Tag: GCSEs

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.

Why a university education has been a win-win for me

Author: | 19 Apr 2023

David is a psychology student at an East of England university. He left school with no qualifications and has had to work hard to get on the course, and stay on it, but now having passed the half-way point he feels, he writes, that he finally has a voice.

It wasn’t easy going into higher education when I left prison. I had got no GCSEs at school and had been in and out of prison most of my life, working on building sites in-between sentences. Then one day I decided I no longer wanted to plaster walls for a living. I wanted to go to university.

I started by attending night school to make good that lack of GCSEs.  That was hard work. The classroom and academia were all new to me. Yet somehow I have made it happen. Going forward, the support I have been given by family, friends, and the Longford Trust has been incredible. I look back and realise that there are so many talented people locked in prison cells who aren’t even aware they can start out on this journey of improving themselves.

Looking afresh at the world

What I want to say to them in this blog is that this path I have taken has already demonstrated to me many of the benefits of a degree. It has, for a start, completely changed my outlook on society. Education has been a win-win for me, helping me to better understand the world around me, and equipping me to make better decisions.

I chose to study psychology because I wanted to make a difference in the lives of others. What I have found out is that what we know about the human psyche is quite dated and poorly understood. Yet the human mind is so fascinating, it is surprising that as a species we know so little about it.

More motivation than intellect

My motivation, to be clear, far out weighs my intellect, but one of the benefits of prison life is that it made me a resilient and resourceful human being. That and the fact that I actually want to learn and better myself as I have had enough of repeating old patterns. So, I focus on the day in hand and get the task done.

When I finally get this degree, and can throw my hat in the air like all the other students, I will feel so proud of myself. And I hope in a small way I will be a living example, not only to others who have walked the same path as me into prison, but more importantly to my children who have witnessed my lifelong struggles with addiction and crime.

Now I can hold my own

Coming from a marginalised background it was like I never had a voice. All I ever had were middle-class barristers, solicitors, probation officers and drug and social workers talking at me. But now I feel I can hold my own. My vocabulary has broadened so I can articulate what it is I need to say. Yet, as I regularly tell myself, “I have not come this far just to come this far”.

If you feel inspired by David’s story to find out about going to university, contact Clare Lewis, the Longford Trust’s scholarship manager, or write to her at Freepost, Longford Trust. You don’t need to put a stamp on it.

I was scared of taking on a degree

Author: | 8 Jan 2023

For Longford Blog, Simon, from our latest intake of scholars, reflects on his journey from arriving in jail and dismissing the idea of a degree because ‘all I had was GCSEs’, to overcoming his fears, beginning studying, and continuing on release from prison. If I can do it, he urges others, so can you…

Adjusting to being in prison at the start of my sentence was extremely hard. I needed a release to keep my mind focused. This is when I discovered training in the gym. It was my escape and kept me mentally and physically strong through tough times.

I was also thinking about how to improve myself so as to leave prison physically and mentally stronger. One day an Open University team came in to give a talk. From the first moment they spoke, I knew this was the path to go down. My biggest problem was what subject to study?  I asked family and friends for advice and decided sport, fitness and coaching.

Taking a leap of faith

I was scared. At no point in my life had I ever thought I was capable of studying at degree level. I’d done GCSEs but nothing more. A friend on my wing who I would train with in the gym reassured me. ‘You enjoy training and sport. You can spend many more months thinking about what you want to do and if you are capable. Or you can take a leap of faith, study a subject you enjoy and give 100% to it.’

That was the day I sent in my application. I wanted prove to my family that I could be a better man and achieve great things. To show them my dedication to studying was a way of  showing them and myself that the future could be better.

At the start of my studies I found it extremely hard to keep up with deadlines and find the time to study in the prison environment. As time went on, though, it became more natural. I began going to the prison library and borrowed all the books I could find on academic writing to try and learn. Soon I was achieving marks of between 70-80 per cent for all my modules. Access to computers and study material was really hard, but this was something I was doing for my future so I made sure I did all I could on my own, to reach my targets

Happy with the man I am today

Over the course of my sentence, I believe I have matured immensely, and feel happy with the man I am today. I put it down to maintaining a strict routine with exercise and studying. Without these, I don’t know how I would have reached the end.

When Covid came around, studying and prison life became very hard. We were all locked behind our doors for 23 and a half hours a day. I used the time to study extra hard and dedicated eight hours each day to reading and writing and an hour a day to learning a new language (Mandarin) to fill the time. I also wrote in-cell workout programmes and nutrition plans for other inmates to ensure we were all keeping active.

Fast forward to 2021 and I was transferred to an open prison which was great because I had more freedom and better facilities to focus on my studies and plan for my future. On day-release on several occasions my family travelled up and I was able to spend quality time with them.

My transition from prison back into the community has so far been a smooth process due to careful planning and a wide range of support. Not long before being released I made my application to the Longford Trust and was granted a scholarship. This involved a financial grant, a laptop to study with, and a mentor. Now I am continuing on the outside with the final year of my degree with the security of the trust’s support.

My mentor is amazing

My Longford Trust mentor is amazing. He will sit with me and go through my work, help me to understand areas where I could improve. He is also there for emotional support should I need it during these challenging times.

If I could give any advice to other prison leavers, it would be to be realistic in your future plans. Locked behind a door can give you a false view of the world and what to expect. Use all resources and support as best you can because life outside of prison is a huge transition.

Find out more about our Longford Scholarships and Frank Awards. You could soon be walking in Simon’s educational footsteps!