VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Think about a time or situation where…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 80%: The eagles soared overhead in the blistering heat of the sun, almost burning the sand dunes that seemed like…
The eagles soared overhead in the blistering heat of the sun, almost burning the sand dunes that seemed like impossible mountains to cross. Amongst this desolate barren landscape was a man tired and weary from his long journey. He carried few belongings: a waterskin, a satchel containing some silver, and a pouch that held his most treasured possession: a sleek obsidian stone and a light quartz. These peculiar stones resembled the likes of Urim and Thummim, which he had come across in his travels to the holy city of Jerusalem. The obsidian being no and quartz meaning yes.
He neared his destination: a castle, old, alluring, with a quiet yet fierce charm to it. He himself was a shepherd, earning a modest living and going where his flock desired. He was them, and the sheep were him.He thought to himself were they accustomed to his way of life or was he attuned to them? He knew each of them by nature what time they grazed and slept. He realised with a jolt it did not make a difference to the sheep who takes care of them maybe they thought of him as a guide and not a caretaker.
He knocked using the brass knocker on the door, and a maidservant promptly welcomed him into the vast luxurious lobby. He walked to the throne room, where he was greeted by the King, a portly man who took pride in his moustache and his horses.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Think about a time or situation where…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 75%: The eagles soared overhead in the blistering heat of the sun, almost burning the sand dunes that seemed like…
The eagles soared overhead in the blistering heat of the sun, almost burning the sand dunes that seemed like impossible mountains to cross. Amongst this desolate barren landscape was a man tired and weary from his long journey. He carried few belongings: a waterskin, a satchel containing some silver, and a pouch that held his most treasured possession: a sleek obsidian stone and a light quartz. These peculiar stones resembled the likes of Urim and Thummim, which he had come across in his travels to the holy city of Jerusalem. The obsidian being no and quartz meaning yes.
He neared his destination: a castle, old, alluring, with a quiet yet fierce charm to it. He himself was a shepherd, earning a modest living and going where his flock desired. He was them, and the sheep were him.He thought to himself were they accustomed to his way of life or was he attubed to them? He knew each of them by nature what time they grazed and slept. He realised with a jolt it did not make a difference to the sheep who takes care of them maybe they thought of him as a guide and not a caretaker.
He knocked using the brass knocker on the door, and a maidservant promptly welcomed him into the vast luxurious lobby. He walked to the throne room, where he was greeted by the King, a portly man who took pride in his moustache and his horses.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Think about a time or situation where…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 72.5%: The eagles soared overhead in the blistering heat of the sun, almost burning the sand dunes that seemed like…
The eagles soared overhead in the blistering heat of the sun, almost burning the sand dunes that seemed like impossible mountains to cross. Amongst this desolate barren landscape was a man tired and weary from his long journey. He carried few belongings: a waterskin, a satchel containing some silver, and a pouch that held his most treasured possession: a sleek obsidian stone and a light quartz. These peculiar stones resembled the likes of Urim and Thummim, which he had come across in his travels to the holy city of Jerusalem. The obsidian being no and quartz meaning yes.
He neared his destination: a castle, old, alluring, with a quiet yet fierce charm to it. He himself was a shepherd, earning modest living and going where his flock desired. He was them, and the sheep were him.
He knocked using the brass knocker on the door, and a maidservant promptly welcomed him into the vast luxurious lobby. He walked to the throne room, where he was greeted by the King, a portly man who took pride in his moustache and his horses.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: I hate her
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 100%: I hate her. You spent your life watching me grow. The changes in my voice, the way I behaved, the insecurities…
I hate her.
You spent your life watching me grow. The changes in my voice, the way I behaved, the insecurities I acted upon. Yet you say you never noticed when it was the only thing visible in my eyes. Thick sweatpants even in summer, paired with a flowy white Tee. The perfect combination that draws the least amount of attention. I prefer it this way. Why would I want the things I hate to be displayed more prominently? My friends go on with their lives, as I act as if everything is fine. Am I fine?
“Don’t be silly Blair”
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: essay prompt, was an image of a young…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 85%: The passion that was lost I look up and look at the pigion grey sky that droupts outside my widow sill. I get…
The passion that was lost
I look up and look at the pigion grey sky that droupts outside my widow sill. I get ready for the day as I leave my dorm room and storm past the blank canvas that hangs on me eisel.
