Rebecca Green didn’t do well at school after battling with mental health issues and the inability to reach her true potential. At 23 she discovered the OU and the option to do an Open degree, which gave her the freedom to focus on all the things she enjoyed, as well as working towards a qualification and new career. After completing her BSc in 2009, Rebecca found the MA of her dreams and is soon to qualify as a psychotherapist, with hopes to return to the OU for a PhD and a spot of teaching. This is her story…
I have not had an easy relationship with the education system, being a student doesn't come naturally to me. As I progressed through the classes from infant to junior school, I became steadily more withdrawn and confused and found it difficult to make friends. I never did as well as I wanted to, despite most of my teachers predicting good things for me, and became frustrated when everyone around me seemed to be finding it much less of an effort to understand what was going on, when I was constantly perplexed by people and their behaviour.
I tried to go on to college but I couldn't seem to settle on anything. My medication affected my concentration and seemed to make me feel jittery. I changed course from performing arts to law and then to psychology, eventually leaving to work full time. The recurring theme throughout was always never quite living up to my potential, and never being able to find something that I could stick at.
'I changed to working towards gaining an Open degree, which reduced my panic about having to choose one direction for my life'
I counted down until I was old enough so that I could be classed as a mature student, meaning that my missing A Levels and GCSE results would not count against me, and then I registered on an Open University course. I started out with a clear goal in mind – to have the most useful qualification so that I could finally be a sensible grown-up. But every time I got the new course prospectus through the post, I was distracted by all of the things that I could learn about and found it difficult to stick to one thing. Again.
I changed to working towards gaining an Open Degree, which reduced my panic about having to choose one direction for my life when I still didn't feel ready or able to do so. So, for every sensible course I took that would kickstart my career in finance, I treated myself to something more frivolous – whether that was French, religion, or 18th century social history. Throughout this, I received both educational and financial support from the Open University. Due to the way that the OU was funded, I received grants for my course fees, help towards buying a computer and even a place on a summer school in France.
When I graduated in 2009, I was unhappy in my job and facing training for a career that I realised that I no longer wanted. My experience of studying with the OU had opened up my options and made me realise that I didn't have to choose between having a serious career and doing something that I enjoyed.
'I know that I can try and make another child's experience of school a little different'
While looking through a careers website for school and college leavers, I started clicking on links for training as a dance teacher when I noticed an option for something called a Dance Movement Psychotherapist. I had a thunderbolt moment and everything seemed to click into place. I could do something creative and fulfilling, and at the same time satisfy a niggling thought I'd always had in the back of my mind about training in some sort of counselling, to use my own experiences to help others.
Within a couple of months I was registered on an evening course at Roehampton University to see if I was suitable and if it lived up to my expectations. The following year in 2010 I was accepted to train as a Dance Movement Psychotherapist on their three-year Masters degree course. Now when I go in to a school it's as a trainee therapist, and even though it brings back all sorts of memories and at times I'm fighting an urge to run away as far as possible, I know that I can try and make another child's experience of school a little different.
I haven't quite finished with my own education either. I still get the OU course prospectus through every year and there are too many subjects that I want to register for. I'm planning to apply for a PhD in either narrative, discursive and psychosocial research or in counselling and psychotherapy at the Open University's Department of Psychology. I hope one day that I'll even be able to become an Associate Lecturer and change someone else's opinion of education.
Pictured above is Rebecca Green at her OU graduation at the Brighton Dome in 2010.
