I left school as soon as I could. I hated it. I hated being talked at, I hated the smell, and I hated the teachers who made me feel stupid. I wasn’t, I was dyslexic, but nobody knew back then. So school wasn’t a happy place, so learning wasn’t a happy thing either.
So I left and did the kind of jobs you do when you don’t have many qualifications. It was only through a love of music that I found my way to the local community radio station. That’s where, very nervously and with a lot of encouragement, I took my first steps back into education, through community education.
In those little back rooms in a community centre in one of the poorest parts of Scotland, I found something I never had before, people who believed in me. Tutors who encouraged, cajoled, and told me I could do it, even when I didn’t believe it myself. Slowly, my idea of learning started to change and so did my idea of myself. I realised I wasn’t stupid because I couldn’t spell, and my handwriting looked like spiders running in ink. I was dyslexic. I wasn’t slow, I just had to find value in the skills I already had and learn how to learn again.
With their support, I built confidence and found confidence in my abilities. I went from stacking shelves to lecturing at a university in five years, not because I was a genius, but because people believed in me until I could finally believe in myself.
Now, thanks to my role as Training Manager at CASPr, I get to be that person for someone else, the person I needed. I know what it’s like to walk into a room full of doubt, wondering if you belong there. So I love seeing our learners gain confidence in new skills and see them realise the value of the skills they already have.
Community education changed my life and gave me the life I have now and that’s why I love it.
Lynn Simpson