As I walk into the lecture hall and see all my classmates full of life and ideas bursting out of their eyes, I look down at my greyed soiled hands that have been sketching and rubbing out designs all night long. My proffesor gives me a sorried look as I sit through the lecture watching as he explains the proper technique of a clean brush stroke. “Now I’ve noticed in some of your work, some. Not all of you . There is a lack of passion in your work, I can tell there is no meaning, there is no hidden message” “Now on this note…. I would like to see the following after class”. I think to myself if he is thinking of me,surely he wouldn’t notice me . It’s not like he has payed attention to me anyways. “Julia,Micheal..” The proffesor goes on as I continue to day dream away. “Kenneth and .. William”. My eyes widen as I jolt up, I haven’t had sleep for days trying to search for the creativity I lack, did he really call my name?, I ask to myself. I stay back after class anyway. If he did’nt call my name he would just ask me to go back to my dorm. We all sit down in a row as he calls on us one at a time. It feels so eerie sitting in that lecture hall, just the four of us. The layers of chairs looking down onto us, judging us, staring us down. “William” the proffesor calls. I stand up and go to his desk, pondering on what he could possibly ask of me. Even though deep down I know what it’s about. “William.. I can tell you work hard.. and that you want to keep your scholarship.. but. It’s just not enough i’m afraid”
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: marginalized voices
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 87.5%: Buildings. A strong, sturdy yet simple framework allowing the desired complexities to be stored. The…
Buildings. A strong, sturdy yet simple framework allowing the desired complexities to be stored. The architect is the designer. Each building needs an architect so it can be tailored to reach the potential thats needed. But also, the building is the architect's creation to manipulate however they like, establishing a sense of control and freedom. In an ever so chaotic world, it's the safety net that physically shows they are capable of something. But what happens when it's unexpectedly refurbished out of their control? or the architect's inherent creation and design is unintentionally destroyed by another architect or pieces of their building are forcefully taken away? Theres no option to start over, the foundations have already been layed down and one can only work with the circumstances at hand. Somehow without a clear builder, pieces lost and unclear sense of its importance it must adapt to become like every other building in the city. Would it be possible?
This architect is me, the constructor of my identity. My perspective is my building and it is what distinguishes me from everyone else. My building was built differently to the typical way, I wasn't the only constructer as I had life altering decisions made for me out of my approval due to my young age. So yes, i know what its like to be overlooked out of coninience and not have your building be as strong as it needs. My life was a geographical map drawn by someone elses hands which inevitably dictated the fabric of my identity or the 'foundations of my building' right from the start. My life and identity was supposed to be my building and i was meant to be the architect, it wasn't though and i wasnt. I was moved from city to city and had to adapt whether i wanted to or not, but every movement caused me to leave a brick behind in the city i had just come from.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: “The Person I Became” Sometimes, the…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 85%: The person I became I was one when I came to Australia. I had no memory of the journey from India, the airport…
The person I became
I was one when I came to Australia. I had no memory of the journey from India, the airport or when Australia became a place I referred to as 'home'. Yet, I have spent most my life trying to understand what it meant to belong to a country I do not even remember arriving in.
My parents arrived with nothing but a suitcase meant to carry their whole future. They came to Australia in search for a better life for me. My whole life I felt as if I need to repay their blood, sweat and tears all for me. Whenever I asked for something, my parents would with the little they had make ends meet to see my smile. I never saw the price or the sacrificed items put back on the shelf to provide for me. I thought I was living a normal family life, without seeing all the tears shed and prayers prayed behind close doors for a successful future.
When I grew up and got to year twelve, I started making friendships which taught me so much. Some taught me to pray in struggle while some told me to smoke to cope. I tried fitting in while minusing all the differences me and my 'friends' shared.
I started smoking, drinking, partying and focusing on everything wrong behind my parents back. "I hate school" I say as I start to break my routine of studying every night and turn my 10 percents into 100 percents using a red marker. Belonging was essential to me.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: section b stimulus 'Stepping up'…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 87.5%: There I lay surrendered to my injuries. The steady drip of the IV faltered, leaving a heavy stillness in its…
There I lay surrendered to my injuries. The steady drip of the IV faltered, leaving a heavy stillness in its wake. The ghost of anguish from the Myeong Dong strip, left to whisper in my ear. The silence was deafening. My body, paralyzed, glued to the sterile hospital bed. I was left to sink into the thin padding, the bed of my fate. A brutal reality check in the wake of the courageous act to push out my chest and be the one to step up. The one to complete the last of the building blocks of our ancestors. The people who built this nation. This was my time. However, instead my mind was left in ruin from the merciless truth of my choice to take action. An inspired young mind, fueled by the hope of our community motto “Be the one who makes a difference” rung out amid the mix of tear gas explosion and the thud of batons.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: 2024 Vce Framework 2: using the title…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 100%: Resist and Persist Despite being discriminated against and dismissed, young people continue to express their…
Resist and Persist
Despite being discriminated against and dismissed, young people continue to express their opinions and challenge establishments, refusing the pressure of political powerlessness falling onto them.
One of the primary motivators for citizens to unite and protest is the ability to make their stance known and ensure politicians recognise their collective disagreement. When institutions are attempting to actively dismiss or make individuals opinions appear redundant, protest becomes a mechanism that people turn to in hopes to rebel against the establishment and assert their dominance. Across France, in September 2026, students abandoned their classrooms and took to the streets, demanding political leaders confront the failures in the educational system that is meant to secure their future. Their protest exposes a troubling contradiction: those who are constantly neglected and hold the least institutional authority are increasingly compelled to demand change from those who possess it.
