Part-time Schooling:

When I think back to my experience of part-time schooling, I wish I’d identified what was difficult about full-time schooling and asked for the help I needed sooner. I struggled through so much of it when I really didn’t need to, there was help available and systems in place to support me!

I struggled with my mental health for a lot of my time in school, but it wasn’t until this peaked during my final year of A Levels that I asked for help. I ended up missing a lot of Sixth-form and wasn’t in any state to sit final exams, either mentally or in terms of the work I’d done. I spoke to my tutor, who was also my French teacher so she knew that I’d missed a lot of content, and told her that I needed to split my final year of A Levels over two years in order to look after my mental health. When I asked for this, I didn’t even know if it was possible. It turned out that this was possible, and there were already a handful of students doing this for a variety of reasons. I sat just one final exam that year, and dropped the rest of my subjects, taking them up again the next year and sitting those exams.

I had to withdraw the application I’d made to university, but it was well worth it. Doing my A-Levels part time gave me the space I needed to work on my mental health, until it was something I could manage on my own alongside the pressures of education. I was a year behind my peers and many of my friends left before I did, but I made other friends and at the end of the day, it was only a year, and was worth it for the difference it made to my emotional strength and well-being.

My tutor helped me apply to university again the following year with an “Extenuating Circumstances” form, which explained why I had taken three years rather than two to sit my A Levels. These forms essentially exist either to explain reasons why a student hasn’t met their academic potential, or to highlight that a student has succeeded in spite of facing barriers, whatever these may be! For me, it mitigated the (unfounded!) worries I had about universities seeing me differently because of my part-time schooling and my disability.

When I eventually did go to university, I was of course still mentally ill (I still am 3 years later!), but I was better rested and better prepared for the pressures on my time and energy that university would pose. There is the option for me to study part time at university as well, but for now, I am doing it full time. It is reassuring to know that this option is there if I need it again, though!