Courtney Williams

Completed 2 years in adult nursing at Staffordshire University in 2013, worked until 2015 and became poorly so was unable to continue to work. I had a daughter and stayed at home until she started school.

My home town!

Whilst on the social work course the support I had from lecturers was incredible! The course itself was insightful and it encouraged me to develop my skills in communication, problem solving and organization. The lived experiences from the members of Outside In provided us insight into people's lives who have had social work support, waiting on social work support, or have their own life struggles and each have their own stories to tell. This allowed me to become curious in my questions and ask how social workers can improve their support for these individuals to make their lives a little easier and brighter. During the degree I often found myself questioning why I was completing such modules and how they would support me in practice. Since qualifying and being in practice it suddenly all became relevant to my role as a social worker for older people. I am able to now put the skills and knowledge into practice and also understand the theories behind them.

The atmosphere was quiet during our first year due to the pandemic, I found this a great way to settle and reducing the risk of feeling overwhelmed. During our second and third year the atmosphere was great, I really liked the campus being full of students and people enjoying their breaks/dinner in the gardens, canteen and cafes. I liked bumping into others in the corridor and finding out how they were doing, whether overwhelmed with assignments or happy they have just had results back they were proud of, we could all relate and it was a great opportunity to share!

I enjoyed the support from peers and lecturers the most on the social work course.

The support was great on the social work course, if I was unsure of anything lecturers and peers would always be available to support. We were able to take advantage of tutorials and even grab a quick chat with lecturers on the corridors or after a lecture. The assignment briefs and outcomes were explained and spoken about, this gave us support before even starting an assignment. I truly felt like the lecturers wanted us to do well, this was a great feeling. The encouragement and positive reassurance was second nature from the lecturers!!

I believe because the university was on my door step and I had a young daughter, this enabled me to still be a 'mum' but also be the typical 'student'. I had the best of both worlds, this I believe is how I completed the degree. My mum and my siblings completed degrees at the University from when it was NEWI then Glyndwr and now me as Wrexham University!

Yes 100% undertake a course at Wrexham University, the support is great, the food is wonderful and the campus is bright, clean and open!! There are plenty of quiet places to study and open places to work in teams or catch up with peers!