself.”
However, thanks to the support of her parents and MFG teachers – particularly English teacher Annie Mullen-Walsh – Sonnet not only survived but excelled, receiving a school-high ATAR of 99.65.
She hopes to study a double degree in arts and law at Melbourne University before heading to Cambridge or Oxford in the UK to complete a Masters.
“I’m tossing up between the idea of becoming a feminist scholar, a professor in feminist literature, or a lawyer, but lawyer is more of a backup plan,” Sonnet said.
“I’m really passionate about feminist literature and diversifying the female canon, because currently it’s a lot of Western literature and there are obviously marginalised voices in feminist discourse.”
