A Derbyshire Times reporter is celebrating after passing her Italian GCSE – and gaining one of the country’s top five marks in the subject.

Helen Beighton, (24), studied for the GCSE at evening classes in Nottingham during the past year, and her A* grade takes her GCSE tally to an impressive six A*s and six As.

She said: “Obviously I am pleased about the result but I thought it was funny and a bit embarrassing!

“I worked quite hard but didn’t practise as much as I should have.”

Reporter Helen.
Pic: Derbyshire Times

Helen has an Italian boyfriend, Tommaso (24), and makes frequent trips to the country. The couple plan to move to Italy at some point in the future.

She said: “Tommaso’s family speak very little English so in order to communicate with them I had to take the impetus to go and learn Italian myself.

“Tommaso thought I was joking about the result but he’s very proud and his family has congratulated me.”

Helen plans to add an A-level in Italian to her others in French, English, geography and media studies.

She was also recently awarded her National Certificate Examination after successfully re-sitting the newspaper practice section.

Helen said: “The summer has been quite busy. The workload for the GCSE is not too heavy and I fitted it in in the evenings and sometimes did homework at lunchtime.

“I think the A-level will be a lot more difficult.”