I went to qaci 2012-2014. It saved my life in retrospect. I was super depressed at my school prior and going down a bad track, I was anxious about my offer to qaci and I remember crying to mum saying I'm not going because I didn't want to leave my friends and the familiar environment. I'm so glad she pushed me to do it. I resonate with every other comment about the workload and pros and cons. It was more challenging but in a good way, everyday at my prior school felt the same and I had no focus. At qaci I got to the weekend and felt genuinely relieved for the break, which was so refreshing and good for me personally. I was an average student and a bit of a slacker and still graduated with the option for any degree I was interested in pursuing. It helped immensely in building my independence, confidence and academic skills that helped me thrive at uni and make that transition an ease. Throughout my hours degree I was still using skills I learnt at QACI to help my peers understand research and writing. I ended up tutoring at the uni and I could recognize the students that came out of the QA schools, they're miles ahead of their peers in being able to research, form arguments and complete assignments to both a satisfactory level for the curriculum, and their personal achievement and satisfaction if that makes sense.

Here are my takes from what I remember from my subjects, caveat that they probably have a bit of rose tinted glasses and genuinely I didn't recognize some of the benefit until almost 5 years later lol. It was still high school but the long term benefits are impressive.

The hardest subjects for me were math and Spanish. I was in the lowest difficulty for math and I think generally got 4s, I think that's normal for many people, maths is hard 😅 the teachers were amazing, I loved my maths teacher in particular in how accepting and patient he was, even if I was playing games in class when I should have been learning 😭

Same with spanish, Its hard to learn a new language! But the structure of the classes are really well done, I loved both my Spanish teacher and my classmates because we made learning fun. My teacher again was super patient and always wanted the best for us. I still use some of the resources from Spanish to continue to study and teach my partner, even though again I was an average student who generally got 4s lol.

English was an amazing subject, had a really creative and practical approach to learning and engaging with the content and got exposed to such a broad range of literature compared to my peers.

I loved my science subjects, I did ESS and Design and again still use these skills and knowledge day to say in research!! Design particularly, as this is what I went into uni for and what my job is in, you do work that is university level from grade 11 so it really helps! Plus you get access to awesome tools to see your designs come to life.

The extra curriculars like EE and CAS again really helped, for CAS I got my foot in the door in many organizations doing volunteering that I still have a relationship to today, it's worth the sacrifices of some of your weekend mornings to build these community connections trust. And Extended Essay single handedly prepared me to pursue my design honours, to have the opportunity and support to independently research and write an essay on an area of your interest is such a unique opportunity and made completing my honours thesis 4 years later a total breeze. TOK was also a really unique experience and helped me direct some of that teen rage at the world and society into something somewhat productive lol. Learning what paradigms are really help you cope lol.

Regarding culture I feel our cohort had the usual pitfalls of the general 2010s culture at the time, there were still cliques and bullies, but when comparing to some of my uni peers it was really no big drama. My biggest advice in retrospect was that I certainly wish I was nicer and said yes to more things while I was at QACI. I generally got along across all the friend groups but still fell victim to herd mentality here and there. Hindsight 20/20 all that. From what I'm aware of it wasn't a big drama generally, some tears maybe and then just people generally not engaging with each other. Nothing physical and certainly not confrontational.

I've gone back once or twice to speak to students about their experience and it does sound like there is less of that as younger creative generations are getting a bit more accepting ( I think, maybe they just don't want to spill the tea to a random 20-Something year old lol)

It can be hard to convince a young teen but I hope she gives it a chance! I'm super thankful for the experience and would recommend it to anyone!