OU graduate Linda: My MA is still serving me as a volunteer 20 years later

Posted on 20 August 2025 • Career planning, Charity sector, Volunteering

When Linda Johns studied for a Masters in Education with The Open University 20 years ago, she never expected it would still be serving her at 71 years old.

Linda transferred skills from her earlier studies to a volunteering role at the Wren Project, a UK charity offering listening support to people with autoimmune disease. Below, she tells us how she unexpectedly found a new and rewarding career at 71…

Explore the Wren Project’s current volunteering opportunities. Discover how you can find a range of volunteering opportunities, how they build your skills and confidence, and how to use your volunteering experience in CVs and job applications.

When I studied for my MA with the OU in the early part of the century, I never dreamt it would serve me in good stead over 20 years later. And I certainly wouldn’t have expected to return to the workplace at 71.

Life takes some surprising turns, so when I learned about the charity the Wren Project, it initially seemed like a useful link to pass on to others. The Wren Project offers something unique – listening.

Listening…’just’ listening…

For people of all backgrounds, living with an autoimmune disease is an immense challenge. It can feel literally like a life sentence. While better treatments are in development, for many patients there is a sense of their life shutting down. They often experience great distress, a sense of isolation, and despair at the prospect of being limited in what they can do for the rest of their lives. The Wren Project, which offers online listening support, can be a lifeline.

Wren Project volunteers are trained to listen actively. They come from all ages and backgrounds and don’t need to have any personal experience or knowledge about autoimmune disease. This is where my OU Master’s degree became relevant; during one year of study doing action research in education, I worked with families of children with additional needs, supporting them and their children in making the transfer to a new school at age 11. I learned, through the tuition and self-discipline that the course offered, a crucial and transferable skill. I was able to stop ‘prescribing’ and ‘proscribing’.

It was vital to really listen to those children and their carers, to see how they could adapt to their new situation. Broadening out my ability to truly ‘hear’ resulted in all those young people developing independence. They did the work themselves. And the parents felt seen and heard. Working with the Wren Project as a volunteer – and now a member of staff – has built on this understanding.

To volunteer with the Wren Project is to learn the priceless skill of active listening…it will serve you well whatever you intend to do. And you will help someone else help themselves, just by being there.

The Wren Project offers free listening support to anyone over the age of 18 in the UK. To find out more about how to receive support, or train to become a Listening Volunteer, head to www.wrenproject.org.