Without each other, Napier Boys’ High School students Charlie Williams and Fergus Cardwell-Dray do not believe they would have achieved the successes they have.
The pair’s friendly rivalry has seen them jostle for Dux from intermediate right through to their final year of secondary school.
At the final prize giving of their schooling career, held last month, Charlie was recognised as NBHS’s 2020 Dux, while Fergus received the Dux Musarum Award for Cultural Excellence and was recognised as Proxime Accessit.
Charlie said he was “surprised” by the accolade given that he was awarded it last year.
“With the dux award it’s been a bit of an ongoing thing between Fergus and I since year 7. In year 7 he got top in our class, and year 8 it was me, and every year since we have alternated, so I was kinda surprised because I thought he had it this year.”
But to get the Dux Gleeson Family Award “feels amazing”.
“It’s something that you work towards for ages and something that you look at when you just come to high school so to be able to get these awards feels pretty amazing really.”
They both agree that they “wouldn’t have done anywhere near as well” if they had not both been at NBHS.
Charlie will study a Bachelor of Advanced Science (BAdvSci)/Bachelor of Engineering (BE) conjoint at the University of Auckland next year.
Fergus plans on studying composition and sonic arts at Victoria University of Wellington.
Other elite award recipients include Nicholas Mannering, Ashcroft Cup for All Round Excellence and Da Wilson Memorial Prize for Head Prefect; Bayley Foote, Dux Ludorum: Baker Reaney Cup for Excellence in Sport; Oliver Marshall, Clyde Jeffery Cup for General Excellence; and Clifton Bush III, Outstanding Sporting or Cultural Achievement.
Napier Boys’ High School Deputy Headmaster Bruce Smith said: “It was a great celebration of the year and a great send-off for the year thirteens”.
It is believed to be the first time in the school’s history that the prizegiving had to be postponed, let alone postponed twice due to the one-in-250-year storm that hit Napier.
However, Mr Smith said they were “always” going to recognise the boys’ achievements somehow. “It’s essential”.
He said the hall was “jam-packed” with parents. “It’s great to see the boys and what they’ve managed to achieve even in a disrupted year with Covid-19.
PHOTO: Napier Boys’ High School Proxime Accessit and Dux Musarum Fergus Cardwell-Dray (left) with Dux Charlie Williams.
