'This is the best thing I have ever done.' Mature student, Anna Clark, shares her story
In October 2014, on the off chance, I called into my local university and it just so happened there was an open day on. I spoke to a lovely man who reassured me that if I wanted to enrol, I could, despite having two young children. I remember him telling me: ‘it won’t be easy, but you can do it, because I did.’ That year I chickened out. It was so easy to keep everything the same and not embrace the change. I consoled myself that the young man had a wife at home who could look after his children, but I regretted my decision, and so, the next year I went to the open day again. I found out as much as I could and applied to UCAS. I remember thinking that it was challenging to apply because I had been a stay-at-home mum for seven years and had no confidence. UCAS made the application simple and you could save it and go back, which I did many times. I was delighted to receive an offer and accepted it straightaway. This was just the start of my journey.
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