Successful Students Return to Inspire

Five talented students who have recently graduated from Cronton Sixth Form have returned to the classrooms to inspire and encourage current students to plan for their next step to university and their future careers.
Luke Baker, Michael Cooke, Amy Milne, Gareth Maher and Rebekah Hanrey who all achieved fantastic results in their A levels last year came back to college to reveal their success stories to the current Cronton students in the hope to help them with their applications to university. They planned to give them an insight to the types of experience they need in order to achieve their career goals.
Luke progressed onto Newcastle University after graduating from Cronton last summer and he introduced the event by discussing his Biomedical Sciences degree, he also revealed that he has been successful at achieving an interview for a transfer to study medicine. 350 people on his university course have applied for this course and he is one of only ten that have interviews in March. He encouraged the students to make sure that ‘you realise your dreams and never take no for an answer’.
Michael Cooke then spoke about studying medicine at the University of Leeds. He said he made sure he had lots of work experience and attended a course to do the BMAT exam to secure his place at university. He was successful and told all of the students about how he is really enjoying his studies. Amy then echoed the advice about work experience and how vital it was in ensuring she had successful offers for her course. She is now studying a nursing degree at The University of Liverpool and she explained that she did not understand the importance of some of the work experience until she started her university interviews.
Gareth is currently studying a Chemistry Degree at The University of Manchester. He explained that he originally wanted to study medicine but over the course of his A Levels he developed an interest in research for life saving drugs and how that helped he make the next step onto the right course at university.
After receiving her A level results last summer Rebekah was delighted with her fabulous grades of two A* grades and a grade A. She explained to the students that she didn’t want to make any hasty decisions as she was unsure of what she wanted for her future career so she decided to defer her university applications and take a gap year. This time has given her the opportunity to gain work experience in a variety of fields and has helped her to make the decision to apply to study medicine at university.
Muniza Waseem was the final student to address her peers. Muniza is a current second year student at the college but has already received an offer to study dentistry at university in September. She spoke about her experience volunteering at the Liverpool Women’s Hospital and explained that she had been able to answer questions at her university interviews relating to procedures she had observed at the dental practices she attended for work experience.
Jill Greenhalgh, Head of the Tomorrow’s Doctors programme said, “The whole session was of great benefit to the first year students as they look to plan their next steps. The thinking behind the returning student’s strategies was both fascinating and insightful. What a wonderful set of students and we wish them all the best in their future studies!”