Learn Hardcore German: Ihr Abiturzeugnis war so gut, dass sie Medizin studieren kann. - Her high school diploma was so good that she can study medicine.

Ihr Abiturzeugnis war so gut, dass sie Medizin studieren kann.

Her high school diploma was so good that she can study medicine.

Breakdown of Ihr Abiturzeugnis war so gut, dass sie Medizin studieren kann.

the high school diploma

Elon.io is an online learning platform

We have an entire course teaching German grammar and vocabulary.

Start learning German now

Questions & Answers about Ihr Abiturzeugnis war so gut, dass sie Medizin studieren kann.

How do I know whether Ihr here means “her” or “your (formal)”?

In writing, Ihr can mean either:

her (possessive for a woman)
your (formal) (when addressing someone politely)

In this sentence, the second clause is:

…, dass sie Medizin studieren kann.

Here, sie is lowercase and the verb is kann (3rd person singular). That tells us:

sie = she (3rd person singular), not Sie (you, formal).
So Ihr must match that same woman: “her Abitur certificate”.

If the meaning were “your Abitur certificate … you can study medicine”, we’d expect:

Ihr Abiturzeugnis war so gut, dass Sie Medizin studieren können.
(capital Sie, verb können = 2nd person formal)

Why is it Ihr Abiturzeugnis, not Ihre Abiturzeugnis?

The form of the possessive (ihr / ihre) depends on the gender and case of the noun it modifies, not on the gender of the owner.

Abiturzeugnis has the article das → it is neuter.
It is the subject of the sentence → nominative case.
Possessive determiners (mein, dein, ihr, sein, etc.) in nominative neuter singular take no extra ending.

So:

das Abiturzeugnis → ihr Abiturzeugnis (neuter, nominative)
But: die Note → ihre Note (feminine, nominative)

Compare:

Ihr Abiturzeugnis war gut. – Her / your Abitur certificate was good.
Ihre Noten waren gut. – Her / your grades were good.

What exactly is Abiturzeugnis? How is it different from Abitur?

das Abitur = the final school-leaving qualification (roughly like A-levels / high-school diploma, depending on the country).
das Zeugnis = report card, certificate.
das Abiturzeugnis = the physical certificate (the document) showing the Abitur result/grades.

So:

Sie hat ihr Abitur gemacht. – She did/finished her Abitur.
Sie hat ihr Abiturzeugnis bekommen. – She received her Abitur certificate.

In many contexts, Germans might also just say Abitur when they really mean the result, but Abiturzeugnis is more precise: it’s about the grade sheet that was so good.

Why is it war so gut and not ist so gut?

German often uses the simple past for a state or quality that is being looked at as a completed situation in the past, even if the document still exists.

Here, war so gut focuses on:

the evaluation at the time she got the certificate / applied to university,
and the resulting consequence: now she can study medicine.

You could say ist so gut, especially if you’re looking at the certificate right now:

Ihr Abiturzeugnis ist so gut, dass sie Medizin studieren kann.
→ More like: Looking at it now, we see it’s so good…

But war so gut is very natural if we’re narrating her past school career and its consequence.

How does the so … dass construction work here?

so … dass expresses a degree of something that leads to a consequence:

so [adjective/adverb], dass
- clause

In the sentence:

so gut – such a good grade
dass sie Medizin studieren kann – result/consequence clause

Literal structure:

Ihr Abiturzeugnis war so gut, dass sie Medizin studieren kann.
→ Her Abitur certificate was so good that she can study medicine.

Compare:

Es war so kalt, dass das Wasser gefror. – It was so cold that the water froze.
Er spricht so schnell, dass ich ihn kaum verstehe. – He speaks so fast that I hardly understand him.

Don’t confuse this with so gut, um … zu – that doesn’t work in German. You’d use:

gut genug, um Medizin zu studieren – good enough to study medicine.

Why is the verb kann at the very end in dass sie Medizin studieren kann?

dass introduces a subordinate clause. In German subordinate clauses, the conjugated verb goes at the very end of the clause.

Here, the conjugated verb is kann (from können).

Word order inside the clause:

dass (subordinator)
sie (subject)
Medizin (object)
studieren (infinitive)
kann (conjugated modal verb, final position)

So we get:

…, dass sie Medizin studieren kann.

More examples:

…, dass er heute kommen kann. – that he can come today.
…, weil sie das Buch lesen will. – because she wants to read the book.

In subordinate clauses with a modal + infinitive, the infinitive(s) come before, and the finite verb is last:

…, dass sie hätte Medizin studieren können.

Why do we say Medizin studieren and not Medizin lernen or something else?

In German:

studieren is used mainly for studying a subject at university (being enrolled in that program).
lernen is more general: to learn, to study (for a test), to acquire skills.

So:

Medizin studieren = be a medical student at university.
Medizin lernen sounds unusual; you might learn about medicine, but the standard phrase for doing a medical degree is Medizin studieren.

Other examples:

Sie studiert Jura. – She is studying law.
Er studiert Maschinenbau. – He is studying mechanical engineering.
Ich lerne für die Prüfung. – I’m studying for the exam.

Why is there no article before Medizin? Why not die Medizin studieren?

When you talk about studying a university subject in general, German usually omits the article:

Medizin studieren – study medicine (as a degree)
Informatik studieren, Psychologie studieren, Biologie studieren

Using an article changes the meaning:

die Medizin can mean the medicine as a concrete substance or the field of medicine in a specific sense.
die Medizin studieren is not wrong, but it sounds less idiomatic for “do a degree in medicine”. The neutral, standard phrasing is Medizin studieren.

So the sentence is using the most idiomatic form for “study medicine at university”.

Could I also say …, dass sie Medizin studieren konnte or könnte? What’s the difference from kann?

Yes, but the meaning shifts slightly:

…, dass sie Medizin studieren kann.
- Present tense, real possibility now.
- Her grades are good enough → she is allowed/able to study medicine.
…, dass sie Medizin studieren konnte.
- Simple past.
- Focuses on the past opportunity: her grades were so good that she was able to study medicine (at that time).
- Typical in a narrative about the past.
…, dass sie Medizin studieren könnte.
- Conditional.
- More hypothetical: her grades are so good that she could study medicine (if she wanted to, for example).
- Often implies it’s an option, not necessarily something she will or did do.

The given sentence with kann presents it as a current, real option.

Who does sie refer to here, and how is that different from Sie?

In the sentence:

…, dass sie Medizin studieren kann.

sie is lowercase → 3rd person singular (she) or plural they.
Here it clearly refers back to the woman whose certificate it is.

Because the verb is kann (3rd person singular), sie must be “she” (not “they”):

sie kann = she can
sie können = they can

Sie with capital S is the formal “you”, and it always takes the plural verb form:

Sie können Medizin studieren. – You (formal) can study medicine.

So:

…, dass sie Medizin studieren kann. → that she can study medicine (3rd person singular).
…, dass Sie Medizin studieren können. → that you can study medicine (formal “you”).

Could I say Ihr Abitur war so gut, dass … instead of Ihr Abiturzeugnis war so gut, dass …?

Yes, you can, and many speakers would say Abitur here. The difference is subtle:

Ihr Abitur war so gut, dass …
→ Focuses on her Abitur result/grade overall.
Ihr Abiturzeugnis war so gut, dass …
→ Focus is on the certificate with all the grades being so good.

In everyday conversation, Abitur is very common:

Ihr Abitur war so gut, dass sie Medizin studieren kann.

Using Abiturzeugnis just makes it clear we are talking about the grade report itself, but both are understandable and natural.