I am probably meant to play it cool on receiving an award such as the Henry Prize, but I am absolutely blown away. When I returned to education four years ago, after a break of nearly thirty years, I could never have imagined receiving such an honour or imagined what lay ahead of me.
Don’t get me wrong, it has not all been plain sailing. I have had my share of lows; painful essay grades; honest feedback; wrapping my head around ANOVA. However, my confidence creeped up when I was introduced to qualitative research in my third year. Working with a band of merry mature students I found my tribe, my passion and hopefully my career path.
That little taster encouraged me to approach Dr Mirjam Brady-Van den Bos to be my thesis supervisor and alongside fellow student Alastair Meek, developed a research project to explore Autistic Students’ experiences. This led me deeper into the realms of qualitative methodology and to the high points of my university career. In my final weeks of study, I studied advanced qualitative research methods under the instruction of Mirjam and alongside some of the greatest humans I have ever met (you know who you are). Our not-so-secret society clustered together to delve into the wonderful world of Phenomenology, Narrative Analysis and stretched our brain with Discourse Analysis.
I count myself as extremely lucky to have studied with the School of Psychology whilst staff such as Dr Jacqui Hutchison and Dr Madge Jackson have championed widening access to university. My success here is testament to their hard work, in not only allowing access but enabling and empowering students to reach their full potential.
Looking to the future, I hope to incorporate my passion for qualitative research into empowering and enabling access for Neurodivergent people to education, health and social care.
Lyn will graduate with an MA in Psychology with Counseling Skills in the summer of 2024.
