Lauren Mitchell
Transforming her education and future turned out to be a priority for Lauren Mitchell from Erskine, and the 20 year old student from Renfrewshire says that it was her positive experience at Reid Kerr College since 2007, that has taken her from a young girl with no appetite for studying to a young woman with a real focus on her career. Four years on, Lauren looks back at her experiences and realises just how much her college education has led her onto a very worthwhile career.
Lauren said, “I came to College at the age of 16 and just didn’t know what I wanted to do. After my 4th year at school I began researching college places and spotted the Introduction to Care course on Reid Kerr’s website. I enrolled the following August and little did I know that this course would be the training that awoke my interest in studying as well as highlighting a future career.
Having completed work experience at Yorkhill Hospital while I was at school, Care seemed like a natural choice for me and as I progressed through Reid Kerr, placements became an integral part of completing my studies every year. After my first year, I enrolled for an NC Child Health & Social Care and I worked at Erskine during this course. A Preparation for Nursing course the next year opened up placement opportunities with an A & E department at a local hospital. My final course, HNC Healthcare which I complete this June, took me to the Larkfield Unit where I worked with elderly patients and I also worked with St. Vincent’s Hospice as part of my course.
It is vital to gain practical experience in this line of work and each stage of my studies provided me with the appropriate placement to help support my classroom learning. I have been able to take learning from the classroom and transfer my skills easily into a working environment. Communication skills have been crucial to the make-up of my training and this has come in many forms including class projects, group working and team building trips to help enhance the study experience. I feel very passionate about education and very positive about how Reid Kerr has helped mature me as a person over the years. I have received amazing support and encouragement along the way and having left school with little in the way of qualifications, I am very proud to be leaving further education having been accepted for a place at University to study a BSc in Adult Nursing.
Maureen Macpherson Head of Health & Social Care at Reid Kerr has worked with Lauren from the beginning and said, “I am extremely proud of Lauren and the commitment she has shown has definitely paid off. We are committed to supporting young people from an early stage in their College career and the Introduction to Care course is a great starting point. It’s very rewarding to see young people progress through further education and to go on to either employment or higher education.
For further information about Health & Care courses at Reid Kerr College, please contact Student Services on 0800 052 7343 or log on to www.reidkerr.ac.uk. You can now follow Reid Kerr on Facebook & Twitter.