Protest often emerges when formal democratic participation becomes limited. For young people, whose political influence is constrained by age and the lack of respect by leaders, collective action becomes a substitute form of participation. When young people gather in public, they actively rebel against the forced ideology of being politically powerless, and transform dissent into visibility, pressuring institutions to respond. When the youth assert their presence, they signify more than physical location; it is a declaration of political recognition and empowerment, through their democratic rights of expression and assembly. Consequently, despite lacking authoritative power, protest enables young individuals to exert meaningful pressure onto establishments, who often ignore this collective voice at their political peril.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Title: ‘The Cost of Silence’
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 90%: The Cost of Silence 2.6 million girls. Not 2.6 million statistics. Not 2.6 million numbers on a page. 2.6…
The Cost of Silence
2.6 million girls. Not 2.6 million statistics. Not 2.6 million numbers on a page. 2.6 million futures interrupted.
According to UNICEF, more than 2.6 million Afghan girls have been denied secondary education since 2021, following the Taliban's return to power. <Cite refs={["turn377924search3"]}/>
Let that number sit with you for a moment.
Behind every number is a girl who may have wanted to become a doctor, a teacher, an engineer. A girl who once walked into a classroom believing her future was hers to shape, only to discover that the world had made a decision about it for her.
And what is the cost of taking away a girl's education?
We might measure it in lost qualifications, lost opportunities, lost income. But how do we measure the cost of a dream someone is forbidden to pursue?
How do you calculate the price of a voice the world refuses to hear?
In Afghanistan, the answer is not found in a textbook. It is written into the lives of girls who have been told that their education must end, while their ambitions are expected to disappear with it.
But ambition does not disappear simply because permission is withdrawn.
And neither does protest.
We often mistake protest for noise: crowds filling streets, fists raised, voices joined in a single demand. Yet protest can begin long before a crowd gathers. It can begin with a girl who continues to learn, a woman who refuses to surrender her beliefs, or a community that quietly protects the possibility of a different future.
Resistance does not always announce itself. Sometimes, it survives in the spaces power attempts to close.
Of course, we must not romanticise this resistance. Afghan women should not have to be extraordinary simply to access an education. They should not have to demonstrate courage to claim what ought to be theirs by right. To praise their resilience without questioning the restrictions imposed upon them is to admire the strength of people while ignoring the burden placed on their shoulders.
And yet, we must recognise their courage, because courage exposes the weakness of a system that fears an educated girl.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: title: "I belong" stimulus is image of…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 100%: I Belong Pop's hands shake a little now when he holds anything small, so for the last month I have been the…
I Belong
Pop's hands shake a little now when he holds anything small, so for the last month I have been the one who holds the photographs.
The box came out of the wardrobe on Saturday, a shoebox gone soft at the corners and tied shut with a bootlace. I tipped it onto the kitchen table and the pictures slid out in a fan: black and white, curled at the edges, every one of them a landscape. A river with a bridge. A hillside cut into steps. A pear tree standing alone in a field like someone waiting for a bus. Not one person in any of them.
"Where's everybody?" I said.
"Behind the camera," said Pop. "Somebody had to hold it."
I have never been to the place in these photographs. I have heard its name my whole life, the way you hear the name of a distant cousin, worn and fond, and I have never once been able to picture it. At school I am the one who gets asked where I'm really from. I say here, and they say no, before that, and I have nothing in my hands to answer with. Now it lay across the tablecloth in greys, smelling of cardboard and old dust and something faintly sweet, like pressed fruit.
"New rule," Pop said. "Whoever's holding it tells it."
"I don't know any of them."
"Then I'll hold, you listen. Next one, you hold, I listen. Fair?"
He took the first photograph in both hands, careful, like carrying water.
"That goat," he said, "ate my father's hat. Twice."
"Twice?"
"He didn't learn the first time. Neither did the goat."
He told me about the hat, and then the bridge in the second picture, which the river took every spring "like a tax," and which the whole village rebuilt every spring, grumbling, out of the same stones. He told me which slope the pears grew on, and how the soil there was so red it stained your boots for a week, and how in October the entire hillside smelled of jam. And somewhere around the pear tree I realised I could see it: the red earth, the stained boots, the jam. I could see a place I had never stood in.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Moving Forward
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 90%: Crafting texts SAC - Moving Forward Paper stands alone on the desk, blankly staring back at me, expecting a…
Crafting texts SAC - Moving Forward
Paper stands alone on the desk, blankly staring back at me, expecting a response to the few words written on its surface.
