Name: Lisa Kay
Course: BA (Hons) Social Studies

I left school at the age of 16 and went straight in to work with no encouragement to pursue any type of further education despite being bright throughout my time in academia. I went on to progress well working in some major companies and in many management roles. Those companies included Severn Trent Water, TUI, Capita, Deutsche Bank and telent technology services.

Both my daughters have had the opportunity to attend university, and whilst my eldest daughter detested it and gave up after 18 months, my youngest daughter is in her third year of a double degree at Aberystwyth in Law and International Politics and loves it.

I started to have health problems in 2017 and as such I’ve had numerous illnesses and surgeries over the last 4 years, leading me to be medically dismissed from work in March 2021. I have a chronic autoimmune disease called Paget's Disease that is incurable. It may eventually lead to loss of sight but I have a positive mental attitude and I'll cross that bridge when it comes !!

My thirst for knowledge has never deterred and rather than sit and wallow I applied and successfully completed an Introduction to Counselling Course with the Centre for Lifelong Learning at Warwick University earlier this year.

With the knowledge I would have to give up working on a full-time basis I finally had time for me, I have no experience of higher education and thought that I would need to complete an A Level prior to even thinking about university. Finding out that there was a Gateway to Higher Education course that could potentially allow me to fulfil my dream of higher education, it meant that instead of seeing my medical condition as a negative, I could turn it around and see it as a positive. I am 50 years old, and once I complete my degree, I will be 54. If I didn't have a go, I'd still be 54 in three years' time.

I applied to do the Gateway course as one of my counselling course attendees was doing it at the time and raved about how much she loved it and how the teaching was such that you didn't feel like you were learning. I had an interview with Steve Gascoigne and was accepted on to the course. Seeing how I could write and reference an essay after only a few weeks of 2 hour sessions on line blows my mind even now. Steve is one of the best teachers I have ever known, his style of teaching, his personality, his enthusiasm for the subject oozes out of every single session. I absolutely loved it. My results at the end of the Gateway course equated to a First and two 2:1's which meant I was able to enrol for the full time course. I'm now on week 9 and I am so so happy. I've made lifelong friends, we chivvy each other on, we laugh together, we panic together and it feels more like a family than a study group.

Completion of the Social Studies degree is not for me to pursue a different career, it is purely for me to be able to finally fulfil my dream, and the content of the degree speaks to me more than I thought it would. My age is standing me in good stead as my life experience allows me a much broader mindset than it would had I been able to complete it in my earlier years.

I knew I could. And I did.