VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: "How did you change?"
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 80%: He had lain there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided…
He had lain there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit
Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided angels. Throbbing intensified, the body coiled ready to spring forwards to fly like an arrow of God. There he lie in all his glory; someone who had purpose, someone who had style, someone who was happy. I could see through my visor-like eyes the mirror to the perfect alternate version of myself. No one was around but my own conscience to guide me through the pain. My life was fading, something I couldn’t control. Was life ever going to change?
6 months later…
Getting out of bed was the hardest part of the day, disenfranchised by the lack lustre purgatory of not improving. Twice a day, I wrote to myself during the summer; year 12 was looming, I wrote my dreams into a timeless capsule under my bed in the aged monopoly set that smelled of cat piss.
I was told year 12 was suffering…
The start of a brand-new day, the same normal people I called my peers were distant background noise to me. I was silently suffering like a prey animal, but much like the prey animal I had learned to conceal hardships. Bogged down, brought down, beaten. The days went by in a gruellingly slow fashion, like paint drying against the seams, growing grass against the footpath, SACs accumulated like dull dust.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: "How did you change?"
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 72.5%: He had lain there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided…
He had lain there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit
Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided angels. Throbbing intensified, the body coiled ready to spring forwards to fly like an arrow of God. There he laid in all his glory; someone who had purpose, someone who had style, someone who was happy. I could see through my visor-like eyes the mirror to the perfect alternate version of myself. No one was around but my own conscience to guide me through the pain. My life was fading, something I couldn’t control. Was life ever going to change?
6 months later…
Getting out of bed was the hardest part of the day, disenfranchised by the lack lustre purgatory of not improving. Twice a day, I wrote to myself during the summer; year 12 was looming, I wrote my dreams into a timeless capsule under my bed in the aged monopoly set that smelled of cat piss.
I was told year 12 was suffering…
The start of a brand-new day, the same normal people I called my peers were distant background noise to me. I was silently suffering like a prey animal, but much like the prey animal I had learned to conceal hardships. Bogged down, brought down, beaten. The days went by in a gruellingly slow fashion, like paint drying against the seams, growing grass against the footpath, SACs accumulated like dull dust.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: "How did you change?"
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 65%: He had laid there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided…
He had laid there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit
Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided angels. Throbbing intensified, the body coiled ready to spring forwards to fly like an arrow of God. There he laid in all his glory; someone who had purpose, someone who had style, someone who was happy. I could see through my visor-like eyes the mirror to the perfect alternate version of myself. No one was around but my own conscious to guide me through the pain. My life was fading, something I couldn’t control. Was life ever going to change?
6 months later…
Getting out of bed was the hardest part of the day, disenfranchised by the lack lustre purgatory of not improving. Twice a day, I wrote to myself during the summer; year 12 was looming, I wrote my dreams into a timeless capsule under my bed in the aged monopoly set that smelled of cat piss.
I was told year 12 was suffering…
The start of a brand-new day, the same normal people I called my peers were distant background noise to me. I was silently suffering like a prey animal, but much like the prey animal I had learned to conceal hardships. Bogged down, brought down, beaten. The days went by in a gruellingly slow fashion, like paint drying against the seams, growing grass against the footpath, SACs accumulated like dull dust.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: "How did you change?"
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 65%: He had laid there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided…
He had laid there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit
Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided angels. Throbbing intensified, the body coiled ready to spring forwards to fly like an arrow of God. There he laid in all his glory; someone who had purpose, someone who had style, someone who was happy. I could see through my visor-like eyes the mirror to the perfect alternate version of myself. No one was around but my own conscious to guide me through the pain. My life was fading, something I couldn’t control. Was life ever going to change?
6 months later…
Getting out of bed was the hardest part of the day, disenfranchised by the lack lustre purgatory of not improving. Twice a day, I wrote to myself during the summer; year 12 was looming, I wrote my dreams into a timeless capsule under my bed in the aged monopoly set that smelled of cat piss.
I was told year 12 was suffering…
The start of a brand-new day, the same normal people I called my peers were distant background noise to me. I was silently suffering like a prey animal, but much like the prey animal I had learned to conceal hardships. Bogged down, brought down, beaten. The days went by in a gruellingly slow fashion, like paint drying against the seams, growing grass against the footpath, SACs accumulated like dull dust.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: “You were looking for the key for…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 87.5%: Changing Direction “You were looking for the key for years. But the door was always open!”- vce eng exam 2025…
Changing Direction
“You were looking for the key for years. But the door was always open!”- vce eng exam 2025
The room smelled like antiseptic and mangoes.
A woman sat beside my bed, enclosing my hand within both of hers. Her face seemed familiar, though familiarity had become a cruel sensation: the certainty of knowing without the comfort of remembering.
“Dad?” she whispered. “Do you know who I am?”
Behind her stood a man and two children, waiting for an answer I could not give. I smiled because they appeared to need me to.
“I’m sorry.”
The woman lowered her head. As she pressed my hand against her cheek, my gaze settled on the faded name beneath my hospital bracelet.
Alina.
My fingers found the small metal key hanging from my neck.
“Alina,” I said.
The woman looked up. “Who is Alina?”
The sweetness of mangoes grew stronger, pushing the antiseptic from the room, and suddenly my hands were young again.
“Wrong.” Alina tapped the centre of my palm.
“I copied exactly what you wrote.”
“You wrote it backwards.”
“Urdu itself is backwards.”