"Step one"
Nothing follows it, however. It waits and waits. Pen gripped in my hand, gently grazing the page, yet not once does it touch it. It itches to make its mark, to dance upon the lines with letters that dictate what I will do with my life. The truth is, I'm stuck. I have "Step one" ready to go, but what happens now? I try to mutter up any idea I can.
Steps, these are typically as simple as following a recipe. A cup of flour enters the bowl, followed by 2 eggs; these come under their own, individual steps. See, so simple. Silence dances along the walls of the room. No rustling of paper, no pen scratching the empty page, no ink vocalising across the page.
I've always known life to be similar to that of a recipe. From a young age it has been represented as such to me. Basically, life has steps. This way of thinking, engraved into me from my earliest days, it never seemed wrong. It was obviously a naive version however. The grass' fresh scent travelled through my sense of smell, the warm embrace of the sun, glittering across me at recess; this moment is where I announced I will become a princess, and I knew what I had to do!
Step one, wear a dress. Step two, live in a castle.
Steps, it is what I have structured myself around since I believed I could truly become a princess. Although naive, it still relied on that fundamental belief. That's why I have stuck with it. Yet, in this moment at my page, the structure hasn't made itself known, which confuses me.
I truly believed that the steps would reveal themselves.
Voices littered the room, some high & loud, or some whispering, nonetheless, the room filled with sounds. The room is filled with year 11s like myself, my classmates, it even features a few year 10s. We have all picked this subject for VCE. I'm excited, I like this subject, it seems important for my future. The teacher begins.
"Let's hear from all of you!" She is asking us to share. Share our excitement for the future, what is the job we would like to pursue.
A wave of fear shoots through my system, job?
I know I will be working in the future, its how life goes, but I realise in that moment that answers will float around the room, moving like clockwork from classmate to the next, and by the time I am due to answer, nothing will come out. The feeling disappears, I relax. Theres a plan. University. Theres my answer, I knew that. It's fine that I'm not exactly sure of what will come after, but I have faith in my structure, things will fold out under each other and steps will follow. Once the words leave my mouth, it feels fine, even the teacher responds affirmatively; any lingering worry erases from my body.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Title: At What Cost
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 90%: At What Cost? By midnight, the city had folded itself into silence. Rain tapped against my window and my phone…
At What Cost?
By midnight, the city had folded itself into silence. Rain tapped against my window and my phone lit the desk again.
I’ll be there tomorrow.
Anika, my closest friend, had sent it hours earlier.
Tomorrow, she would stand outside the college gates again. For four months, the administration had barred female students from classes while lessons continued without us. We gathered on one side of the iron bars while students crossed between classrooms on the other, close enough to hear the bell yet forbidden from answering it.
Tomorrow’s protest would be our first public refusal to keep waiting quietly. We wanted one thing: open the gates and let us return to our classrooms.
My mother appeared in the doorway.
“You’re not going.”
“I didn’t say I was.”
Her eyes moved to Nisha’s photograph, six stitches above her eyebrow after the last demonstration, then she left without closing the door.
I turned tomorrow over in my mind, searching for a side that did not cut. Nisha’s stitches told me to stay; four months of locked gates pulled the other way. Fear argued carefully, and none of its evidence was false. Yet staying home meant another classroom beginning without us.
Until then, I had thought the cost of protest was easy to calculate: bruises, arrests, a mother waiting by the door. I had never tried calculating the price of silence.
I imagined Krishna beside me — the Hindu god I had grown up hearing about whenever duty and consequence became difficult to separate. He sat cross-legged in my chair, perfectly calm while I paced.
That night, I did not want wisdom. I wanted an instruction.
“We tried doing this properly,” I said. “Letters, a petition with hundreds of names, then meetings where they thanked us for our patience and promised our concerns were being considered.”
“Considered, reviewed, scheduled. They have a remarkable number of words for not yet.”
By the third meeting, Nisha was sketching flowers while another administrator explained why nothing could change.
“They heard us,” I had said afterwards.
“They received us,” Anika corrected.
“So what do we do tomorrow?” I asked Krishna. “Another letter? Another meeting? Every quieter way of asking to come back inside has led nowhere.”
He watched me for a moment.
“And what will staying home cost?”
I looked towards Nisha’s photograph.
“They let us speak,” I said, “but a voice is not the same thing as power.”
The next morning, thirty-seven of us stood outside the gates.
Nisha wore her usual white shoes. Anika stumbled over her first line, swore under her breath and made us laugh. Krishna lounged on the low wall as though waiting for the bell.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Title: The time has come. (Please look…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 87.5%: Section B. The Time has come Year 2061 Dear mother, I hated your colourful top. I remember when I was seven,…
Section B.
The Time has come
Year 2061
Dear mother, I hated your colourful top.
I remember when I was seven, I hated that you left me alone.
I remember crying and begging for you to stay.
I remember despising that colourful top that you wore every single time you walked out of that door away from me.
I remember being annoying and clingy. I don't know how you dealt with me.
You never forgot what that top meant to you.
