Identical twins Rafaella and Elpida Louca had a double reason to celebrate at their graduation, after they both achieved a first-class degree in Mathematics.

The pair have lived and studied together for the past three years, and will now go on to work towards a Master’s degree in the same field.

The 20-year-olds studied for the same modules, and so had all of their lectures together during their time at university – only separated during workshop classes.

Rafaella explained: “That was ideal for us because we were given the opportunity to act independently, learn more about our individual strengths and weaknesses throughout the courses but also to be working together as a team.”

The Lonsdale College graduates, who are from Cyprus, lived in the same flat on campus with six other students for all three years of their time at Lancaster.

Rafaella and Elpida enjoyed the opportunity to meet people from different cultures during their time at University, and the chance to create valuable friendships with people from across the world. Elpida said: “We also enjoyed the fact that there was a Cypriot-Hellenic Society where we have met a lot of people from our country, and we were able to organise events in order to keep our tradition alive.”

Although the siblings had not always planned to go to the same University, they both wanted to study Mathematics and decided to take the opportunity to be together.

Rafaella said: “Being at University together was precious for both of us because we were always supporting and motivating each other to achieve any goal we had.

“During these three years we had the same friendship groups, however we were members of different societies, the UNICEF society and the Business Consultancy Society, as we wanted to spend some time apart.”

Both Rafaella and Elpida will now go on to undertake an MSc in Risk Management and Financial Engineering at Imperial College Business School, where they have both been awarded the Women in Finance Scholarship because of their academic achievements and career potentials.

Rafaella then hopes to pursue a career in the banking industry as a Credit Risk Analyst, and Elpida would like to work as a Portfolio Risk Analyst.