She gasped as though I had insulted God, then threw a mango seed at my head. We were seventeen, when borders belonged in schoolbooks and death belonged to old people, so we spent entire afternoons beneath the mango tree without believing an afternoon could ever be our last.
Taking my hand again, she traced the Urdu letters of her name across my Punjabi palm.
“Again,” she ordered.
I copied the movement carefully: Aa-lii-n-a.
Mango juice travelled along her wrist as I watched.
“Are you learning?”
“Very carefully.”
“Besharam.”
Shameless.
Although she rolled her hazel-green eyes, a smile escaped from the corner of her mouth. I wanted to tell her that I loved the way she said that word, but there would always be tomorrow.
That afternoon, an eclipse darkened the village. Birds disappeared into the trees, and the cattle became restless as the world held its breath.
“Are you scared?” I asked.
“No,” she replied too quickly.
When sunlight finally returned through the leaves, Alina smiled as though she had summoned it herself.
“See? It always comes back.”
The following morning, the shouting began.
Smoke pressed through our windows, stinging my eyes, while my mother threw clothes into our metal trunk. My father repeated that we would return within a week, although his shaking hands folded the same kurta three times.
They packed enough clothing for seven days. I ran to Alina.
Dragging my bicycle by its broken chain, I pushed past families moving in every direction, their possessions clutched against them as if a bundle of clothing could hold a life together. Someone called for me to stop, but smoke had swallowed the road behind me.
Alina’s front door stood open.
I would later forget the precise sound of her laugh and whether her dupatta had been green or blue, but I never forgot that doorway shifting in the hot wind.
“Alina!”
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Title: 'The Stage' Stimulus 1: "All…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 95%: THE STAGE Somewhere between childhood and adulthood, we will no longer play tiggy or race each other down…
THE STAGE
Somewhere between childhood and adulthood, we will no longer play tiggy or race each other down rolling green hills.
Somewhere between childhood and adulthood, we grow old because we stop playing and become cynical about society and rigid with the universe.
Somewhere between then and now, the world would become a stage where we are merely actors, forever playing an unsuitable role and stuffing our personalities into a costume much too small.
I've loved the stage since I was little. The moments in darkness before the curtain rises, the applause at the end of a show, the plethora of compliments the next day where you pretend you're not soaking up the attention. I love it all. Although I suppose it makes sense that I am so good at acting - most of my life since I can remember has been a performance.
As our toes became cramped in our shoes, and our mums dragged us to the uniform shop to get a new blazer that we can ACTUALLY move our arms in, I too was outgrown. My lack of laughter was 'creepy', my outbursts of intense emotion were 'childish'. I suppose that really, I didn't fit into the characters of the new show titled 'adolescence'. But to be a good actor, one must learn to adapt to be a part of the play! And so I performed. I learnt how to smile, how to change the tone of my voice, how to dress like the role of the 'smart-yet-likeable girl' that everybody seemed to love. But truly, I learnt masking. A survival tool for the neurodivergent to socially conform and seem well-suited to a stage. One not made for individuality.
Masking, whilst it initially appears useful, eventually crosses a boundary where the play never ends and the performance never stops. The director becomes unsatisfied and forces you to continue acting for the raving social reviews and acceptance into the 'popular' friend group. Adolescence - no longer a stage of life but rather the longest performance of your lifetime. Until you physically can no longer go onwards, you reach neurodivergent burnout. The audience awards the actors who contort themselves to reflect everything they value and desire, exiling those who don't to a social jail where loneliness is inevitable and destructive. The audience is a hivemind, which also plays a role. And that's the issue.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Title: 'The Stage' Stimulus 1: "All…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 95%: THE STAGE Somewhere between childhood and adulthood, we will no longer play tiggy or race each other down…
THE STAGE
Somewhere between childhood and adulthood, we will no longer play tiggy or race each other down rolling green hills.
Somewhere between childhood and adulthood, we grow old because we stop playing and become cynical about society and rigid with the universe.
Somewhere between then and now, the world would become a stage where we are merely actors, forever playing an unsuitable role and stuffing our personalities into a costume much too small.
I've loved the stage since I was little. The moments in darkness before the curtain rises, the applause at the end of a show, the plethora of compliments the next day where you pretend you're not soaking up the attention. I love it all. Although I suppose it makes sense that I am so good at acting - most of my life since I can remember has been a performance.
As our toes became cramped in our shoes, and our mums dragged us to the uniform shop to get a new blazer that we can ACTUALLY move our arms in, I too was outgrown. My lack of laughter was 'creepy', my outbursts of intense emotion were 'childish'. I suppose that really, I didn't fit into the characters of the new show titled 'adolescence'. But to be a good actor, one must learn to adapt to be a part of the play! And so I performed. I learnt how to smile, how to change the tone of my voice, how to dress like the role of the 'smart-yet-likeable girl' that everybody seemed to love. But truly, I learnt masking. A survival tool for the neurodivergent to socially conform and seem well-suited to a stage. One not made for individuality.
Masking, whilst it initially appears useful, eventually crosses a boundary where the play never ends and the performance never stops. The director becomes unsatisfied and forces you to continue acting for the raving social reviews and acceptance into the 'popular' friend group. Adolescence - no longer a stage of life but rather the longest performance of your lifetime. Until you physically can no longer go onwards, you reach neurodivergent burnout. The audience awards the actors who contort themselves to reflect everything they value and desire, exiling those who don't to a social jail where loneliness is inevitable and destructive. The audience is a hivemind, which also plays a role. And that's the issue.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Question 14 Use the following…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 65%: We Can’t Blame the Technology when we make the mistakes. To my fellow American Citizens Bombs are not the…
We Can’t Blame the Technology when we make the mistakes.