I didn't understand back then.
Today, when I am no longer seven, I finally understand.
This top meant connection as you held hands with strangers united for the same cause.
I remember you showing me photos of your protest, laughing over jokes written on signs like "This planet is hotter than my Ex" and stupid jokes about "I've seen better climate in Minecraft".
Believe it or not... you were lame, mother.
But I never quite understood why you stopped.
The memories and passion to fight have left you ever since the day you walked through the front door, bruised, your colourful top torn.
I remember you trying to shrug it off, you couldn't bear to tell me what had happened. You couldn’t bear to tell a seven-year-old what authority does when you speak up.
At ten I was happy that you were home, and your battle was over.
I suppose I was too gullible.
At fifteen I saw you standing sorrowful in front of the factory where you first protested, you stood staring at the smoke and the grey water coming out of it. Perhaps you knew you couldn't do anything.
That’s when I realized what those photos held: the voices of a community that stood against authority. Home for a better world.
You stood wearing the only colourful top you could find against a world so grey and suffocating that tears were hard to shed.
They silenced you,they made you scared. Silence is what made them strong.
I saw right through the pain in your eyes, the regret of not having a voice, regret that the world around you had shown its true form you wish you hadn’t seen.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Framework: Writing about personal…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 75%: Section B The road inside me Dear Amma and Baba. This is something that is very difficult for me to express…
Section B
The road inside me
Dear Amma and Baba. This is something that is very difficult for me to express with my words, so I hope this letter softens the blow of my actions. Growing up, I remember how we used to attend Jummah every Friday. How during lockdown, we spent an hour every night during Ramadan praying together. To be honest, my upbringing in this household is very closely tied to the Islamic teachings taught by you. However, now that I'm older, I've learnt and taught myself lots of things about myself. And a few of the things that I've learnt is that I did not absorb any religious teachings, and I've met my other half, a truth that you'll never be willing to accept, no matter how open minded and understanding you were about my personal beliefs.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Title:resist and persist…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 90%: The heat on the pavement was thick, clinging to the asphalt like the tension between the three men in the…
The heat on the pavement was thick, clinging to the asphalt like the tension between the three men in the alleyway. To the rest of the street, it was just another routine check—a performance of authority that had played out a thousand times before. Elias didn’t see it as routine, though. He saw an injustice that needed a voice, and he was convinced that his own was loud enough to quiet the gears of the machine. As he stepped in, the officers’ hands didn’t leave their belts, but their eyes drifted toward him with a chilling, practised indifference. He walked away a moment later, chest tight with the adrenaline of a self-anointed hero, believing he had bent the arc of the world just a fraction of an inch to the right. He didn't know that the machine didn't bend; it just waited for you to turn the corner.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Small acts Big wins
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 90%: Small Acts, Big WINS Khan Behind Camera reality show October 23rd 1998 Orange and blue lights shine on the…
Small Acts, Big WINS
Khan Behind Camera reality show
October 23rd 1998
Orange and blue lights shine on the stage, cameras begin rolling, and "ACTION!'
Ishita Sen: Good evening, viewers! This is our weekly show “Khan Behind Camera”, where we interview the prominent Khan stars of Bollywood. Last week, we were joined by Salman Khan after his success as Aman in the blockbuster Kuch Kuch Hota Hai! Today, we are joined by the anti-hero in “Avrodh”, the one and only Vaastav Khan! Now, Vaastav, how does it feel to star in an absolute blockbuster of our time?
Vaastav: First of all, thank you for having me here. I always do appreciate the love and support from all the fans, and it’s always an honour to star in such a blockbuster. The tragedy of Bollywood is that it is always so divided, fearing consequences; Each success, each artistic excellence, draws fans, friends, critics, more contracts, and— (pause) and even bullets.
Ishita: Wait, Bullets? Oh yes, your hero in the blockbuster is a sharpshooter, but still, would you please elaborate, Mr. Khan,
Vaastav: No, Ishita, real bullets; you know the fans only see our on-screen facade. They see our charisma, our on-screen chemistry with prominent female actors, but behind any black-leather-jacket hero, there are threats from the underworld, blinded towards our talents, yet projected to our profits.
(Shakingly)
(stage lights turn scarlet)
Ishita: That's for the newspaper to address; let's now focus on your excellent perfor—
Vaastav: I am contending this; that’s my small act. Ishita, I know how much you love Bollywood, so you must listen to this; they must listen to this. My friend Shah Rukh Khan lives in the constant fear of the Abu Salem gang, for extortion... with the threat of death as the alternative. Death! Ishita, this is crazy; no matter how great your extended arm poses may be, you are never safe from the greedy monsters who leech off your greatness. I mean, no one approves of an eerie phone call describing what saris their wives wore to the store or what time their kid arrived at school. My good friend Karan Johar, whose last week’s release was a blockbuster, is not here to celebrate, following a threat to his mother’s life by the underworld. You know, Ishita, for any director or actor, a box-office flop is a gift; on the outside, it’s a failure, but our private life stays safe. It is always this Abu Salem; he called me nights ago, threatened my family, and blurted out profanities like my success is his? NEVER!
