The 17-year-old Goulburn student has tied equal first in the state in Film and Media Studies.

Ms Craig got an ATAR of 95 for the subject. She said her HSC exams involved writing a lot of essays about various films and popular culture. 

She was ecstatic on receiving the news of her success and was possibly the loudest person in Goulburn at that moment. 

“I communicated in foghorn and screamed up the hallway to Mum. I wasn’t expecting it. I was ecstatic,” Emily said.

“For the HSC, I wrote an essay on The Shawshank Redemption, which is my favourite film as well as completing essays on the short stories of Tim Winton.”

Emily completed the Tertiary Preparation Certificate (TPC) last year at the Goulburn campus of TAFE Illawarra NSW.

She has now been accepted into a double degree in International Relations and Arts at Wollongong University and will study there this year. 

Her studies will have with a focus on languages and relationships between countries, which is something she has already had some first-hand experience with. 

Emily is used to being independent after she participated in a student exchange to France in 2015. 

“I went on a Rotary Student Exchange to France for a full year when I was 15-years-old and I got a real taste for the French culture and language,” Emily said. 

“I also met a lot of Latin American people and fell in love with their culture as well.”

She lived with three separate families in Bethune, near Lille in northern France. She is now a fluent French speaker.

“The first family I stayed with were all musicians. They took me to a lot of professional concerts,” she said. 

“I also went to Paris a lot and I got to see the Louvre many times, especially on Wednesdays when it is free for students to go in.

“I absolutely adored Paris with its old buildings and elegance – that city has such an old-world feel to it. Many of the buildings are hundreds of years old. Nothing prepared me for that sense of age about a place, I guess because Australia is such a young country in comparison.” 

While staying in Bethune, she also got to visit the WWI battlefields 

“It was very moving to visit Villers Bretonneux on Anzac Day and be part of the ceremony there,” she said.

“There are still bullet holes in the memorial from WWII, because war raged around it then too.”

After returning from France, Emily was attracted to a different way of learning for the HSC.

“I got back from my exchange and I had the option of returning to school or going to TAFE but I was really attracted to an adult learning environment,” she said. 

Emily has also been involved with the Lieder Youth Theatre Company.