My name is Lisa McDonald, 47 and I went back to college at the age of 40 to get back into work in an area that would help me as I have mobility issues. I started doing Office Administration Level 5, but through the year I did a class in events, where a tutor made it interesting, and this changed what I wanted to get out of life and put me on this new path. This led to me working through my Level 6 and completing my HND Events Management in 2020. I failed 2 units in 2019 and felt that I had wasted my time and my lecturers, but I was persuaded to come back and complete them which I passed last year. I am glad that I did or I would not be working in an area that I enjoy right now.
In 2020, I was able to get my first job as an Operational Assistant in 16 years with the Fife Centre of Equalities. Working there I have been involved in many projects such as helping create Diversity Week 2020 online for them where we had artists and interviews from local groups discussing how they had been coping with Covid-19. This led to a project that I never thought I would get involved with which was having a fortnightly podcast further discussing poverty and protected characteristics in Fife.
Working here has also made me also investigate another area, which is research. The skills and confidence that Fife College gave me has helped me immensely as I never would have done anything like this before. I felt that my health issues would hinder me in events and but was shown ways in adapting on how to make it work for me and to also being able to confront my fears at the same time.
I am thankful for Fife College in letting me achieve goals that I felt I would never think I would be able to achieve. I am also grateful to the lecturers, who put up with me for 5 years pushing me to achieve what I did with them and to the Student Association as they helped me see that working within the third sector was an area of interest to me.
If you are interested in events this is a brilliant course to do as it helps you just not with the main areas but also give you skills in areas of work that you may have not considered before. 2020 has shown that people have had to adapt by going virtual for most areas of work life instead of the one-to-one contact we are used to having (hopefully this will be back this year).