Tag: ambition

Two small brown dogs walking on leads in a park

Could do better – and I did!

Author: | 19 Aug 2025

School can be a difficult experience for many people. Our Ambassador Lisa reflects on her schooldays, poor career guidance and how she found a way to focus on what she loves. As she says, if you need a degree, ‘reach for the moon’.

Could do better… sound familiar? My school reports were always full of ‘could do better’ remarks. A useless comment, leaving me wondering just how the hell I was supposed to do better! If I could do better, I would have done better.

School for me was horrible and I really did not want to be there, at all. The only subject I enjoyed was English as you got to read books and I’ve always been quite the bookworm. The rest, though, seemed pointless. Remember trigonometry? If you are standing in a boat and looking up at a 250-metre cliff, what is the angle you are looking up at? If I was ever in a boat looking up at a cliff, I definitely wouldn’t be worrying about the angle. I’d more likely be frantically waving my arms around and screaming for help.

I thought education wasn’t for me

I remember asking the teacher, ‘why do I need to learn this?’ Her answer: ‘It’s in the curriculum’. So, I asked, ‘what job would I need trigonometry for?’ only to be told, ‘stop messing around and get on with your work’.

I despised hockey and gym. Loathed computer science. Couldn’t understand physics… I think you get the picture. I also had a tendency to mess around in class – setting the gas taps in the physics lab alight (without a Bunsen burner attached) or liberating the frogs from the biology lab, or hiding in the suspended ceiling – only to come crashing down in the middle of the lesson.

I left school after my GCSEs, only scraping passes. The careers advisor, back in those days, was useless. When asked what I enjoyed doing, I replied, ‘I love training and being with my dog’. She promptly stated that I ‘couldn’t play with dogs as a job’ and told me to be either a nurse (no way, I hate the sight of blood), a teacher (I hate school!) or work in a bank but I needed to go and do an OND in Business and Finance.

So, off to college I went, obtaining a Merit for my efforts. At the urging of my family, I continued on to do an HND in Business and Finance, this time a Distinction. College life suited me far better than school, with better learning support and continuous assessments through assignments, rather than focusing on exams.

What next after prison?

During my time in prison, I started thinking about what to do upon release, seeing as I couldn’t and didn’t want to return to the job I had. While working full-time as a single mum, I somehow found time to follow my childhood dream and became a qualified dog trainer. On reflecting, I realised how happy I was during moments of teaching at dog training classes. I decided to build on this.

It was, after all, what I should have done all those years after my GCSEs. As a dog trainer, I remembered how people would ask me questions that crossed from training into the realm of dog behaviour. I was also fascinated by the head trainer who ran courses for reactive dogs with real tangible results.

Now I have just passed the second year of my degree in Animal Behaviour and Welfare with the support of the Longford Trust. I am aiming to become a Clinical Animal Behaviourist, helping owners with naughty pets. I’m doing really well, too, with grades that are higher than anything I ever gained in school. The support I’ve received as a mature student going back into learning has been incredible, with tutors on hand to offer academic guidance on how to get to grips with new technologies to help you learn.

The Longford mentoring has been invaluable to me. My mentor Andrew has been able to give me advice and guidance on tackling everything from university study to setting up my business and scaling it to fit in with my studies. I feel that having a mentor means I am accountable to someone which has helped to keep me focused and reaching my goals.

The takeaway from my story is this… if you enjoy something, then the learning becomes easy and enjoyable. So have a think about what you enjoy, and then look what qualifications you need. If you need a degree, then reach for the moon and, even if you fall short, you’ll end up among the stars.

Want to study for a degree but need some financial and mentoring support after leaving prison? Take a look at our Scholarships and Awards page.

Woman smiling at the camera, in a park

A scholar’s rocky road to a fulfilling career

Author: | 22 Jul 2025

Imogen Andrews made a big impact on the audience when she spoke from the stage at the Longford Lecture in 2013 about her love for geology, her degree subject. ‘It rocks’, she said. Later, though, she dropped out of her degree but the support she experienced as a Longford Scholar, she now writes, has contributed to where she has got to in her career, running her own successful fundraising consultancy.

Life doesn’t always follow a planned route. My university journey, made possible by a Longford Trust scholarship, was unexpectedly cut short by a family breakdown that led to homelessness. Suddenly, the academic path I was on vanished. The future I’d imagined felt distant.

However, even amidst this crisis, support arrived from unexpected corners. The immediate crisis of homelessness was addressed by a dedicated charity that stepped in decisively, providing the crucial first month’s rent that enabled me to secure a place to live. Another organisation then provided essential supplies. These were distinct acts of kindness, each playing a vital role in my ability to rebuild.

Working in a gold mine

Before the family breakdown disrupted my studies, the Longford Trust had provided me with extra help to deal with the complex maths that was part of the geology course, via Margaret, an advanced maths teacher who was one of their volunteers.  Then, through my mentor, Luke, I was offered an extraordinary opportunity: work experience with his company in Africa on a gold mine.

This experience was truly transformative. Beyond the fascinating geology, a real-world immersion in the earth’s composition, I learned invaluable lessons about different cultures and myself. It undoubtedly gave me a unique perspective and a real-world edge. My education took an unexpected turn when I discovered first-hand the impressive (and slightly alarming) defensive spray of certain local beetles – a practical lesson in organic chemistry that university hadn’t prepared me for.

But survival then took precedence when I had to leave university. I grabbed the first job available: door-to-door fundraising. It wasn’t what I expected, going house-to-house, talking to strangers. It was a challenging start. But something clicked.

Sharing the support I had received

Connecting with people about a cause, inspiring them to help, felt meaningful. It was a way to give back, channelling the support I had received into benefiting others. I found my stride, moving into other areas of fundraising. I began to excel, consistently surpassing targets and breaking fundraising records.

My connection with the Longford Trust remained a source of incredible moments, both during and after my formal studies, with the annual lectures being a consistent high point. One year, after I had spoken on stage about the scholarship’s impact, I had the truly surreal and awesome experience of Vivienne Westwood calling me magnificent. It was a lifetime highlight, a moment of pure validation from someone so iconic.

Eventually, the skills and experience I gained in fundraising led me to a new ambition. I enjoyed the energy, the challenge, the direct link between my work and positive change. The skills I was developing – communication, resilience, empathy – felt incredibly valuable.

Where life can take you

Five years on, I lead my own fundraising and consulting agency. It’s a reality I couldn’t have envisioned, underscoring how initial opportunities can shape unexpected successes. The Longford Trust’s belief in me, and the experience in Africa, remain invaluable, even though my path diverged from academia. Overcoming homelessness and family breakdown, thanks to crucial early support, revealed an unforeseen strength in fundraising, which has become both my career and a source of genuine purpose. My journey is a testament to how life’s detours can lead to surprisingly fulfilling destinations.