Ella joined Sedbergh in Year 10 is hoping to pursue a career as a psychologist – specifically the way behaviour shapes children as they grow up. She’s done work experience in pre-schools and found that area really interests her. She’s currently studying geography, biology and psychology at A level – but psychology is her favourite.
WHAT IS YOUR DREAM FOR UNIVERSITY?
My dream is to attend Bath university – I went to an open day – but the grades are really high for that; it’s A*, A, A. I’ve also been looking at other universities like York and Warwick – and Durham because that’s its quite close to home. An important factor in my choice of university is that different universities offer different modules that you pick up. For example, Newcastle is quite biologically based, which I don’t mind because I like biology, but I’m more interested in the behaviour of humans rather than the brain and things like that so I ruled that out. Edinburgh is quite maths-y.
Psychology can be a 3 or 4 year course because some unis offer a placement year where you can either go abroad or go into a clinical setting – often the NHS. I’d be quite interested in a placement year but it depends; if I go on to a postgrad course then I wouldn’t do a placement year.
I’m also looking at the place [location] because four years of your life is quite a long time. I want a campus uni, I think because I’m more of a small area person than a big city person.
Have you always wanted to study psychology?
Not always; I didn’t really know it was an option when I was doing my GCSEs. I became aware of the psychology pathway at an A level fair; I listened to previous A level students talk about the subjects. If you didn’t take the subject at GCSE its a bit of risk taking it for A levels because you might not enjoy it, but I have always been interested in how people think. When I first started looking at courses [for university] I was looking at joint honours courses because I thought maybe I’d do more biology, but a lot of the jobs that come out of that are research-based or lab-based and I’d rather work with people.
HOW IS SEDBERGH HELPING YOU WITH YOUR UNIVERSITY APPLICATIONS?
The School has been good at helping me get to Open Days – they organised transportation when I went to Bath. You get two days out of each term to go an visit universities. They’re also very supportive of the whole university application process; they don’t hold your hand… but more, guide you through it. I’ve had informative personal statement talks on what to put in there.
HAVE YOU PURSUED ANY EXTRA-CURRICULAR ACTIVITIES TO DEVELOP YOUR SKILLS?
I do work experience over the summer break and during term-time, as a part of my Duke of Edinburgh, I volunteer to help Year 9s with John Muir. I’m also doing my first presentation for the Burke and Hare Society; its a joint presentation with Millie who wants to study medicine so we’re looking at two sides of depression.
How do you relax during downtime?
I go out with friends – watch the cricket and support my brother. We like to kick a ball around.
WHICH OF SEDBERGH’S HARK VALUES DO YOU MOST IDENTIFY WITH?
Obviously they’re all important, but if I had to go with one, it would be ambition. I think if you don’t have ambition you’re not going to get anywhere. You don’t have to be the smartest one in the room but if you’re not driven to be the best person you can be then you are stuck going nowhere. Some people don’t go to uni but they’re driven and they end up being massive CEOs. Obviously it comes with all of the other things because if you’re not kind no-one is going to like you!