Ishita: (Frantically) Okay, let’s have a break; our sponsors at Pepsi are waiting; we will continue
(Ishita glances at the curious show director)
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Title: Every Voice Is important
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 90%: Parliament of Victoria, Spring Street, 2026. Every voice is important. Take a look back on history. What do you…
Parliament of Victoria, Spring Street, 2026.
Every voice is important.
Take a look back on history. What do you think of? Over the past hundred years our societies have been riddled with failures. War. Human rights abuses. Genocide. All of it could have been prevented if the people of the time had spoken out. Behind every one of those catastrophes sits the same accomplice: silence. The past cannot be rewritten, but the present is still being drafted, and we are its authors. We must speak before it is written without us.
To the people of Australia: our ancestors did not wait idly to win the eight-hour working day. In April 1856, stonemasons withdrew their labour and marched on this very building. Our comrades did not stay silent to win our weekend. They did not sit down when LGBTQIA people faced violence. They marched on our streets, were bashed and locked up, and marched again. Our First Nations people did not wait passively just to be seen and counted as people. In 1966 Vincent Lingiari led the Gurindji off Wave Hill station, and nine years later Gough Whitlam poured the soil of their country into his open hand. Protest works. In our fight for justice, every voice carries weight.
Silence. It creeps in quietly, like damp through a crack in the wall. It does not announce itself. It does not come with a warning. And yet, left unchecked, it hollows out the foundations of this great country. There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.
Some will tell you protest is merely noise. That it clogs the streets, divides the room, and changes nothing. But every right you take for granted, the vote, the weekend, the wage, was once dismissed as disruption by those who preferred the quiet. Comfort is not the same as peace. A silent chamber is not a just one. Ask the stonemasons how quiet this chamber was before they arrived. Ask the Gurindji who walked off Wave Hill.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Title: Silence is deafening Stimulus:…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 87.5%: Silence is deafening The air is cold. Not the kind of cold that brushes across your face on a warm summer’s…
Silence is deafening
The air is cold. Not the kind of cold that brushes across your face on a warm summer’s day. No, not that kind of cold. The kind of cold that feels empty, sparse, still.
“How do you find the defendant, guilty or not guilty?”
“Not Guilty”
The gavel hits. Flat, hollow.
Deafening silence. Only broken by the soft sounds of tears flowing down her bruised face, her family solemnly embracing her in their arms.
I shift in my seat, he’s patting me on the back now. Different to the kind of comfort she’d received. His hands feel bruised, coarse, as if rusting from decades of stillness. I should feel joy. Justice. But I don’t. I can’t.
I can still hear the verdict:
“Not Guilty”
The gavel hits. Flat, hollow.
The legal system is built on the idea of ‘justice’, silently celebrating what’s right, loudly convicting what’s wrong. It, in itself, is a form of institutional protest.
Tightening my tie, I step slowly into the dark, quiet hallway outside. The muscles in my face tense as I try to force a smile. An acquittal, the prosecution failed to obtain sufficient evidence, he walks away legally innocent.
The cold air brushes my face. What was once silence and emptiness is now engulfed in the chants and screams of a crowd on the steps outside. They will be disbanded soon. Called ‘public nuisance’ and made to return to the silence that once was. Are we really prosecuting wrongdoing or only actions we feel undermine our authority? We let dangerous individuals go on the premise of ‘insufficient evidence’ yet simultaneously imprison people for making noise against the legal system- my legal system.
‘WHAT’S YOUR OPINION ON THE VERDICT?’
‘HOW DO YOU FEEL?’
“He wasn’t guilty”, three words, the only ones I could offer to break my silence.
Chants, screams, the crowd only gets louder with each breath. All united and protesting against the legal system- my legal system.
But the doubt lingers. What if that girl crying in her family’s embrace now has to enter the world and walk alongside her perpetrator? I defended him, I am liable, I am the face of institutional protest.
“Not guilty”
The gavel hits.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Title: Silence is deafening Stimulus:…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 87.5%: Silence is deafening The air is cold. Not the kind of cold that brushes across your face on a warm summer’s…
Silence is deafening
The air is cold. Not the kind of cold that brushes across your face on a warm summer’s day. No, not that kind of cold. The kind of cold that feels empty, sparse, still.
“How do you find the defendant, guilty or not guilty?”
“Not Guilty”
The gavel hits. Flat, hollow.
Deafening silence. Only broken by the soft sounds of tears flowing down her bruised face, her family solemnly embracing her in their arms.
I shift in my seat, he’s patting me on the back now. Different to the kind of comfort she’d received. His hands feel bruised, coarse, as if rusting from decades of stillness. I should feel joy, justice, but I don’t, I can’t.
