The Higher School Certificate isn't a walk in the park, and this year's current crop of students haven't had the smoothest ride.
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The COVID-19 pandemic has seen schools forced to adapt with technology taking a key role at Marian Catholic College.
While some students spent nearly two months studying from home, they welcomed back their peers to school this week.
School vice-captain Julia Forner said studying from home was a challenge.
"The online classes through Zoom are fine, it's like you're in class," she said.
But maintaining the study routine after 'class' was a lot harder than it was usually.
Fellow vice-captain Sam Macrae agreed and said the challenge was realising that year 12 was still going despite the best laid plans being undone by the pandemic.
"The first two weeks were a bit hit and miss. After term two I realised that we were halfway through."
It didn't take long for most year 12 students to get their head around what they needed to do, and with school coming back full-time questions remain about what happens next.
"It's all the special things that we want to experience in our last year of school that we've missed out on," school captain Darian Le Cornu said.
Things like year 12's last athletics carnival and the fundraising that was organised by year 12 are in doubt.
"We don't get to experience the last of everything," school captain Aribo Kaibwa said.
And as restrictions are eased, working out how school graduations and end of year celebrations work will be the next challenge.
Fortunately there's good news, students have been told that requirements for university will be adjusted to take the pandemic into consideration.
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Many year 12 classes were brought back ahead of the rest of schools, and some students had to remind themselves they weren't alone at times.
"It felt weird being in an almost empty school," Darian said. "Having other students back has made getting back into routine easier"
Principal Alan Le Brocque said the school made efforts to help students who might have felt disconnected from their peers and shared information about wellbeing, providing professional development for teachers to learn new software and opening the school library for small groups to study.
With everyone studying from home, Julia said recess and lunch group calls brought students together so they could still share their social time with each other.
"The student leadership team did an outstanding job in supporting the wellbeing of their peers," Mr Le Brocque said.