To my fellow American Citizens
Bombs are not the problem of the modern era; we are.
We talk about the devastating effects that the atomic bombs do to our land, killing our family, friends, and homes and taking so much away from what we loved. We say that it’s the reason wars get so out of hand and lead to global wars such as WW1 and 2.
We complain, talk and cry, but we don’t fix.
How do you think the bombs are created? Created by magical fairies hidden beneath our soil?
No! We, the humans that walk upon this earth, are the ones that create the poisonous bombs.
We build and build till the earth has nothing left to give, then we move onto the next. No remorse, no second thought.
A goal, programmed into our minds, that it’s the only solution to all our problems.
So when we cry about the damage they inflict onto our own homes, our land. We don’t stop to rethink our actions.
No,
We look to our own machinery, and hope it inflicts worse upon our enemies. We get stuck in a never-ending cycle with no sense of leaving it, nor any desire to do so.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Compose an interpretive text which…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 82.5%: To the Parents Who Keep Telling Us to Slow Down Dear Mum and Dad, You keep telling us to slow down. You say…
To the Parents Who Keep Telling Us to Slow Down
Dear Mum and Dad,
You keep telling us to slow down.
You say it when we rush out the door without breakfast. You say it when we spend hours staring at our phones. You say it when we complain that there aren't enough hours in the day. Enjoy it while it lasts, you tell us. One day you'll wish you could come back to these days.
We smile, nod, and continue running.
Because isn't that what growing up is supposed to be?
We are told that success belongs to those who move quickly. Finish school. Get into university. Find a career. Make money. Buy a house. Build a life. Every stage seems to have another finish line waiting behind it.
So forgive us for treating today like something we need to get through.
But perhaps you were right.
Perhaps the moments we are rushing through are the ones we will spend the rest of our lives trying to find again.
You probably won't remember the mornings when you reminded us for the fifth time to put our shoes on. You won't remember the arguments over messy bedrooms or unfinished homework. At the time, these moments probably felt insignificant — just another ordinary Tuesday.
But I wonder if, years from now, you would give anything to hear those footsteps running down the hallway again.
That is the cruel thing about ordinary moments.
We don't recognise their value until they become memories.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: "...so I knew nothing I said was gonna…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 70%: "Wow…" The teacher exclaimed, "Your English is surprisingly very good!", slowing down with every word she…
"Wow…" The teacher exclaimed, "Your English is surprisingly very good!", slowing down with every word she uttered loudly, plastering the glistening pearly whites on her face. This wasn't the first time I heard this phrase since I stepped foot here.
"Oh! Thank you…" I muttered, failing to meet her eyes. My mouth was dry, my breath turning into dust. Whispers circulated the classroom, not loud enough for me to hear what they were saying, yet loud enough for me to feel small. A forced smile tugged on my lips, my fingers restlessly playing with one another.
"Uh... " I sighed, "May I sit down please miss?"
“Of course darling, here!", she tugged out a chair. I sank into my seat, my shoulders finally breaking free from their shackles. I released my bag onto the floor. THUD! It rung throughout the classroom. Shoot! I’m such a clutz. A myriad of faces shifted towards me, yet none like mine.
––––––––––––––––––––––––––
The sunrays crept through the holes in the playground shade, radiating light throughout the vast zoo of humans. All I felt in that moment, was the bark beneath my feet digging into my shoes, and those harsh sunrays cutting deep into my skin as my heartbeat quickened.
“And… here is your buddy!” Miss MacBeth exclaimed, her voice lost in the screams and laughs. At least I finally learnt the teacher’s name.
Miss turned, “Tanya! Yes, you! Come here now please.” She yelped across the garden, her hands aggressively signalling her as if there was a fire drill.
Emerging from behind the teacher, a girl my age, somewhat taller than me, with brushed out curly, black hair oiled into a braid, thick glasses, and skin the same shade as mine bolted beside me. My shoulders relaxed, and my heartbeat slowed down.
––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Tanya turned out to be a great girl. She was really welcoming, relatable, and her accent was just like everyone else’s, making it all the more obvious why she was likable despite being the black sheep in the herd. However, something was throwing me off. The backhanded remarks.
The benches at lunch in the school yard were full of other year 5 and 6 girls squished up on each seat. Including our bench. I sat across Tanya, the sunrays pelting on her brushed-out frizzy curls. It seemed as if she didn’t want those beautiful coils, she wanted to be someone she wasn’t. And in this moment, I wanted to too.
Tanya broke my train of thought.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: This is my Family
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 77.5%: The suitcase was my grandfather's. Hard shelled, the colour of rust, with a dent on one corner from when my…
The suitcase was my grandfather's. Hard shelled, the colour of rust, with a dent on one corner from when my father dropped it off a train platform thirty years ago. Time had polished its scratches until they looked less like damage and more like a language only my family could read. Now it sat open on my floor like something waiting to be buried.
"Pack only what matters," my mother had said. As if that wasn't the cruelest instruction she could have given a fourteen year old. Adults always spoke about what mattered, then spent their lives leaving it behind.
