Philip Howard didn't have any magic number in mind when he woke Thursday morning to discover his ATAR result.
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The James Sheahan Catholic High School student was simply looking for his hard work to be rewarded.
Not only was he pleasantly surprised with his score, Mr Howard's 99.65 was the highest among all Orange students for 2023.
"I didn't expect to get anything close to that which is amazing," he said.
"My course doesn't need anywhere need this, so I was just hoping for the best I can get."
The course for which Mr Howard has his eye on is a bachelor of science and a masters of mathematical science. It "only" required a 93.
This particular degree wasn't always on the cards though.
"There's been a bit of flip-flop because I wanted to do engineering for a bit and all sorts of other stuff," Mr Howard added.
"But I've always loved maths and data science, so being able to do that in uni would be amazing."
He was far from the city's only high achiever.
Xiaolu Fan, who a day before receiving her ATAR, was awarded a first in course for biology, scored a 99.6.
Although the course she is hoping study at university didn't have a specific number needed, the lowest ATAR accepted from the 2022 cohort was 95.
The Kinross student was happy to share the moment with her friends.
"Straight after the ATAR was released a lot of us were texting each other, blowing up the group chat and asking how each other went," she said.
"Definitely a weight off my shoulders and I can get a good night sleep now. It's been very exciting these past few days."
Over at Orange Christian School, Lucy Grant was the star of the show.
The teenager was just hoping to get a high enough score that she could keep her options open "because that's what the ATAR is for."
Fair to say her 98.45 will provide her with plenty of choices going forward.
"It's a little bit up in the air," she said.
"But at the moment I'm leaning towards a pure maths course hopefully, which could lead to a few different areas and open up a wide variety to do after that."
"There was also a little bit of friendly competition around some other high achievers in the school, so I was pretty much seeing how high I could go."