Wagga High School student Tahira Roshan spends her downtime detoxing from the year's complexity and uncertainty by researching the nation's darkest hour.
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Though the commemoration of Anzac Day will look different in 2020, the year 7 student was compelled to gather an understanding of what life looked like when the Anzacs first took to the shores of Gallipoli in 1915.
Entering her poem into the 10th annual Anzac Day writing competition run by the deputy prime minister, Michael McCormack, the 12-year-old was presented with the highly commended award.
"I wrote an Anzac Day acrostic poem," said Tahira.
"It took me a few days to write it. We had learnt about acrostic poems in English and I thought this would be a good way to do [the writing challenge] in my own way.
"My friend and my sister did it too, but they wrote stories and I wanted to do something that would be different."
In other news:
Fellow student, Freya Howard from the Wagga Christian College was last week awarded the top prize in the competition, for the secondary schools in the south division.
Meanwhile, Turvey Park Public School student Imogen Patterson, aged 10, won the primary school south division.
The three students made up the Wagga represented winners, chosen from 680 entries across the federal Riverina electorate.
"As Anzac services have been cancelled this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, it is now more important than ever for us all to remember our Anzacs and invoke their resilient spirit," Mr McCormack said.
Although she had entered last year, Tahira's research into the subject was ramped up ahead of her re-entry this year.
"I learned lots of things about how many people died, how they left their families to go and fight," Tahira said.
"I enjoyed writing about it [but] I felt pretty sad for them all."
All 16 winners' writing will be compiled into a 36-page booklet that will soon be distributed ahead of April 25.