I started with clothes because clothes didn't ask anything of me. They carried no memories, demanded no goodbyes. But then my hand found the ring, my great-grandfather's ring, too big for my finger, sitting at the bottom of my father's sock drawer where it always lived, and I sat on the floor holding it for ten minutes before I even understood why my chest had gone tight. It was absurd really; the ring couldn't have weighed more than a few grams, yet somehow it felt heavier than the suitcase beside me.
We were not visiting Australia. We were leaving, permanently, completely, the kind of leaving that doesn't come with a return ticket folded inside it. The kind that quietly divides your life into a before and an after. I never understood why adults were always willing to trade today for a tomorrow nobody had actually seen.
"This is the dream he wanted for us," my father said that night, watching me turn the ring in my fingers. "He crossed an ocean with nothing but this and a promise that his children would never have to want for anything again. Now we're crossing one too."
I had heard that story my whole life, told the same way every time, my great-grandfather as a poor boy turned visionary, the ring as proof that hunger could be turned into something solid if you wanted it badly enough. I used to love that story. That night, for the first time, it just made me angry.
"It's not fair," I said, the words finally cracking loose. "You didn't ask me. You just decided. You're taking everything, my friends, my school, my home, and you're calling it a gift."
I expected him to get angry back. Instead he sat down on the floor next to the suitcase, slowly, like his knees had aged ten years that week alone.
"You think this is hard for you," he said, not unkindly. "Let me tell you what is hard."
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Stimulus 3 “[Playfulness is] not about…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 97.5%: Play on. I used to think the farm was the whole world, something I have spent the rest of my life trying to…
Play on.
I used to think the farm was the whole world, something I have spent the rest of my life trying to get back.
I’ll never forget soaring over the paddocks as our car sped along the gravel road, the dry river beds that were peppered with trees blurring into craters on a distant planet. In my head we weren’t driving, we were on a rocket ship, flying past asteroid belts and stars. There was a sudden jolt as the rocket crashed – a pothole. I rubbed my eyes and the toxic smell of rocket fuel left the tip of my nose, the galaxies I could almost touch faded away, as the green of the paddocks crept its way back into my vision.
I often catch myself thinking about it differently now, watching James stare out the car window as though the paddocks might still become something else. It is how we first learn the rules of the world while still remaining entirely ourselves.
Scrambling out of the car I craned my neck to take a good look at the castle. “Let the games begin,” I would say to myself. I shaped the castle so its towers stood firm and proud, its drawbridge like a mouth was closed up tight. I’d reach my hand out and place it on the beautiful limestone walls, the bumps getting stuck in the grooves of my little palms. I jerked my hand away as rust fragments scattered towards the ground, not a castle at all – just the corrugated iron walls of the shed.
The metal squeaked as I forced my way in; dust particles danced through the air, burning the surface of my eyes. The musty stench of the shed crept its way up my nose and forced a powdery cough out of me. I turned the corner and gasped when the dazzling sea of blue scales from my sleeping dragon revealed itself to me. The sounds of its snores made the walls of the shed rumble.
Every twist of the throttle fed it, and it answered with a furious snarl that tore the silence. It wasn’t a dragon at all, just my blue motorbike that my little legs were quickly outgrowing.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Speech - Oral Presentation, Contention…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 67.5%: Can you believe that in Australia, the national youth offender rate was 1,650 per 100,000 young people aged…
Can you believe that in Australia, the national youth offender rate was 1,650 per 100,000 young people aged 10–17? Many child development experts in the health and legal field support raising the age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 14, as a necessary step to decrease crime and support youth. Greetings, classmates and Mrs Goro , Today, I urge you to consider why we as a community must prioritise the safety and support for the youth in decreasing crime rates to foster a safe and friendly environment for all children and teens in Australia.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Speech - Oral Presentation, Contention…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 60%: Can you believe that in Australia, the national youth offender rate was 1,650 per 100,000 young people aged…
Can you believe that in Australia, the national youth offender rate was 1,650 per 100,000 young people aged 10–17? Many child development experts in the health and legal field support raising the age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 14, as a necessary step to decrease crime and support youth. Greetings, classmates and Mrs Goro , Today, I urge you to consider why we as a community must prioritise the safety and support for the youth in decreasing crime rates to foster a safe and friendly environment for all children and teens in Australia.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: write a diasporic fiction story.
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 85%: a bowl of rice and a ceramic plate I am the first daughter. i am the second. i sit down at the table and flip…
a bowl of rice and a ceramic plate
I am the first daughter.
i am the second.
i sit down at the table and flip my phone face-down, breathing in the steam from my bowl of warm white rice. my hands gloss over the surface of the marbled black table as i pick up the cracked rice spoon and begin to poke the rice, the spoon gripping the grains with certainty.
My brother’s voice breaks the lull in conversation, his hands pushing my father’s folded newspaper off the table. His brash voice cuts through the oversaturated room. My parents easily talk over him using the harsh and fricative phonetics of Mandarin, Cantonese and Hokkien, each syllable vying to be louder than the last, consonants exploding with force and spittle. My brother’s voice raises, grating the wooden table that nestles my warm rice until my parents turn to look at him. He’s only asking for the soy chicken. I frown at his abrasiveness before I silently give him what he wants. My mother reminds him to finish his chiah before he leaves the table, and I dish myself another spoonful of rice before I begin to chew.
