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The leading two British-curriculum schools in the kingdom are celebrating the academic achievements of their top students who excelled despite a tumultuous series of incidents during their examination year.
St Christopher's School and the British School of Bahrain, along with other educational institutions, were forced to keep their institutions closed after the summer holidays as a precautionary measure to curtail the spread of swine flu in Bahrain.
And, in April, just weeks before the crucial tests, several teachers and students were stranded in Europe as flights were cancelled as a result of the Icelandic volcanic ash incident.
Undeterred by the challenges, the students romped home with some of the best results produced by the two institutions.
GCSE results at St Chris have been described by head teacher Nick Wilson as 'the best so far' and a 100 per cent pass rate at A' levels at BSB has thrilled acting director Karen Moffat and her fellow academics.
In a two-part series GulfWeekly's Anasuya Kesavan interviews some of the best scholars and asks their head teachers to offer advice to parents on how they can help the current crop of exam-year students etch another fantastic success story in the history books.
This week we highlight St Christopher's School.
Motivated by the prospect of scoring excellent grades, the top six scholars of St Christopher's sacrificed many a leisurely hour, including time spent on chatting with friends on social networking site Facebook, to earn laurels for themselves and their school.
Encouraged by friends and special inspirational assemblies organised by teachers and support from home, they describe the two-year journey as a lot of hard work that has resulted in nothing short of 'great relief'.
Reem D'Souza, 16, said: "It was a great achievement because we all passed out with the best results. So it was just fantastic for everyone of us. We had a long two years but for me it was an amazing two years. It was just wonderful!
"Carrying folders was not a lot of fun but over time we got used to it. Last year was also hectic with extended days caused by the many disruptions but we joined together as a group.
"We learned to plan our time, set our timetable; and once you start learning to balance your day, we realised that it was not so bad after all!"
Fatima Dhaif, 17, added that choosing subjects that they enjoyed learning was also important to get the optimum results.
Her colleague Aditya Sarkar added that preparing for GCSEs taught them important student skills that had given him a head start in preparing for important examinations in the future. He said: "Before GCSE, deadlines were not as important. But, here if we didn't do our work on time we could lose marks. It taught us to be more organised and responsible, and has given us a head start for tackling our A' levels and IBs this year.
"We learned to balance out time but closer to GCSE examination time the balance was definitely tilted to more work and less play.
"Around January, when we got our mock results we realised that GCSEs were just three or four months away. That's when we started to get worried. We panicked and from then on all weekends were spent studying and revising. In April we all just completely went into exam mode.
"There were frustrating moments. Maths was tough and we scored low in mocks but we learned from our mistakes and knew what to improve on. Past papers were really useful. You have to listen to your teachers and follow their advice.
"We were given presentations and talks to keep us motivated throughout and we soon understood that resilience was the key to everything. One thing that they always told us, almost repetitively, that these are the most important exams of our life ... so that kept us going."
At the same time, the young achievers made time to unwind. They pursued their passions in music and sport to help them relax. Aditya and Zaid Hasham, for example, played cricket and were members of the Under-17 Bahrain team.
Fatima said: "Studying too much makes you overwhelmed and frazzled and that is not what you want to be before your exams. As long as you know you have studied well you should not worry."
The top team have taken IB and A' levels for their Post-16 studies. Reem, who wants to study business or economics, is doing IB because it also allows her to study two languages - English and Spanish. Anmol Mohapatra, also an IB student, wants to study economics at the UK's Cambridge University or London School of Economics. Aditya and Zaid, both A' level students, want to carry on their academic endeavours in engineering or economics. Sophie Appleton and Fatima, both A' level students, hope to pursue further studies in medicine.
TOP TIPS FROM PUPILS
Aditya Sarkar, 15, 8A*s 2As
Start early and work throughout the whole two years and if you do so it won't be as much strain. Be consistent.
Reem D'Souza, 16, 9A*s 2As
Apart from setting out your timetable, get off Facebook. It is one big sacrifice that has to be made. If you are serious about your grades, I will encourage everyone to do so.
Anmol Mohapatra, 17, 9A*s
Work together and collaborate. Help each other and boost each other's morale ... you are not alone in the whole journey.
Fatima Dhaif, 17, 10A*s 1A has cleared Arabic A' level exams with an A grade
You can spend all day studying and driving yourself crazy but you need to give yourself an hour to forget all about it to try and relax.
Zaid Hasham, 16, 7A*s 2As
There is no space for complacency in GCSE. You can't rely on your first term grades and even if you get a good grade in the mock you cannot rest until you get your final grades. You have to keep working all the way to the end.
Sophie Appleton, 16, 10 A*s
Set achievable goals and try to reach them. Be serious about it because this is the time when you can't make excuses for yourself. In the end whatever you get is whatever you put in; so long as you are serious about it you will do fine.
