Paula Tellechea. PHOTO: loaned

Paula Tellechea Aramburo (1st year Medicine) has obtained the first Extraordinary award of high school diplomaThe first prize, awarded each year by the department of Education of the Government of Navarra, was given to Paula Tellechea Aramburo. "I was very surprised to receive the award because I assumed that there would be others who had done better than me. My sister sent me a message and I had to read it three times until I believed it," he says. "All the students who took the exam had very good grades."

Endowed with 450 €, the award recognizes the students who obtain the best grade in an exam organized with this goal. The Navarre phase, which took place on October 17, was attended by 15 students. The only requirement to do so was to have a minimum grade average of 8.75.

Four tests

The test consisted of two exams of common subjects (language, History or Philosophy and English) and another one of two subjects of her modality. In Paula's case, these exams were Chemistry and Biology.

"At first I thought about choosing language, as did almost all of my classmates, because it was a critical commentary and not something that had to be known. However, it didn't seem to me that the text on that exam would give me much to go on and I like History, so I chose to take the History exam, even though the text it asked about was not part of the syllabus and we hadn't seen it on class as such," he recalls. "For me, the most difficult test was Biology. Unlike on university entrance exam, the questions dealt with only one topic (viruses) and I didn't feel very confident with what I knew about it. I did my best, but I didn't feel very good about it. To prepare, Paula didn't want to take time away from studying Medicine subjects, so she only reviewed last year's notes from Chemistry to "refresh how to do the problems. With the rest of the subjects I felt I was already quite prepared".

Paula is now studying medicine at university. It has always been clear to her that this is what she wanted to study, "to know how something as complex as the human body works. And to help others to stay healthy and live better.

Tips for making the most of study hours

"I manage to make time, no matter how much I have to study. I like movies, finding out about current events, reading novels and going out with my friends," Paula confesses. She also speaks English, German and Basque, and until last year she was also studying the violin. Her secret: take it easy. "You shouldn't get overwhelmed when studying or taking an exam. It's better to calm down and trust in your own ability". When it comes to studying, she bets on understanding rather than simply memorizing, and so she recommends it: "attention to understand the importance of what I study because you can't learn something well if you don't care about it at all. You have to look for the importance of each subject".

The second prize award, also worth 450 €, went to Jon Iparraguirre, who is doing the degree program of Fine Arts in Madrid.