I can still hear the verdict:
“Not Guilty”
The gavel hits. Flat, hollow.
The legal system is built on the idea of ‘justice’, silently celebrating what’s right, loudly convicting what’s wrong. It, in itself, is a form of institutional protest.
Tightening my tie, I step slowly into the dark, quiet hallway outside. The muscles in my face tense as I try to force a smile. An acquittal, the prosecution failed to obtain sufficient evidence, he walks away legally innocent.
The cold air brushes my face. What was once silence and emptiness is now engulfed in the chants and screams of a crowd on the steps outside. They will be disbanded soon. Called ‘public nuisance’ and made to return to the silence that once was. Are we really prosecuting wrongdoing or only actions we feel undermine our authority? We let dangerous individuals go on the premise of ‘insufficient evidence’ yet simultaneously imprison people for making noise against the legal system- my legal system.
‘WHAT’S YOUR OPINION ON THE VERDICT?’
‘HOW DO YOU FEEL?’
“He wasn’t guilty”, three words, the only ones I could offer to break my silence.
Chants, screams, the crowd only gets louder with each breath. All united and protesting against the legal system- my legal system.
But the doubt lingers. What if that girl crying in her family’s embrace now has to enter the world and walk alongside her perpetrator? I defended him, I am liable, I am the face of institutional protest.
“Not guilty”
The gavel hits.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: time to fight
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 90%: A flare cracks overhead. I turn sharply, expecting Armin to flinch beside me, his shoulder brushing mine as it…
A flare cracks overhead. I turn sharply, expecting Armin to flinch beside me, his shoulder brushing mine as it always did when he was frightened. For an instant, I feel that familiar warmth beside me. But the space is empty.
Red light flickers across thousands of faces beneath the flags. I curl my fingers around the small silver pendant Armin gave me.
He was my joon — my heart, my little brother, whose crooked smile could soften my darkest days. Whenever the world grew heavy, he summoned happiness. Then the sky splits open above our neighbourhood in eastern Iran, our childhood home collapsing beneath a choking cloud of dust. The shaking stops, yet I remain frozen; where Armin stood, only piercing white noise remains. A flash of uniform pulls me back to the protest, my shoulder stiffening as the chanting swells around me.
Now, his absence joins countless others carried through streets where mourning has become defiance. Armed patrols turn our alleyways into zones of fear, harassing anyone who dares to look up. Security forces tear portraits from our hands, yet mourners retrieve them from the mud, restoring the faces the regime tries to erase.
The impact shakes me to the core, a deep, harsh thud that jolts my bones and rattles my jaw. The Republic’s line drives forward, crushing the banners raised above our heads. The chanting falters beneath their advance, each command cutting through the crowd until our voices become little more than scattered cries. But the silence doesn't hold. The sound surges, a defiant wave crashing against their heavy steel, refusing the quiet they try to force down our throats. Fear settles over the crowd as the Republic marches closer, silencing our voices and leaving us exposed and powerless.
They want us silenced.
The word returns me to those first nights after the bombardment, walls shuddering around us as sirens tore through the darkness. My mother called Armin’s name until her voice broke. Our pain was folded beneath the state flag and carried away quietly. They renamed our suffering: destroyed homes became collateral damage, grief became civil disorder, and our voices became national threats.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: ‘Make Up Your Own Rules’
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 85%: Rule 1. All noises must be kept to a minimum. She stares in front of her. An angry, glaring screen stares back.…
Rule 1. All noises must be kept to a minimum.
She stares in front of her. An angry, glaring screen stares back. She looks to her sides, only to be met with three enclosed walls. She stares up above her. A lonely light illuminates her cubicle, a replica of the hundreds of similar cubicles that occupy the same building. Same building, same job, same lives. The rushed clatter of keys echoes across the building, a stark reminder to return to focus. But a fleeting thought passes her mind, a feeling of curiosity that she quickly shuts down. Not now. Her mind returns to a blank state, absent of any life, and ready to continue working. And so it ensues – the continuous back and forth emailing and communicating to her co-workers without actually meeting them, the relentless ache just below her back serving as an indication of her wasted hours spent slaving away for a mere pay cheque that never seems to be enough for her. There is something else she searches for; something she can’t quite pinpoint but she knows it’s out there somewhere. Along with each clack of her mouse, her other hand instinctively taps out a tune, each finger rhythmically singing against the cold touch of her desk. Suddenly, a momentary feeling transforms the stiff surface of a desk into the smooth ivory of a piano, reconnecting her to a feeling of tranquillity. It’s not long until her voice joins the orchestra, beginning as a silent hum and building into a slight melody that begins to warm her soul, slowly but surely.
Rule 2. Work attire must be consistently formal and appropriate.