“how many minutes have you studied today?” i don’t reply. i don’t count the minutes but today i know there aren’t many of them. “i don’t understand how you spend this much time on your laptop without accomplishing anything meaningful. your procrastination is a serious issue, one day you’ll regret wasting all this time.” my mother lectures me, her words scraping across the table as they attempt to worm their way into my head. my sisters focus on eating, if their mouths are full then they can’t be asked to contribute to this conversation. i avoid eye contact and look back down at my rice. it has gone cold.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Standing up against tyranny
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 67.5%: Fellow citizens, Today, I stand before you not as a dissenter, but as a seeker of truth in a world shrouded…
Fellow citizens,
Today, I stand before you not as a dissenter, but as a seeker of truth in a world shrouded by the illusion of perfection. The speech we heard earlier extolled the virtues of our so-called utopia, a place where order and harmony reign supreme. But I ask you, at what cost?
We are told that our society is the pinnacle of human achievement, yet our voices are stifled, our freedoms curtailed. The promise of security has become a cage, and the pursuit of uniformity has erased our individuality. We are expected to conform, to accept the doublespeak that masks our reality. "Peace" is enforced through surveillance, "harmony" through suppression, and "unity" through fear.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: in relation to the text m. e.…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 70%: After 120 days in the belly of the Queen Victoria, Meabh had arrived in the new colony. She couldn't help but…
After 120 days in the belly of the Queen Victoria, Meabh had arrived in the new colony. She couldn't help but resent the flat dry land[1] which yielded no resemblance to the green hills of Ireland to which she held a fierce native fondness for.
As her poor mother had died of sickness, her father fallen victim to the same illness some years prior, Meabh had set out to find work , where it was now abundant. Australia.
With a sorrowful goodbye to her homeland, Meabh Kelly had endured the 120 [2] long days and nights on the careless sea. At night, the hands of men groped through the darkness. In the day, as the cruel sun shone, seawater smothered her cracked lips as disease clung [3] to the scuttling rats.[4]
Sea salt stuck to her itchy skin as she arrived in Sydney harbor, her hair knotted and clumped with salt. In desperation for a warm bed and a shower Meabh set out to find work.
Not one week after arriving in the port Meabh took a position as a maid in a doctor's house. A paper had advertised the job on a newly erected lamppost; she had called the house and been hired that same day. A cab had been organized to take her to a the newly established settlement out of Sydney, a town named Cadwell.[5] [6] [7]
Dr. Allbones was a new resident of Cadwell, where his house functioned as both clinic and home[8] to him and his young wife.
When Meabh had arrived, she was surprised to see Mrs. Allbones herself awaiting her by the doorstep. "Good evening Meabh, welcome to Caldwell!”. Meabh had taken immediate notice of Mrs. Allbones feminine quality and plush persona. She didn't speak as such but cooed [9] in sweet tones, her saccharine [10] voice could put the most diligent soldier to rest[11] . At the sight of her mistress Maebh’s was reminded of the tales her mum had told her around the darkening hearth, whispering of sirens and selkies. Creatures with sweet voices and inhuman beauty.
“I'm glad you have come” Mrs. Allbones breathed in her gentle tone, “it's hard to get people willing to leave the city and come to Cadwell, and I've been oh so desperate for a good maid. It’s much more difficult to lace up a dress by yourself.” Amused by herself Mrs. Allbones let out a breathy laugh.
Mrs. Allbones prattled continuously [12] as she showed Meabh about the rooms as if there was no partitioning [13] between her thoughts and voice.
The house was a grand and new residence which had been styled in that new colonial way[14] . It stood in the center of town among the shopfronts. On the first floor was the room used to see patients where at the center of the room was a clean steel examining table while cupboards against the walls held strange and usual equipment. The study doubled as a library and each bookshelf was pushed tightly together and crammed with medical journals and a plethora of other genres. “Your welcome to read these anytime you like, I have read these myself many times over” Ms. Allbones had said with a enthusiastic lilt in her sweet voice. Meabh nodded along, she didn’t bother mentioning she wasn’t able to read.
On the second story Dr. and Mr. Allbones room was cushioned in soft hues contrasting against the hardwood furniture. It was obvious that Dr. Allbones had let his impressionable wife decorate and the room swarmed with flowery scents and pretty rugs and furnishings. Mrs. Allbones had guided Maebh through each room, all a similar shape and styled but decorated uniquely. Yet amongst all the rooms there was no nursery. How uncommon for such young newlyweds[15] Maebh had thought!
Mrs. Allbones was different from all other doctors’ wives Meabh had seen in Dublin. She lacked the churlish smirk and dismissive glance[16] that those women[17] wielded.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: in relation to the text Lady Audelys…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 65%: After 120 days in the belly of the Queen Victoria, Meabh had arrived in the new colony. She couldn't help but…
After 120 days in the belly of the Queen Victoria, Meabh had arrived in the new colony. She couldn't help but resent the flat dry land which yielded no resemblance to the green hills of Ireland to which she held a fierce native fondness for.
As her poor mother had died of sickness, her father fallen victim to the same illness some years prior, Meabh had set out to find work , where it was now abundant. Australia.
With a sorrowful goodbye to her homeland, Meabh Kelly had endured the 120 long days and nights on the careless sea. At night, the hands of men groped through the darkness. In the day, as the cruel sun shone, seawater smothered her cracked lips as disease clung to the scuttling rats.
Sea salt stuck to her itchy skin as she arrived in Sydney harbor, her hair knotted and clumped with salt. In desperation for a warm bed and a shower Meabh set out to find work.
