WHO ARE THEY?

Precious is currently in year 10. Her parents are from Malawi but she was born in Bradford and goes to school there. If she goes to university as she intends to, she will be the first in her family to do so.

She is ambitious and interested in STEM and Politics and is outgoing. Prior to taking part in Go Higher Presents, she was set to benefit from understanding which types of career can play to her self-identified strength of talking!

THE LEARNER’S EXPERIENCE ON ‘GO HIGHER PRESENTS’

During Go Higher Presents Precious worked with a group of other year 10s to interview a student ambassador from a Black African background about his life and education experience.

“The person that I interviewed, he told us about his experience in the school and his experience as a coloured person.”

She reflected on how the activity worked for her and how she felt positively towards higher education (HE). Her depth of knowledge has grown, including knowing more about terminology.

For Precious, an unexpected outcome was that she felt more confident about her future as a result of meeting someone from a similar background who could give advice. She otherwise gets most of her advice from parents, friends and teachers and appreciated the viewpoint of someone with a similar lived experience that she could relate to.

“I learned more about higher education and how it’s — how it’s seen for— obviously I’m a person of colour myself, like how it’s seen through their eyes… how it’s seen through someone that’s already in higher education, how they’re doing it and it did help in a lot of aspects.”

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

Although she came to the activity already well-informed, with support and advice available, the activity has helped Precious understand more about HE. She already had the intention to study in HE but she now knows more about the reality and practicalities of doing so, including how it feels to be a person of colour in HE and the experience of studying and living away from home.

Like most learners, Precious enjoyed taking on the role of interviewer, which facilitates trusting conversations. Working with role models in this way, and co-creating the podcast, enabled Precious to have agency over important conversations.