She finally reaches home after her shift. The door creaks open upon her entrance as if to welcome her, and without thinking, she launches herself onto her couch, dirty clothes and all. Her couch sits across an imposing view of the cadenced shimmer that adorns the towering skyscrapers around her. Her gaze shifts from the vast world ahead of her to the solemn reflection that silently greets her, and it is then where she notices her closet door slightly ajar. A small, worn book peeks out at the door’s corner, inviting her closer. She stands up with a grunt, shuffling towards the handle of a door she hasn’t reached for in ages and reluctantly pulls it open.
Crash.
An avalanche of used books tumbles onto her apartment floor, each book studded with rhinestones of every colour and signed by the handwriting of her thirteen-year-old self. With a sigh, she gently picks up the book closest to her feet as if it were porcelain, opening up its contents only to be greeted with a black tie attached on the first page by a mere piece of tape. The tie is embellished with treble clefs dancing along its fabric, adorned with a vibrant pink hue.
“MY FAVOURITE TIE FOR REHEARSALS!!”
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: ‘Make Up Your Own Rules’
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 80%: ‘Make Up Your Own Rules’ Rule 1. All noises must be kept to a minimum. She stares in front of her. An angry,…
‘Make Up Your Own Rules’
Rule 1. All noises must be kept to a minimum.
She stares in front of her. An angry, glaring screen stares back. She looks to her sides, only to be met with 3 enclosed walls. She stares up above her. A lonely light illuminates her cubicle, a replica of the hundreds of similar cubicles that occupy the same building. Same building, same job, same lives. The rushed clatter of keys echoes across the building, a stark reminder to return to focus. But a fleeting thought passes her mind, a feeling of curiosity that she quickly shuts down. Not now. Her mind returns to a blank state, absent of any life, and ready to continue working. And so it ensues – the continuous back and forth emailing and communicating to her coworkers without actually meeting them, the relentless ache just below her back serving as an indication of her wasted hours spent slaving away for a mere pay cheque that never seems to be enough for her. There is something else she searches for; something she can’t quite pinpoint but she knows it’s out there somewhere. Along with each clack of her mouse, her other hand instinctively taps out a tune, each finger rhythmically singing against the cold touch of her desk. Suddenly, a momentary feeling transforms the stiff surface of a desk into the smooth ivory of a piano, reconnecting her to a feeling of tranquility. It’s not long until her voice joins the orchestra, beginning as a silent hum and building into a slight melody that begins to warm her soul, slowly but surely.
Rule 2. Work attire must be consistently formal and appropriate.
She finally reaches home after her shift. The door creaks open upon her entrance as if to welcome her, and without thinking, she launches herself onto her couch, dirty clothes and all. Her couch sits across an imposing view of the cadenced shimmer that adorns the towering skyscrapers around her. Her gaze shifts from the vast world ahead of her to the solemn reflection that silently greets her, and it is then where she notices her closet door slightly ajar. A small, worn book peeks out at the door’s corner, inviting her closer. She stands up with a grunt, shuffling towards the handle of a door she hasn’t reached for in ages and reluctantly pulls it open.
Crash.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: ‘Make Up Your Own Rules’
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 75%: Rule 1. All noises must be kept to a minimum. She stares in front of her. An angry, glaring screen stares back.…
Rule 1. All noises must be kept to a minimum.
She stares in front of her. An angry, glaring screen stares back. She looks to her sides, only to be met with 3 enclosed walls. She stares up above her. A lonely light illuminates her cubicle, a replica of the hundreds of similar cubicles that occupy the same building. Same building, same job, same lives. The rushed clatter of keys echoes across the building, a stark reminder to return back to focus. But a fleeting thought passes her mind, a feeling of curiosity that she quickly shuts down. Not now. Her mind returns to a blank state, absent of any life, and ready to continue working. And so it ensues – the continuous back and forth emailing and communicating to her coworkers without actually meeting them, the relentless ache just below her back serving as an indication of her wasted hours spent slaving away for a mere pay cheque that never seems to be enough for her. There is something else she searches for; something she can’t quite pinpoint but she knows it’s out there somewhere. Along with each clack of her mouse, her other hand instinctively taps out a tune, each finger rhythmically singing against the cold touch of her desk. It’s not long until her voice joins the orchestra, beginning as a silent hum and building into a slight melody that warms her soul, slowly but surely.
Rule 2. Work attire must be consistently formal and appropriate.
She finally reaches home after her shift. The door creaks open upon her entrance as if to welcome her, and without thinking, she launches herself onto her couch, dirty clothes and all. Her couch sits across an imposing view of the cadenced shimmer that adorns the towering skyscrapers around her. Her gaze shifts from the vast world ahead of her to the solemn reflection that silently greets her, and it is then where she notices her closet door slightly ajar. A small, worn book peeks out at the door’s corner, inviting her closer. She stands up with a grunt, shuffling towards the handle of a door she hasn’t reached for in ages and reluctantly pulls it open.
Crash.