Not one week after arriving in the port Meabh took a position as a maid in a doctor's house. A paper had advertised the job on a newly erected lamppost; she had called the house and been hired that same day. A cab had been organized to take her to a the newly established settlement out of Sydney, a town named Cadwell.
Dr. Allbones was a new resident of Cadwell, where his house functioned as both clinic and home to him and his young wife.
When Meabh had arrived, she was surprised to see Mrs. Allbones herself awaiting her by the doorstep. "Good evening Meabh, welcome to Caldwell!”. Meabh had taken immediate notice of Mrs. Allbones feminine quality and plush persona. She didn't speak as such but cooed in sweet tones, her saccharine voice could put the most diligent soldier to rest . At the sight of her mistress Maebh’s was reminded of the tales her mum had told her around the darkening hearth, whispering of sirens and selkies. Creatures with sweet voices and inhuman beauty.
“I'm glad you have come” Mrs. Allbones breathed in her gentle tone, “it's hard to get people willing to leave the city and come to Cadwell, and I've been oh so desperate for a good maid. It’s much more difficult to lace up a dress by yourself.” Amused by herself Mrs. Allbones let out a breathy laugh.
Mrs. Allbones prattled continuously as she showed Meabh about the rooms as if there was no partitioning between her thoughts and voice.
The house was a grand and new residence which had been styled in that new colonial way . It stood in the center of town among the shopfronts. On the first floor was the room used to see patients where at the center of the room was a clean steel examining table while cupboards against the walls held strange and usual equipment. The study doubled as a library and each bookshelf was pushed tightly together and crammed with medical journals and a plethora of other genres. “Your welcome to read these anytime you like, I have read these myself many times over” Ms. Allbones had said with a enthusiastic lilt in her sweet voice. Meabh nodded along, she didn’t bother mentioning she wasn’t able to read.
On the second story Dr. and Mr. Allbones room was cushioned in soft hues contrasting against the hardwood furniture. It was obvious that Dr. Allbones had let his impressionable wife decorate and the room swarmed with flowery scents and pretty rugs and furnishings. Mrs. Allbones had guided Maebh through each room, all a similar shape and styled but decorated uniquely. Yet amongst all the rooms there was no nursery. How uncommon for such young newlyweds Maebh had thought!
Mrs. Allbones was different from all other doctors’ wives Meabh had seen in Dublin. She lacked the churlish smirk and dismissive glance that those women wielded.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: write a speech about something you are…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 60%: “Are you xenophobic?” “Please explain”, Yes Pauline hanson you as a federal politician who stands up at…
“Are you xenophobic?” “Please explain”, Yes Pauline hanson you as a federal politician who stands up at parliament and makes xenophobic statements need me to clarify what xenophobia is, this interview is one of Australia's most iconic pop culture moments, while many like myself laughed at this meme a couple years ago I no longer find myself cracking a smile. The tides have shifted the menacing threats against immigrants particularly people of colour have escalated. Guys guys join in on the flashy new trend, all the biggest influencers are doing it, its called being a widely accepted racist political party disguising themselves as nationalist. “them job taking curry munching rascals”, yes Dazza from townsville, we hear you and we will protect you from them job hungry bastards.
The influencer getting paid the big bucks is Trump and his ICE bots, he is closely followed by Britans Nigel Farage, Canada's Mamie Bernier, and many more. But the world's most underrated influencer is our very own Pauline Hanson who has been in the game since 1994, yes why join the trend when you can start it. Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party’s rise in popularity is a sign of retrogression in Australia’s culture, deepening the fracture in national multiculturalism and misleading the wider Australian community by redirecting their growing discontent to immigrant communities.
P1: Pauline Hanson's vindictive speeches and press runs are built from ignorant and baseless research rather than substantive policies which tackle the root cause of crises and protect Aussie values. Pauline Hanson like all notorious dictators is a fiery charismatic character, people rarely listen to what she says but rather how she says. Her cultivation of follower adore her for her legitimising and voicing their thoughts and concerns, throughout her 32 years in politics she often used hateful and discriminatory speech to express these thoughts, she has openly labelled Muslim immigrants as "violent primitive peoples” and she has famously told Senator Mehreen Faruqi to “pack your bags and piss off back to Pakistan”. The tactic of scapegoating minority groups is by no means new, Adolf hitler spread widespread antisemetic propaganda as the cause of germany's economic devastation, Saddam Hussein who persecuted ethnic and religious minorities including the Kurdish people's, to strengthen his regime. One thing all these dictators have in common is to consolidate power by scapegoating a specific racial or religious group, sounds familiar right?.Using these tactics Pauline Hanson has built her political influence by exploiting the fears and insecurities of Australians, convincing struggling families that migrants rather than policy failures, are responsible for job shortages, the housing crisis and rising cost of living. Fear may win elections but it will never solve Australia's Australia's problems.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Write a piece on personal journeys…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 90%: The beats of the ceremonial kompang pervade my thoughts as I sit rigid on the pelamin (the wedding dais), my…
The beats of the ceremonial kompang pervade my thoughts as I sit rigid on the pelamin (the wedding dais), my face hidden from view with an ornate fan by my mother seated next to me. She is crying, her tears running tracks through her makeup. Ironically, I do not cry. I look straight ahead, my eyes seeing everything, yet nothing. The fan is beautiful, silver and gold flowers on maroon fabric that looks like the grating, scratchy songket I was made to wear (“Suck in your gut, sayang, there we go.”). A wall of my most trusted female relatives and friends form before me, stopping the groom’s procession. Do they know? I do not think so. Better if they didn’t. My pain will be the one thing I alone will own.
