Excerpted from Mediacorp

Mishel Maryam Nasir was ranked No. 1 in her Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) four years ago, she vowed to herself that she would do well again in the O-level exam. She never imagined that she would emerge as the top scorer among the 275 madrasah students who took the exams last year.

The 16-year-old Mishel from Madrasah Al-Arabiah Al-Islamiah in Toa Payoh achieved eight A1s for pure mathematics and pure sciences and an A2 for additional mathematics.

“It was my drive to make my school and community proud that motivated me to work hard,” said Mishel, “but I couldn’t have done it without my parents’ support.”

Her 49-year-old mother is a former accountant who is now a housewife, and her 53-year-old father, who was a commercial pilot in Australia for 15 years, is now self-employed.

She is among the 23,555 students who sat the O levels in 2021.

Tan Yi He, 16, who just got his O-level results on Wednesday, passed six subjects, exceeding his expectations. Tyler made the switch from Pathlight School to Serangoon Garden Secondary last year, but he said he did not socialize much and stayed mostly to himself.

Students in his school slowly became his friends when they started initiating conversations with him. Although most students did not know about his autism, he told them about it when he trusted them.

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