It’s the day you get your marks back for the Maths Yearly Examination, the air in the classroom is heavy with baited anticipation. A paper lands on your desk with a dull thud. Hesitantly flipping it over, a 70% pops out from the page. Not bad. Not amazing. What you were expecting. A few seats away, someone exhales sharply. You glance over. It’s them—the student who always seems to know all the content, whose hand shoots up with answers to questions in a matter of seconds. Their paper sits in front of them, bold red numbers scrawled across the top: 98%. You scoff. “You’re basically a genius.” They shake their heads, eyes still on the paper. “It’s not genius. It’s just work.”

The Oxford Dictionary defines ‘genius’ as “exceptional intellectual or creative power or other natural ability.” The definition itself suggests that genius is something innate—a gift one is born with rather than developed. But is this really the case?

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been taught to embrace a hard-working mentality. Entering high school, there were a variety of subjects I enjoyed doing but also those that I found challenging. But instead of neglecting them, I put equal time, if not more into honing these subjects. I found that just because I disliked them didn’t mean I couldn’t be good at them, with hard work and effort being the true proponents in me achieving consecutive Dux of the Year awards and First in Course awards for not only the subjects I enjoyed but also those I didn’t. It wasn’t pure talent or ability that allowed me to get there, but rather sheer grit and determination.

If you ask an HSC state ranker how they achieved such high levels of accomplishment, they won’t say that they were “just good at the subject.” They’ll talk about the late nights refining their responses, the hours spent pouring over past results, and the sheer persistence it took to improve. Their success wasn’t born out of some innate brilliance—it was built through effort, discipline and a willingness to push past failures.

This is the reality that often goes unnoticed. When we see someone excel, we assume it comes naturally to them, that they’re somehow wired differently. What we don’t see are the quiet hours spent revising, the frustration of getting things wrong, and the determination to keep going anyway—to keep on improving, no matter what.

It has not been my experience that students need to sacrifice everything to do well. Like everything in life, without balance, you will end up burnt out, overstressed and ultimately unable to perform in the big exams. What it does mean, is that grit is crucial in determining how one will fulfil their potential in the long run. Talent might give someone a head start, but it’s the consistency and hard work that determine how far they truly go.

The road to the HSC is a marathon—one that demands just the right pace. Go too slow, and the weight of unfinished work piles up behind you. Sprint too fast, and exhaustion sets in long before the final exam papers hit the desk. It’s this delicate balance that every student must navigate, the struggle between knowing one’s own potential but also their limits. Perhaps, it’s not brilliance that sets people apart, but the ability to endure—the difference between those who simply aim to do well and those who will be labelled as ‘geniuses.’