The beats do not falter. They grow louder, closer, until they settle beneath my skin, a second pulse that does not belong to me. Each strike of the kompang feels like a reckoning, the walls closing in, a narrowing of choice. The women before me laugh, their voices light, teasing, bargaining for passage in language and ritual older than us all. Their bodies form a barrier, but it is a gentle one, meant to be crossed. Everything here is meant to give way.
Everything except me.
This was never meant to be my life. Not him. Not like this. Not now.
It began, as most things do, quietly. A suggestion over the dinner table, like we were only discussing the weather. “He is a good man,” my mother said, not unkindly. “Stable, pious. He will take care of you.” My father could only nod, refusing to meet my gaze. It was never framed as a question, only a sequence of reasonable steps laid out so logically that refusal would seem irrational and ungrateful.
He is a good man. That has always been the problem. But I did not love him the way a wife is meant to love her husband. There is nothing to point to, nothing to refuse without sounding cruel. Just small things – the way he speaks for me without noticing, the way my silences become agreement in his presence, the way my world, around him, felt already decided. A life where I am safe, provided for, and slowly, carefully, reduced.
I told myself I had time. That there would be space later for me to grow into whoever I was meant to be.
But time, I have learned, is something other people decide for you if you do not claim it yourself.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: write a pursuasive speech on the topic…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 87.5%: Before you leave the house tonight, make sure your phone is charged. Walk the lit road, not the shortcut.…
Before you leave the house tonight, make sure your phone is charged. Walk the lit road, not the shortcut. Keep your keys between your fingers, just in case. Hood up, music off, eyes up. Text me when you get there and don't leave your drink alone. Wear something that covers you, you wouldn’t want to suggest anything, but not so long you'll trip if you have to run. Always scream fire, never help.
We don't hand this list to boys. We have never handed this list to boys. We give it to girls before they're old enough to understand why, and by the time they're old enough to ask, they've already memorised it. Nobody decided what to hand boys instead. The manosphere decided for us.
Over the last decade, an ecosystem of podcasts, forums and posts built itself around that gap, telling boys that women are objects for their entertainment, showing emotion is weak and for girls, and feminism is the reason they feel lost and can’t get a girlfriend. This is the manosphere, and it did not create misogyny, but it has industrialised it and turned something that once needed a search to find into something that finds our youngest generations first.
The manosphere is not a single website or a single man. It is a misogynistic, global subculture operating across platforms that UN Women describes as being “characterised by anti-feminist, misogynistic viewpoints and the promotion of rigid, aggressive models of masculinity”. Andrew Tate is one such model. This ‘man’ has publicly stated that he is “absolutely a misogynist”, and posted a video stating his response to an accusation of cheating by a woman would be to “bang out the machete, boom in her face, grip her up by the neck … and you go f her”. He is currently being charged with 10 criminal offences including assault, rape, human trafficking and controlling prostitution for gain. He has collectively ten million followers. Boys are still searching his name. This is who is raising our boys while we aren't looking.
When a culture repeatedly tells young boys that showing emotions and vulnerability is for girls, and men should toughen up and deal with it, it should not surprise us when those boys grow into men who respond to vulnerability with violence. Police recorded 40,087 reports of sexual assault in 2024, the highest number on record. But a separate ABS survey tells a more confronting story. 92% of women who'd experienced sexual assault never came forward. Thousands of Australian women trapped in a blanket of fear and silence, a silence the manosphere is built to justify. The manosphere didn't pull the trigger; these men did. What it did do was provide them with a loaded gun and spare bullets. Bullets aimed at women and the very movement fighting for their rights.
Feminism is not a textbook definition; it is the apparently radical belief that the girl walking home tonight deserves to do so without a list of rules. The idea that women are people, not vessels for someone else’s dinner, children, and desires. Yet these forums, podcasts and ‘male advocates’ have twisted this word to fit their own misogynistic views. The manosphere didn't just discredit feminism; it took a word that once described the idea that women deserve the same treatment, opportunities and freedoms as men, instead rebuilding it into a threat aimed at men.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: write a pursuasive speech on the topic…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 87.5%: Before you leave the house tonight, make sure your phone is charged. Walk the lit road, not the shortcut.…
Before you leave the house tonight, make sure your phone is charged. Walk the lit road, not the shortcut. Keep your keys between your fingers, just in case. Hood up, music off, eyes up. Text me when you get there and don't leave your drink alone. Wear something that covers you, you wouldn’t want to suggest anything, but not so long you'll trip if you have to run. Always scream fire, never help.
We don't hand this list to boys. We have never handed this list to boys. We give it to girls before they're old enough to understand why, and by the time they're old enough to ask, they've already memorised it. Nobody decided what to hand boys instead. The manosphere decided for us.
Over the last decade, an ecosystem of podcasts, forums and posts built itself around that gap, telling boys that women are objects for their entertainment, showing emotion is weak and for girls, and feminism is the reason they feel lost and can’t get a girlfriend. This is the manosphere, and it did not create misogyny, but it has industrialised it and turned something that once needed a search to find into something that finds our youngest generations first.
The manosphere is not a single website or a single man. It is a misogynistic, global subculture operating across platforms that UN Women describes as being, “characterised by anti-feminist, misogynistic viewpoints and the promotion of rigid, aggressive models of masculinity”. Andrew Tate is one such model. This ‘man’ has publicly stated that he is “absolutely a misogynist”, and posted a video stating his response to accusation of cheating by a woman would be to “bang out the machete, boom in her face, grip her up by the neck … and you go f her”. He is currently being charged with 10 criminal offences including assault, rape, human trafficking and controlling prostitution for gain. He has collectively ten million followers. Boys are still searching his name. This is who is raising our boys while we aren't looking.
When a culture repeatedly tells young boys that showing emotions and vulnerability is for girls, and men should toughen up and deal with it, it should not surprise us when those boys grow into men who respond to vulnerability with violence. Police recorded 40,087 reports of sexual assault in 2024, the highest number on record. But a separate ABS survey tells a more confronting story. 92% of women who'd experienced sexual assault never came forward. Thousands of Australian women trapped in a blanket of fear and silence, a silence the manosphere is built to justify. The manosphere didn't pull the trigger, these men did. What it did do was provide them with a loaded gun and spare bullets. Bullets aimed at women and the very movement fighting for their rights.
Feminism is not a textbook definition, it is the apparently radical belief that the girl walking home tonight deserves to do so without a list of rules. The idea that women are people and not vessels for someone else’s dinner, children and desires. Yet these forums, podcasts and ‘male advocates’ have twisted this word to fit their own misogynistic views. The manosphere didn't just discredit feminism, it took a word that once described the idea that women deserve the same treatment, opportunities and freedoms as men, instead rebuilding it into a threat aimed at men.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: On the text : Lady Audley secret ·…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 65%: After 120 days in the belly of Queen Victoria Meabh had arrived in the new colony of Austlain. She couldn't…
After 120 days in the belly of Queen Victoria Meabh had arrived in the new colony of Austlain. She couldn't help but resent the flat dry land which yielded no resemblance to the green hills of Ireland to which held a fierce native fondness for.
As her poor mother had fallen ill and died, her father was a victim of the illness some years prior, Maebhe had set out to find work , where it was abundant. In Australia.
And so with tearful goodbye to her young siblings, Meabh Kelly had endured the 120 at sea. At night the hands of men groped through the darkness and in the day seawater soaked your cracked lips as disease clung to the sctuttling rats.
Not one week after arriving in the port of Sydyney Meabh had traveled to a newly established settlement where she had been assigned as one of the house servants of the local doctor.
A cab had been arranged to take her from Sydney port to her new master residence. Dr.Allbones was a recent resident of the town of Caldwell where his house functioned as both clinic and home to him and his young wife.
When Meabh had arrived she was surprised to see Mrs. Allbones herself awaiting her by the door step. “Goodevening Meabh, welcome to Cadwell!”. Meabh had taken immediate notice of Mrs. Allbones femmine nature. Mrs. Allbones didnt speak as such but cooed in sweet tones. Her saccharine voice could put the most diligent soldier to rest.
“I'm glad you have come” whispered Ms. Allbones in her gentle tone “it's hard to get people willing to leave the city and come to Cadwall”.
Mrs. Allbones prattled continuously as she showed Meabh about the rooms as if there was no partitioning between her thoughts and voice.
The house was a grand and new residence which had been styled in that new colonial way and was in the center of town among the shopfronts. On the first floor were rooms used to see patients as well as the kitchen and palour. On the second story The west wing of the building's second floor was Dr. Allbones rooms, dining room and study while the east was the servants quarters. No nursery, Maebh had noticed. How uncommon for such young newlyweds!
Mrs. Allbones was different to all other doctors wife Meabh had known. She lacks the churlish smirk and dismissive glance that those women possessed.
Ms. Allbone was casual with all her servants, and flirted freely, although not intentionally. She acted in a way which made Meabh had wondered what Ms. Allbones had been before she had become a doctor's wife.
Meabh was gracious of Mrs. Allbones liberality. Mrs. Allbone was as precious within her treatment of maebh as she was in her appearance.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: Personal Journeys
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 72.5%: How would you define yourself? Chinese? Australian? Indian? Croatian? For many teenagers nationality…
How would you define yourself? Chinese? Australian? Indian? Croatian? For many teenagers nationality represents who they are. For me it used to be Argentinian and Chinese, but my identity is more than a language.
I was born and raised i n Buenos Aires and though I knew many people, and was in many groups, my favourite by far must’ve been table tennis. In table tennis I didn't need words — my paddle said everything. After training, I'll sit together with my Chinese and Argentinian friends eating empanadas and dumplings off a small table, laughing in two languages, proud of both. In Buenos Aires, being Chinese and Argentinian wasn't a contradiction. It was the best thing about me.
Though Argentina was a beautiful place- my beautiful home, it was also a broken one. Inflation, corruption, and safety issues led to deep disappointment. The final straw for my parents was when I was robbed at knife point on a night returning from table tennis training. It killed the last bit of hope for my parents. So we moved to Melbourne when I was twelve. We packed our languages, our recipes, our traditions and my paddle — everything that couldn't fit in a suitcase but came anyway — and with a grief that felt strangely like hope, we left Argentina behind. My parents were carrying the weight of our future even while knowing that they'd have to bear uncertainty, sacrifice and the risk of failure. Luckily Australia gave the stamp for our passports and I finally got the chance to live in Australia. I'd heard so many stories about it. Australia felt like another universe. It was stable, safe and most importantly, full of hope for the future.